MAY 6: THE FIRST DAY OF FULL CONFLICT
The Return to Second and Master
The tension left behind on May 3 did not dissipate. It accumulated. Over the weekend, Nativist organizers announced that their disrupted meeting had only been postponed. On Monday afternoon, they called their supporters back to the same ground: the schoolyard at Second and Master Streets, beside the Master Street School and within sight of the Washington Market, the place Philadelphians called the Nanny Goat Market.
By early afternoon, the crowd filling the yard and surrounding streets had swelled into the thousands. Some accounts say three thousand. Others estimate four.
Whatever the exact number, it was far larger than the first gathering, and unmistakably charged.
It was a varied assembly: determined party members, journeymen and apprentices, bystanders drawn by curiosity, and Irish residents wary of renewed provocation. A noticeable number of men carried weapons. A makeshift stage was raised against the school fence. From it, Samuel R. Kramer resumed the speech interrupted on Friday, joined by Col. Peter Sken Smith, a militia figure and temperance lecturer. Nearby waited Lewis Levin, the party’s most powerful orator, ready to address the largest audience the Nativists had yet brought to the district.
John O’Neill and Escalating Tension
During these opening moments, John O’Neill, an Irish carter known locally, drove a wagon directly into the thick of the gathering. Sources differ on the load he carried. Some say dirt, others manure. All agree that he dumped it near the platform, within ten feet of the speakers. The crowd erupted in shouts, but only briefly. O’Neill walked away without injury. Whatever spark was struck did not yet ignite the fuse. That role would fall to the weather.
A Sudden Storm and a Single Shelter
Shortly after 3 p.m., a sudden downpour fell so sharply that the speeches halted mid-sentence. Levin had barely begun with the words “Fellow citizens, we have reached an important crisis” when the rain broke over the yard. Thousands pushed toward the nearest covered structure: the long, low, enclosed shed of the Nanny Goat Market.
A Public Ledger reporter described the chaos as people surged from the yard into the narrow space: “Hallooing and shouting,” he wrote, and “everyone in the street seemed to be either running or fighting.” Inside the market house, where Irish vendors worked daily, friction erupted immediately. One worker was heard snarling to his companions: “Keep the damned natives out of the market house. This ground don’t belong to them. This is ours.”
The market, already cramped, now held a volatile mass of bodies pressed shoulder to shoulder.
A Confrontation in the Nanny Goat Marker
The first violent clash began between Nativist David Fields and an Irishman named McLaughlin. Irish resident John Donnelly yelled, “You old rascal, knock him down.” Then the accounts diverge. Some witnesses claimed the first muzzle flash came from an Irish defender. Others insisted a Nativist fired into the air. A third group reported that John Finletter, a young Nativist, drew two pistols and fired, hitting Patrick Fisher in the face.
A Ledger reporter exclaimed, “My God, they have got firearms,” signaling what all present immediately understood: this was no longer a confrontation of fists and stones. Philadelphia had crossed into something new. Gunfire inside the crowded market house sent people crashing back into the streets.
The Streets Become a Battlefield
Outside, the Nativists found themselves exposed in the open streets. The Irish were not. Their defensive positions formed a rough semicircle around the market:
• Cadwalader Street, lined with Irish homes that offered elevated windows.
• The Hibernia Hose House, a volunteer fire company whose upper floor gave a clear firing vantage.
• Harmony Court, a narrow weaver’s lane where John Paul had supplied muskets earlier that day.
From these positions, Irish defenders — including Patrick Lafferty, David Funk, Robert Quillan, John Daley, Francis Small, and Terrence Mullin — fired from windows, doors, and rooftops. One Nativist later described them as “secure and invisible,” while his own side stood “in the open,” with no cover from the incoming fire.
The Death of George Shiffler
The pivotal moment came at Germantown Road and Master Street, where a group of Nativists came under a concentrated volley. George Shiffler, an eighteen or nineteen year old apprentice cordwainer, was struck in the chest by buckshot. He died immediately. He was the first confirmed fatality of the Kensington Riots. Later retellings claimed he died holding a flag. Contemporary accounts consistently report only that the flag had been dirtied in the storm, not carried by Shiffler at the moment of his death. Nearby, Joseph Cox was also shot in the hip. He survived the day but died of his wounds on May 22.
Shock, Reinforcement, and Retaliation
Shiffler’s death jolted the Nativist crowd. Peter Albright, a retired tavernkeeper and former militia captain, carried the young man’s body out of the line of fire, his hands covered in blood. He immediately left for his home in Northern Liberties, gathered roughly eighteen armed acquaintances, and returned to Kensington with muskets. With this new firepower, the Nativists surged up Cadwalader Street, no longer focusing on the market house but on specific homes believed to be firing points. They attacked:
• Patrick Lafferty’s house
• John Lavary’s house
• Edward Develin’s house
• And several others associated with Irish sharpshooters
Irish defenders pushed back, chasing some of the Nativists toward Master Street. In this exchange, the homes of John Lafferty and Widow Brady were damaged.
Law Arrives, But Too Late to Calm the Neighborhood
Around 5 p.m., Sheriff Morton McMichael arrived with deputies. Their presence created a temporary lull, though it did not restore order. Nearby stood General George Cadwalader, commander of the First Brigade of the Pennsylvania Militia. He declined to deploy troops without explicit authorization, citing Pennsylvania law that could hold soldiers personally liable for deaths or injuries inflicted during a riot. This legal uncertainty kept the militia inactive at a moment when neither sheriff nor police had the means to fully control the situation.
Evening Turns Toward the Seminary
As light faded, Nativist groups reassembled along Second Street. Their anger, no longer concentrated on the firefights around Cadwalader Street, turned toward Catholic institutions. A shout rose above the crowd: “Go to the nunnery.” The group moved toward the Sisters of Charity Seminary at Second and Phoenix (now Thompson) Streets. Inside was Sister Mary Baker, a caretaker, along with two young girls. She opened the door, pleading for calm. A brick struck her in the head, and she fell unconscious. The three escaped through the garden as the mob attempted to set the surrounding fence alight. A volley of gunfire suddenly cracked across the street, fired not from the seminary but from Irish defensive positions near St. Michael’s Church, including Joseph Corr’s Temperance Grocery. Two young men fell:
• William Wright, killed instantly with a shot to the head
• Nathan D. Ramsay, mortally wounded by a bullet to the breastbone
The Night Belongs to Disorder
Around 10 p.m., another crowd gathered at Franklin and Second Streets, smashing windows and forcing their way into Irish homes as they moved toward the market area. Many Irish residents had already fled. Only those organized around the Nanny Goat Market and St. Michael’s maintained defensive positions. Throughout the night, sporadic gunfire echoed across the district. Irish defenders massed around St. Michael’s Church, prepared to defend it “at the hazard of their lives,” though no full assault came before dawn.
The Day’s Toll
By midnight, the first full day of the riots had ended.
Nativists killed:
• George Shiffler
• William Wright
Fatally wounded:
• Nathan D. Ramsay
• Joseph Cox
Additional wounded:
• At least eleven Nativists
• Several Irish injured by misfiring weapons
• No confirmed Irish fatalities on this calendar day
The use of firearms at this scale was unprecedented. In the words of one account, “guns had been used by rioters to a greater extent than ever before.”
The Irish had held their defensive ground. The Nativists left with martyrs.
And both sides understood that the violence begun on May 6 would not end on May 6.