He was known for his brutal boxing style: "He was well known as being a notoriously dirty fighter, not averse to biting off noses, gouging out eyeballs, or beating a man to jelly.

These gangs were composed of nativist White Anglo-Saxon Protestants who were opposed to enfranchisement of the growing number of Irish Catholic refugees from the Great Famine.

William Poole detested the Democratic Party's local political machine, Tammany Hall, because they accepted and included immigrants as members.

Tammany Hall-affiliated street gangs also protected Irish Catholics from Poole's Bowery Boys, whom he sent to terrorize immigrants and keep them from registering to vote.

Poole and the Bowery Boys were a de facto extension of the Know Nothings, a nativist and militantly anti-Catholic political party.

[3] The goal was to organize native White Anglo-Saxon Protestants to defend and preserve their religion and control of American politics from enfranchised Catholics, immigrants and their descendants.

We learn that at an early hour yesterday morning, two noted pugilists entered Florence's Hotel, corner of Broadway and Howard street, and without any provocation seized the bar-keeper and beat his face to a jelly.

It appears that Thomas Hyer, William Poole, and several others entered the above hotel, and while one of the party held Charles Owens (the bar-keeper) by the hair of his head, another of the gang beat him in the face to such an extent that his left eye was completely ruined and the flesh of his cheek mangled in the most shocking manner.

The desperadoes then left the house, and in the meantime Mr. Owens was placed under medical attendance, and in the course of a short time he proceeded to the Jefferson Market Police, in company with Mr. Florence, where they made their affidavits respecting the inhuman outrage, upon which Justice Blakeley issued his warrants for Hyer, Poole, and such of the others who were concerned in the affair, and the same were placed in the hands of officer Baldwin for service.

Since the above was written we have been reliably informed that the affray originated from the fact of the barkeeper having refused them drinks, after they had been furnished with them twice in succession.Poole's arch rival John Morrissey was an Irish immigrant and worked for the political machine at Tammany Hall.

Broadway, in the vicinity of Prince and Houston Streets, was the scene of an exciting shooting affair about 1 o'clock yesterday morning, which is but a repetition of a similar occurrence that transpired a few weeks ago under Wallack's Theatre between Tom Hyer, Lewis Baker, Jim Turner and several other noted pugilists... View Full Article at WikisourceSeveral days after the shooting, on March 8, 1855, Poole died in his home on Christopher Street at the age of 33.

The war between Poole and Morrissey had been very public and The New York Times covered the events of Stanwix Hall almost every day for a month.

Lewis Baker fled New York City, with the help of Daniel Kerrigan, a twenty-four year old 1853 Democratic nominee for councilman.

"[10] Facing an international manhunt organized by Poole's patrons in the Know Nothing Party, Baker boarded the Jewett and sailed for the Canary Islands.

[3] Daniel Day-Lewis played a heavily fictionalized version of Bill the Butcher, renamed William Cutting, in the 2002 Martin Scorsese film Gangs of New York.