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Push gangs in Australia.

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So, it should come as no surprise
that gangs have existed in Australia
since the colonial era when the first
colonists comprising mostly male
convicts were dragged off the ships
of the First Fleet in chains.

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Since then, gangs in Australia have
evolved through time with cultural
change and extensive immigration
leading to gangs with a wide range of
different ethnic origins, behaviour,
and activities, often criminal.

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The earliest gangs in Australian
colonial history were chain gangs,
large groups of convicts chained
together with ankle irons or chains,
weighing as much as five kilograms or
more, forced to carry out
backbreaking hard labour for the
colony. Although, these gangs were
clearly not through voluntary
association.

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If you see farms with extensive rock
walls acting as fences for paddocks,
they may just have been constructed
more than 150 years ago by the sweat
and blood of convicts in such chain
gangs.

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By the 1860s the convict era was
coming to a close and the last
British-born convicts were getting
dropped off in Australia's colonies
and finding themselves mixing with
several generations of native-born
European Australians. These
native-born Aussies were already
developing their own sense of
identity and referred to themselves
as 'currency lads' and 'lasses' in
contrast with the British born
'Sterling lads' and 'lasses'.

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In the final decades of the 19th
century these rambunctious and
restless Aussie youths, mostly men,
though, occasionally women, started
becoming known as 'larrikins' or
'larrikinesses', and began to gather
in 'pushes' or 'push gangs'. The word
'push' had entered Australian English
via 'Flash language', a vast
vocabulary of slang developed by
criminals in the streets of London
and imported to Australia on the
first convicts ships. 'Flash
language' was used by criminals to
talk about specific topics, which
they wished their victims or the
police would remain ignorant of.

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'Push' originally meant 'crowd of
people', but which was adapted to
later just mean 'a group of the
larrikins or troublesome youths'.

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In his book The Australian language
Sidney J. Baker describes the
attributes of a larrikin.

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He had a number of recognisable
features, however, generally he was
young between the ages of 15 and 25,
he was a city dweller, he dressed
with extravagant precision, he
extracted comfort from being a member
of a gang, he was alleged to have too
much money and too lack of parental
control, he looked upon refinement in
social conduct as a form of weakness,
he spoke a weird jargon which it
seemed only his own kind could
understand, he was given to spasms of
violence. In short, he was
exceedingly like modern Australian
louts.

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Naturally, the larrikin showed
contempt for authority and fought the
police wherever arrests were
attempted, and as such, many areas in
Melbourne in Sydney were regarded as
unsafe for the general populace and
downright dangerous if you happen to
be wearing a police uniform.

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Like many gangs today, the push gangs
of the late 19th century were based
on localised identities, so gangs
formed based on which suburb or even
street corner they came from. In
Melbourne, you might find the Crunchy
Push from North Melbourne, the Salt
Lake Bruisers from Montague, or the
Heart and Arrow Push from Footscray.
And in Sydney, you might come across
the likes of the Rocks Push from the
Rocks area of Sydney, The Forty
Thieves from Surry Hills, and the
Gibbs Street Mob.

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However, the door wasn't open for
just anyone to join any push even if
they lived locally. In some pushes
would-be members had to apply in
writing and pay ten shillings
entrance fee. After six months'
probation, they were allowed to sign
the 'push' or 'crime book', and
thereafter, they paid six pence a
week to remain members.

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The leader of the push was its 'king'
or 'captain', and one such push king
was a bloke named Larry Foley. We'll
get to him in a bit.

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Over the years as these localised
identities solidified they became
more violent, more identified with
industrial locales, and more easily
drawn into an adult life of crime in
the minds of the police.

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Larrikins of the 1880s had their own
unique style of dress often
including: a broad rim black hat, a
short black coat with as many pockets
and braids as possible, and
bell-bottom trousers, tight at the
top and flared at the base. Each
larrikin wore high-heeled boots with
pointy toes beneath the trouser
flares. The boots were shod with
brass tips for maximum sound effect
while walking the pavement, and
larrikin who worked in local boot
factories might even decide to pimp
their own footwear out sewing small
mirrors or photos of their
girlfriends into them.

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The larrikin's colour of choice was
black. The only other colour in their
attire being a bright scarf and
occasionally some coloured tassels
dangling from the back of their
jackets.

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Larrikinesses also had their own
unique fashion styles. One of the
popular larrikiness looks included: a
straw hat with large plumes of
ostrich feathers, a plush velvet
jacket, and long-laced boots to the
knee with short skirts to show off
the length of the boots. They also
often carried short parasols a
popular accessory which doubled as a
club during a melee.

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In his book 'An Outback Marriage'
famous Australian poet and writer
Banjo Patterson describes a group of
tourists who go to visit the Rocks
Push and paints the following picture
of the appearance of the gang
members:.

