Johnny Spanish, whose real name was John Weyer, was one of the most feared mobsters of the early 20th century. He took the name Johnny Spanish because he was half Jewish and half Spanish, but on his part Spanish he claimed descent from Butcher Weyer, the last governor of Cuba. So he thought that Johnny Spanish had a lot more cachet than just John Weyer.

Spanish was born on the Lower East Side of Manhattan and quickly became immersed in various street crimes. The short, frail and moody Spaniard was a loner whose specialty was robbing cantinas. However, he liked to add the twist of sending a message first to the owner of the salon, informing them of his imminent arrival. The legend of him grew immensely when he performed that feat in a dive on Norfolk Street owned by Mersher the Strong Arm. Spanish advised Mersher that he would arrive at a certain time, and he did, armed with his usual four cannons and an achievement lurking behind him. He fired a couple shots through the mirror behind the bar, then emptied the register. Then, to add insult to injury, he lined 10 customers up against the wall and took all their cash and jewelry. Spanish’s notoriety grew, and he was soon accepted into Paul Kelly’s Five Points Gang, where he continued his antics.

The Spanish found it profitable to steal the winnings from the highly lucrative gambling suss, which was a variation on the popular faro. He had his eye on one such game, operated by Kid Jigger on Forsyth Street. One day he approached Jigger, who was known to be a fierce gunslinger, and demanded half of the game winnings from him, from then on.

“And why should I give you half of my stuss graft?” Jigger asked.

“Because I’ll kill you if you don’t,” said Spanish.

Jigger laughed. Spanish took offense and said, “Okay, I’ll drop you off tomorrow night.”

Sure enough, being a man of his word, the next night, as Jigger was coming out of his suss game on Forsyth Street, Spanish opened fire with two pistols. Jigger ran back into the building to safety, but the bullets hit an eight-year-old girl playing innocently in the streets and killed her instantly. This necessary Spaniard left town for several months, and when he returned, he was alarmed to discover that his girlfriend (who happened to be pregnant by who knows who) had been stolen by fellow thug Kid Dropper, real name Nathan Kaplan. . Spanish thought he would make up with his ex-girlfriend first. He grabbed her off the streets, threw her in a cab and headed for the swamps of Maspeth, Long Island. There he tied her to a tree, then emptied five shots into her pregnant belly. He left her there for her to die, but miraculously the woman survived and her baby was later born with three fingers missing.

For this atrocity, Spanish was arrested and sentenced to seven years in Sing Sing prison. Upon his release in 1917, Paul Kelly’s Five Points Gang was no more, and Spanish thought he might take over Kelly’s former rackets. Only Kid Dropper had the same idea. The two old enemies fought over the union protection scam for more than two years. One day, in early 1919, the bulky Dropper cornered the Spaniard in the street and dismembered him badly with a knife. The Spanish survived, but not for long.

On July 29, 1919, Spanish was entering a restaurant at 19 Second Avenue, when Dropper and two realizations opened fire, hitting Spanish several times in the chest. Bullets being better than swords, Spanish died a few days later at Bellevue Hospital.