"Happy Jack" Mulraney (1825-1862) was a policeman of the New York Municipal Police Department and a former member of the Dead Rabbits. He later became an associate of the Natives gang of William Cutting, and he was murdered by Dead Rabbits leader Amsterdam Vallon in 1862.
Biography[]
Happy Jack in 1846
John Mulraney was born in 1825 in Ireland, but he later immigrated to the United States. He joined the Dead Rabbits gang of Irish immigrants to protect his people from the hostile Natives of William Cutting and self-proclaimed patriots, and he fought alongside Priest Vallon, being called "Uncle Jack" by his son Amsterdam Vallon. However, in 1846 a battle over the Five Points left Cutting victorious, and Mulraney left the outlawed Dead Rabbits.
Police career[]
Happy Jack on display
After the defeat of the Dead Rabbits, Mulraney became a member of the police force, being corrupt and taking a cut of loot stolen by common thieves as a bribe. He was in Cutting's pocket, and Cutting reminded him that he was the man who enforced the law in the Five Points, not Mulraney and the cops. In 1862, Cutting dispatched him to catch Amsterdam Vallon after he decided to revive the Dead Rabbits gang, and Mulraney chased him from the catacombs into a church. Mulraney tried to lure Vallon out, but Amsterdam outmaneuvered him and garrotted him to death. Mulraney's body was then hung in the square on a makeshift cross, warning Cutting and signifying the rise of the Dead Rabbits. When William M. Tweed asked Cutting if politicians were going to be murdered next, Cutting told him, "I could spare have a dozen of you easier than I could spare him."