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Wiry hard faced little fellows for
the most part with scarcely a
sizeable man amongst them. They were
all clothed in push evening dress,
black bell-bottomed pants, no waist
coat, very short black paget coat,
white shirt with no collar, and a
gaudy neckerchief around the bare
throat. Their boots were marvels,
very high in the heel, and picked out
with all sorts of colours down the
sides.

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Larrikins even had their own style of
music too described by some as an
energetic upbeat polka and by others
as similar to an Irish jig. The
lyrics of their songs remained a
mystery to many outsiders who said
they were made up of unintelligible
slang.

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Fears of larrikinism stemmed from the
British-born Australians who were
uncertain about the morality of
colonial youth, native-born currency
lads and lasses who brimmed with
excessive self-assurance for lower
class unskilled workers.

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As the colonies boomed during the
1870s and 1880s in Melbourne, for
example, members of the lower class
who worked as labourers in
Collingwood or as leather workers in
West Melbourne were able to earn
relatively higher wages, thus
escaping the constant surveillance
that went with an apprenticeship or
domestic service. This led to a
swelling of nonchalance and bravado
among so-called larrikins. These
well-paid and subsequently
well-dressed workers found themselves
free to roam the streets and run amok
rather than desperate brutal thugs
trapped in long term poverty.

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Despite the increase in the lower
class's prosperity, some pushes
developed a frightening propensity
for violence. Constables roaming the
streets on their own were hesitant to
chase members of push gangs into
impoverished lanes in their
territory.

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In Collingwood, Melbourne, pushes
from various corners of the suburb
would gather every Friday and
Saturday night and run amok, throwing
flour and ochre at the Salvation
Army, or chucking rocks at statues in
hopes of breaking off the noses, they
pestered local shopkeepers, they got
into fights with each other and on
occasion with the cops.

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Despite these going-ons in Melbourne,
if the larrikin had a birth place, it
was certainly Sydney Rocks at Dawes
Point in New South Wales. Again, from
his book The Australian language
Sidney J. Barker wrote that:.

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This was a place where slang and
vulgarity were mixed in lavish
quantities. Where harlots and riff
raff,  ex convicts and the scum of
all the oceans collected. Here in the
Rocks was born the Australian hoodlum
as tough and vicious and as
well-versed in unconventional ways of
speech as any person in the world.

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And this leads to the rise of Larry
Foley who boxed his way to the top
and became king of the Rocks Push.

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From the 1870s to the 1890s, the
Rock's Push was a notorious larrikin
gang that dominated the Rocks area of
Sydney. In their heyday, they were
simply known as The Push.

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One of many different push gangs in
Sydney, The Push was made up of
mostly bored larrikin and
larrikinesses who worked as unskilled
labourers by day and supplemented
their income with petty criminal
activities by night. They were
incredibly violent, not only whilst
engaged in warfare with other
larrikin gangs from surrounding
suburbs, but also towards sailors,
police, and civilians, pretty much
anyone who crossed their paths. And
they carried out petty crimes such as
theft, assault, and battery willy
nilly.

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More often than not their victims
would be poor unfortunate drunk men,
and upon being seduced by a beautiful
female member of the push, was led
down a dark alley. The unsuspecting
victim would look up to see the woman
had vanished and a group of young
strikingly dressed men with bad
intentions had appeared in her place.

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In order to become the leader of The
Push, referred to as their 'captain'
or 'king', you had to fight your way
to the top through victory in the
bare-knuckle boxing ring. Enter
Lawrence 'Larry' Foley, a champion
pugilist, or 'pug', for short who
used his fists of steel to climb to
the top of Sydney's most feared push
gang.

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Larry was born on the 12th of
December in 1849 near Bathurst. He
was baptized on the 2nd of May in
1852 at Penrith and as a lad seemed
destined for a career in the clergy.
At the age of 14, he moved to
Wollongong and became a servant to
Father D. O'Connell, the first
Australian born diocesan priest.

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However, Larry decided entering the
priesthood wasn't on the cards for
him. And at 18 years of age he moved
to Sydney where he became a building
labourer. As with many young lads who
suddenly found themselves in a big
city, Larry quickly surrounded
himself with other young men and
eventually fell into the ranks of one
of the many larrikin gangs that
roamed and fought each other in the
inner suburbs of Sydney.

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Many of the push gangs at the time
were distinguished along religious
grounds pitting Catholics against
Protestants. Sydney was also where
Larry took an interest in
bare-knuckle boxing and honed his
skills under teaching from retired
former bare-knuckle boxer champion
John 'Black' Perry a Canadian negro
who had come to Sydney in the 1840s.

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He used his newfound skills to great
effect and within a short period of
time Larry was the captain of the
'Green' push a group of Irish
Catholic larrikins. His first notable
boxing victory was on the 18th of
March in 1871 against a man named
Sandy Ross the leader of the 'Orange'
push, a Protestant group and enemy of
the Greens.

