Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish American Gangster

Paddy Whacked: The Untold Story of the Irish American Gangster
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Manufacturer: Harper Paperbacks
Average Customer Rating: Average rating of 4.5/5Average rating of 4.5/5Average rating of 4.5/5Average rating of 4.5/5Average rating of 4.5/5

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Binding: Paperback
Dewey Decimal Number: 364
EAN: 9780060590031
ISBN: 0060590033
Label: Harper Paperbacks
Manufacturer: Harper Paperbacks
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 480
Publication Date: 2006-03-01
Publisher: Harper Paperbacks
Release Date: 2006-02-21
Studio: Harper Paperbacks
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Editorial Reviews:

Here is the shocking true saga of the Irish American mob. In Paddy Whacked, bestselling author and organized crime expert T. J. English brings to life nearly two centuries of Irish American gangsterism, which spawned such unforgettable characters as Mike "King Mike" McDonald, Chicago's subterranean godfather; Big Bill Dwyer, New York's most notorious rumrunner during Prohibition; Mickey Featherstone, troubled Vietnam vet turned Westies gang leader; and James "Whitey" Bulger, the ruthless and untouchable Southie legend. Stretching from the earliest New York and New Orleans street wars through decades of bootlegging scams, union strikes, gang wars, and FBI investigations, Paddy Whacked is a riveting tour de force that restores the Irish American gangster to his rightful preeminent place in our criminal history -- and penetrates to the heart of the American experience.
Spotlight customer reviews:
Customer Rating: Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5
Summary: Well Written
Comment: I found this to be an extremely well-written book chronicling the Irish mob from the later part of the 1800's to the present day. Some of the historical facts were astounding, leading me to research on my own even further. I also found the history of the mob from the early 1900's to be exciting, giving me a sense of the brutality of the era that erased the movie bred image I had in my mind. It is hard to fathom such an intense life those men and women must have led. Thanks to TJ English I got a chance to catch a glimpse.
Customer Rating: Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5Average rating of 4/5
Summary: Excellent book, except for a few mistakes and ommissions.
Comment: This is a great book for the most part. It details how the Irish Mob pioneered the way in which organized crime would be run in America, a system which was then copied blatantly by the Mafia.

The book also details the many wars that broke out between the Irish Mob and the Mafia and how in most cases the Irish used superior cunning, ruthlessness and violence to defeat the Mafia and Black Hand for many years. Finally a combination of assimilation into mainsteram society by the Irish, and the superior organization and numbers of the Italian Mafia allowed them to replace the Irish Mob as the premiere organized crime syndicate in America.

It also details how in a few areas, the Irish continued to control certain territories particularly in NY, Chicago, Boston and Philadelphia. It discusses groups like the Irish Mob in Boston and the nototrious Westies in NY, who continued to run vast crime rackets up untill the 80's and 90's. The Westies and Whitey Bulger's "Winter Hill Gang" were so lethal and feared, that even during the 60's, 70's and 80's, the Italian Mafia didn't interfere with there buisness or infringe on their turf.

The only place where the book faulters is the recycled and laughable theory that the Mafia killed John F Kennedy. This theory has been disproven by any number of well known and highly respected scholars, many of whom are convinced that there was indeed a conspiracy to kill JFK. However most scholars believe that any conspiracy involved the CIA and other much higher level government forces, and that the Mafia played a passive role, if any role at all. The Mafia as English points out in his book, would not even allow their members to kill police, prosecutors or politicians on a local level, so the idea that they would authorize a hit on the most powerful political figure in the country is quite frankly, ridiculous. It also fails to account for the fact that the Mafia, even with all their power, never wielded enough to kill the President of the United States. They couldn't and wouldn't even attempt to kill mafia procecutors in NY.

Other then that the book is a great histroy of the oldest, most fierce and most succesfull criminal group in American history...The Irish Mob.

PS. It seems odd that Mr. English would do such a detailed review of Irish Organized crime and yet not mention the fact that the North Side Gang in Chicago saw a major resurgence under the "Cavanaugh" family beginning in the late 1940's. Several books have been written about the fact that from 1950-2007 the North Side Gang in Chicago has killed scores of Chicago Mafiosi and now controls a vast swath of criminal rackets on the Niorth Side and throughout Chicago. I find it strange that Mr. English doesn't mention that in his book.


Customer Rating: Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5
Summary: Not Quite the Last Word on Irish Gangsters
Comment: While a pioneering effort on the fascinating topic of Irish-American organized crime, I was somewhat disappointed with Paddy Whacked, considering the acclaim this book has received. The general background of Irish gangsters and the problems faced by Irish immigrants seem very well researched but the effort falls way short when you get down to specifics. Bugs Moran (born Adelard Cunin) was not actually Irish but the son of French-Canadian immigrants and his North Side mob, composed of mostly Germans and Poles, could hardly be considered an Irish gang. The century-long rivalry betwen Irish and Italian gangsters appears overblown here, as an almost continuous conspiratorial intrigue rather than the simple melting pot dynamics of gradually assimilating successive immigrant cultures. Where is the evidence for Owney Madden (English-born but of Irish ancestry) being forced by the emerging Italian-Jewish syndicate to turn on his Irish brethren? The supposed alliance of Vincent "Mad Dog" Coll and Jack "Legs" Diamond probably owes more to newspaper speculation than anything else and English's theory that it constituted a possible Irish combine to challenge the Mafia falls flat when one realizes that most of Coll's gang were Italians and that Diamond's mob was also ethnically mixed. And it's really a stretch connecting Joe Kennedy's early bootlegging involvement to the JFK assassination which may or may not have been a Mob hit. I also have problems with the fictional dialogue sometimes employed in this book. Paddy Whacked is an ambitious effort but still leaves a lot to be desired and falls far short of being the definitive study of Irish-American organized crime.
Customer Rating: Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5Average rating of 5/5
Summary: Introduction to the Irish
Comment: This was the first book I read that focused primarily outside of Italian and Jewish organized crime. This is the book that you want to read as an introduction. I personally took an interest in the chapters on Danny Greene and James Bulger and began to read deeper into them. I cannot say how excellent this book is and I recommend it to anyone who is remotely interested. The best thing about this book, is that you don't need to know much about Irish gangsters to read it. It is broken into short stories and once you take a liking to a particular era or gangster, you can read up on them. Definite good buy!
Customer Rating: Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5Average rating of 3/5
Summary: Extravagent
Comment: I think this was exciting story but it was too long. You would have to read too much to find out too little about a character. I mean it was cool to find out all of the illegal activities going on in the Irish Mob but it was to little information spread out threw many pages which takes me days to read.
The reason I choose this book was for a school project but it turned out I got some pretty interesting information about the Irish Mob from this book. The author goes to much into detail about unimportant people rather then the important roles in the story. This book is pretty violent and I wouldn't recommend it to nonviolent law abiding citizens.

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