Gangs

GANGS

GlescaPal stories from our past

Gangs Neds standing at the street corners and gang fights
               Running at each other with blades, slashing faces and kicking lumps out each other.
               We spent many an evening (1960s), hinging oot oor two-storey windae, cushion on the ledge,
               watching these mindless morons chase each other up and down Baltic Street.

Spur ya bass...aye ah met a few o' they bampots wan night.
Ah wis never a member o'a gang, the nearest ah got tae gangs wis watchin them frae ma bedroom two storey windae, knockin' lumps oot each other! Ma gang wis the BB...sure & stedfast!
In the sixties my Fairbairn St BB, the 175th amalgamated wi the Church Hoose BB and wi changed oor number tae the 154th. We then used tae meet in Barrowfield School a nightmare walk for us Fairbairn St guys fur the Spur didnae like us! And unlike todays kids who get taken everywhere in Dad's car we had nae cars...we jist walked.
One dark Friday night walking hame fae the BB, ah wis stoaped and surrounded by four eejits oot the spur gang.
"Who ur ye! an where dae ye stey!" asked wan o'them. Ah couldnae tell them they would have killed me!
He then pulled oot an open razor, the kind the barbers used,ah wiz sh****n massel'..and held it against ma face!
"Ah wiz at the BB in Barrowfield school ahm no in any gang" ah yelped! They looked at me and told tae f' off...nearly scarred fur life fur nothing! Ma memories are these neds in the gangs were bampots! Terrorising neighbourhoods and destroying lives

Glasgow Evening Times 17 June 1931 'The spear of a swordfish and a wicked looking Gurkha knife were among the number of weapons taken possession by the police following an alleged gang fight in Kerr Street, Bridgeton, yesterday afternoon.
The 'battlefield' was strewn with weapons after the fight......a piece of copper tubing....a brass poker .....a cudgel two foot long with a knob of wood as thick as the head of a drumstick...a wooden baton....an axe weighing one and a half pounds....a steel file 2ft long....a bayonet type knife.....
and an iron rod three 3ft long with a hook at each end.'
Glasgow Daily Record 17 Dec.1930 'The leader of the Billy Boys, John R----, age 22, known as razor king, was sent to prison for 18 months at the High Court yesterday for assault & causing serious injury....
Glasgow Evening Times 14 Mar.1930 letters page 'Sir, it is depressing nowadays to take up ones paper and read the daily catalogue of assaults and murders with knives, razors and other lethal weapons. Indeed razor slashing and stabbing are becoming so common that they appear to be accepted as part of our modern youth's recreation etc, etc
Glasgow Sunday Mail 12 Feb.1935 'During the past ten years, in Glasgow alone, Gangsterdom has been responsible for at least four slayings and serious injury and maiming of many others who have incurred the savage wrath of the different cliques of young hooligans who terrorise the poorer districts of the city

Extract from messageboard, 31st Dec.2002, Charlie McDonald, Glasgow
Webmaster...please understand that my posting was not an attempt to glorify or praise some of these so called 'hard men ' who were members of gangs. I was just trying to recall names of various gangs and where they were located in Bridgeton. Some might say that we in Bridgeton still have the biggest gang in the world...well if you tune into the fitba' every week you'll always hear 50,000 nutters at Ibrox singing the praises of the Bridgeton Derry Boys!! Makes you wonder where they all live in Bridgeton when you consider that they all claim to be part of that one particular gang from the east end. They must all live in the railway tunnels down in the wee Bully!!

Extract from messageboard, June 2003, Betty Murphy, New Zealand
"...when I lived in Govan my friend and I were going to the steamie, all of a sudden these two guys ran across the road, and they hit one of 2 guys who were walking along , the guy fell down and when his mate took his arm to help him up the other one slashed him straight down his face, the first hit was with an short handled axe. I'll tell you we couldn't do our washing that day. anyway just thought to say when you hear the stories YES it was not all good times back then, and good on Wull the webmaister for adding it to the website"

Graffiti and gang slogans sprayed on the tenement walls.....Spur ya bass, Ferryland, Young Toi, The Nunny,
Billy Boys, Baltic Fleet, Tongs ya bass