Herbert Asbury Quotes

The basic creed of the gangster, and for that matter of any other type of criminal, is that whatever a man has is his only so long as he can keep it, and that the one who takes it away from him has not done anything wrong, but has merely demonstrated his smartness.

Until the Civil War there was scarcely a man in public life in New Orleans or Louisiana who had not fought at least one duel; most of them had engaged in several.

You pay your money and you takes your choice.

Brave men don't fight for nothing, like children.' protested Howell's (Major Joe Howell) friend. 'We want to know what we are fighting about. If we are wrong we may apologize.

A freelance gangster and thief” (as Herbert Asbury describes him in his classic work The Gangs of New York), Hicks embarked on his criminal career at the age