American Pinkerton Biography

Allan Pinkerton was born 1n 1819 in Glasgow Scotland. Pinkerton immigrated to the US in 1842 and settled in Chicago Ill. He opened a barrel making shop just outside of Chicago. Pinkerton was an avid fan of Abraham Lincoln. Like Lincoln he was an abolitionist. He used his small shop as part of an underground railroad for assisting slaves who were moving north for freedom. His first adventure in detective work was a mere coincidence. While Pinkerton was gathering wood for his shop he discovered counterfeiters who were making fake coins in the local area. Because of his assistance in arresting the counterfeiters, he was appointed Deputy Sheriff of Kane County and soon became Chicago’s first full time detective. Pinkerton would only serve
the area as Deputy Sheriff for eight years. In 1850 he began his own detective agency, Pinkerton National Detective Agency. Pinkerton spent most of his time pursuing robbers and counterfeiters. In 20 years Pinkerton’s agency assembled the world’s largest data base of mug shots. The term private-eye that to this day is the term assigned to most private investigators was coined from the famous Pinkerton logo, “All-Seeing Eye. Pinkerton’s interest and common goals brought him close to President Lincoln.
In 1862 Pinkerton, while investigating another criminal case, uncovered an assassination plot that was designed to murder Lincoln in Baltimore Maryland during a layover on his trip to be inaugurated as President of the US. Pinkerton was able to sufficiently warn Lincoln to change his plans to avoid the attempt on his life. Probably as gratitude, Lincoln hired Pinkerton to organize and establish the secret service. The goals of the early secret service were to gather military information in the southern states during the civil war., and later after the war they pursued counterfeiters. Kate Warne and Timothy Webster were two of the best spies employed by Pinkerton. During his time in the secret service he travel and operated under the fake name of Major E.J. Allen. Today’s secret service still exists and still serves at the president’s whim. Their main purpose now is protecting the President of the US and investigation and preventing crimes against the President and the government of the US. Pinkerton’s agency accumulated evidence in 1869 that broke up the Molly
Maguires.
. In 1862 President Lincoln fired George McClellan and his cabinet demanded that Pinkerton be removed from service. They claimed his war service was not productive enough. Pinkerton left Washington area in 1862 and spent the last years of the war chasing and investigating those who sought to profit from the war. Pinkerton once revealed that his biggest disappointment was that he was not in charge of protecting President Lincoln on April 14, 1865. One of the darker and sinister sides of Pinkerton’s Agency was their initiative as strike breakers.
They were responsible for many violent clashes with union activist and members. It was Pinkerton’s sons Robert A. Pinkerton and William A. Pinkerton who, after Allan Pinkerton’s death, became active in labor union issues. They were responsible for breaking the famous Homestead Strike of 1892. They were hired as management labor spies in many companies

References

Allan Pinkerton Facts, Encyclopedia of World Biography. Copyright 2010 The Gale Group, Inc. accessed online Jan 9, 1014 at: http://biography.yourdictionary.com/allan-pinkerton

Allan Pinkerton, The Columbian Electronic Encyclopedia, 6th Edition, 2012 Accessed Online Jan 8, 2014 at: http://www.infoplease.com/encyclopedia/people/pinkerton-allan.html#ixzz2qE51prRX

Lincolns Spy That Never Slept. Bummer, Dec, 9, 2012. Accessed online at: http://www.civilwarbummer.com/lincolns-spy-that-never-slept-detective-allan-pinkerton/

America’s Story, The Library of Congress 2014 Accessed on line Jan 8, 2014 at:
www.americaslibrary.gov/jb/nation/jb_nation_pinkerto_1.html