Jacob Hays

Jacob Hays (1772–1849), known as "Old Hays", was the high constable of New York City from 1802 until shortly before his death, serving for nearly half a century as the city's leading law enforcement officer before the creation of the New York City Police Department in 1845. His portrait is the first in the NYPD's series of portraits of its chiefs.

Early life

Hays was born in 1772 in Bedford, in Westchester County, the eldest son of the merchant David Hays and his wife Esther. He grew up in a family of Jewish shopkeepers in rural Westchester with little formal education. His grandfather, also named Jacob Hays, had come to New York from Holland and worked as a ritual slaughterer for Congregation Shearith Israel.

According to family tradition, during the British raid on Bedford in July 1779, the seven-year-old Jacob was among a party of boys who drove cattle through the British lines to the American army.

High constable

Before 1845, policing in New York was the responsibility of constables, two elected for each ward, and a high constable appointed by the mayor, who had no greater formal authority than the others. Many constables neglected the job or used it to collect bribes. Hays rose to constable of the Fifth Ward, and in 1802 Mayor Edward Livingston appointed him high constable. He drew no base salary in the post.

Hays held the office until about a year before his death. He was credited with professionalizing the role, and his long experience made him the dominant figure in the city's law enforcement; he kept personal indexes of criminals, now held by the Museum of the City of New York. He was known as "the terror of rascals of every grade," and parents warned misbehaving children that "Old Hays will get you!" In 1828 a citizens' watch in White Plains named itself the Jacob Hays Club. The city's Common Council commissioned his portrait, which hung in the Governor's Room of City Hall.

Personal life

Hays converted to Christianity from Judaism upon marriage. He married Catherine Conroy and, after her death in 1812, Mary Post; he had eleven children. He died in 1849 and is buried in the Marble Cemetery in Manhattan's East Village.

His grandson became known as a painter of animals. Later descendants include the novelist John Dos Passos and the newspaper publisher A. G. Sulzberger.

Legacy

Hays was largely forgotten after his death. Herbert Asbury profiled him in The New Yorker in 1932, and he appears as the narrator-detective of Joel Rose's historical novel The Blackest Bird (2007). Renewed interest followed research by Patrick Bringley, whose graduate thesis at Hunter College examined Hays's career.