Female members of the Push would entice drunks and seamen into dark areas to be murdered or assaulted and robbed by the gang.
Larry Foley, later to be regarded as the 'Father of Australian Boxing', was the leader of a Roman Catholic larrikin gang known as the Greens.
A poem called The Bastard from the Bush, attributed to Henry Lawson, and a sanitised published version, The Captain of the Push,[3] describe in vivid and colourful language a meeting between a Push leader and a "stranger from the bush": Would you dong a bloody copper if you caught the cunt alone, Would you stoush a swell or Chinkee, split his garret with a stone?
[4] Another contemporary poet, Banjo Paterson, describes a group of tourists who go to visit the Rocks Push, and paints the following picture of the appearance of the gang members: 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 waistcoat, very short black paget coat, white shirt with no collar, and a gaudy neckerchief round the bare throat.
In the early hours of the morning (around 00:00-04:00), Push members would employ a prostitute from one of the bars on Harrington Street to bed a young sailor, then move towards the canal for an intimate moment.
The Push members' dress was not intimidating, but they were to keep a razor blade in the band of their hat, and attached to the toe of their shoe.
Further information about similar events is provided in the famous Rocks Ghost tours, as a majority of related stories are passed down from generations.