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According to one account, the fight
lasted 71 rounds and over two hours
before the cops finally intervened.
To declare the winner, the men later
met up again at Port Hacking where
Larry knocked Ross out after a
gruelling 28-minute fight. With
Larry's victory, the Greens assumed
leadership of the rocks push gangs
and became The Push.

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Larry split his time between running
the push and fighting. At the time,
boxing matches were illegal in
Australia in large part because of
the gambling rather than it being a
violent sport in and of itself.
However, Larry earned a small fortune
through fights alongside the
admiration of the public who came in
droves to view the illicit sport.

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Larry managed to win or draw every
single one of his bouts, and the
pinnacle of his boxing career came in
1879 in a bout against Abe Hicken.
Originally, slated to be held in
Melbourne, the bout was moved to
Echuca in order to avoid police
attention. A special train brought
700 spectators from Melbourne to
Echuca where they were then ferried
across the Murray River into New
South Wales to attend the fight.

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After 16 punishing rounds, Hickens
corner threw in the towel, actually a
sponge at the time, and Foley took
home 1000 pounds in winnings, a small
fortune that would amass to about
$100,000 or more in today's money.

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This event would also leave its mark
on Australian English when the
expression 'as happy as Larry' was
coined, meaning 'extremely happy'.
The papers reported that the punters
who backed him, and subsequently won
money too, were as happy as he was
with the win.

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Larry retired from the ring the same
year and later bought the White House
Hotel on George Street in which he
set up a boxing gym and staged bouts.

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In 1883, he momentarily came out of
retirement to fight the English born
'Professor' William Miller. This time
after 40 rounds Larry was on the
verge of literally being pounded into
the canvas. His fans weren't going to
have it, though, and they rushed the
ring stopping the fight.

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Although occasionally threatening to
stage a rematch of the bout between
himself and Ross, the fight never
took place and the ultimate outcome
will never be known.

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In later years, Larry's gang
activities took second place as he
embraced the career of a publican and
boxing trainer. And as the 19th
century came to a close, The Rocks'
push gangs had all but been broken up
as the police cracked down on unruly
larrikin behaviour.

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Ultimately, Larry left the trappings
of the push larrikin lifestyle behind
him and slid into a much more
comfortable and respectable life as a
businessman. He became the official
demolition contractor for the NSW
Government and was even considered
for a job as the sergeant-of-arms in
Parliament.

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Whilst visiting a Turkish bath in
1917 he suffered a heart attack and
died a few days later, and he was
survived by a son and two daughters
from his first marriage, and by three
sons and two other daughters from his
second wife, and left behind a
wealthy estate of over 11,500 pounds.

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The story of larrikinism, push gangs,
and Larry Foley gives us a detailed
look into the lives of early
Australians. The nation's population
was swelling at the time both from
the creation of newer generations of
currency lads and lasses, as well as
through immigration, many of whom
were British-born Sterling migrants.

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It was a time where young men and
women born in the countryside started
moving back to large cities in search
of unskilled work as labourers and
factory workers. As strangers in a
new place, these young larrikins and
larrikinesses became friends and
naturally formed groups that evolved
into push gangs. Their identity and
relationships were likely reinforced
by class conflict and discrimination
from both new and old Australians who
still considered themselves British
at heart with a disdain for anyone
who had even a hint of convict blood
in their veins.

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In these times, violence could be
used as much as a tool for control
and fear as well as a means to ascend
through the ranks of society as
encapsulated in the story and life of
Larry Foley. He started life out as a
schoolmaster's son from the country
and he climbed through the societal
ranks of larrikin, push king and
bare-knuckle boxing champion, and
ended his days as a wealthy and
respected Sydney businessman.

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So, next time you hear someone say
that they're 'as happy as Larry' or
call a young Aussie bloke a bit of 'a
larrikin', remember Larry Foley and
the young Aussie larrikin and
larrikinesses from the late 1800s and
early 1900s where these terms were
born.

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So, I hope you enjoyed this episode,
guys. I would love feedback from you.
Obviously, I'm trying something a
little different. I'm trying to work
on my writing skills and really
introduce you to a lot more about
Australian culture and history as
well, so that I can obviously give
you much more detail much more
information, and, you know, it's kind
of fun doing the reading in the
research myself as well.

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But yeah, please let me know if you
enjoy these. I'm trying to include
some of the more advanced English in
there. Obviously, this isn't always
how native speakers would speak to
one another, because this is, you
know, written English, but hopefully
it's a good source for you to find a
lot of different vocabulary and words
and slang, as well as educate
yourself on Australian history and
culture.

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Anyway I'm Pete. This is Aussie
English. It's been a pleasure talking
to you. I hope you enjoy the episode.
I look forward to your feedback and
I'll chat to you soon. See ya!