The Pinkerton Detective Agency | "We Never Sleep" | 1

American History Tellers

Wondery

Society & Culture, Kids & Family, History, Education For Kids

4.7 • 18.3K Ratings

🗓️ 8 May 2024

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In the early 1850s, Scottish immigrant Allan Pinkerton stumbled upon a counterfeiting operation while gathering wood for his barrel-making business. After helping the authorities arrest the criminals, he was inspired to form a detective agency, to chase bank robbers and train bandits. His business grew quickly and in 1861 he was enlisted to prevent an attempted assassination of President Lincoln.

The Pinkerton Detective Agency soon established itself as America’s most innovative and aggressive private police force, spying for the Union during the Civil War, and sending agents out to hunt the nation’s most notorious Wild West outlaws.

Pre-order your copy of the new American History Tellers book, The Hidden History of the White House, for behind-the-scenes stories of some of the most dramatic events in American history—set right inside the house where it happened.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Wunderry Plus subscribers can binge new seasons of American history tellers early and
0:05.1	ad free right now. Join Wundery Plus in the Wundery app or on Apple Podcasts. Imagine it's February 15th, 1861. You're an undercover Pinkerton agent posing as a stockbroker from Georgia, and you're being escorted into a dark and smoky
0:33.7	Baltimore barn. They're here to meet the leader of a secret group of pro-slavery
0:38.4	rebels aligned with the newly formed Confederacy. You're investigating rumors that they're plotting to kill the President Abraham Lincoln.
0:46.7	A stone-faced man leads you by the arm through the crowded bar and into a quieter backroom
0:51.6	parlor. Sitting at a scuff table is the leader of the group,
0:55.2	Cypriano Ferandini, a slight balding man with an enormous mustache. After immigrating
1:01.2	from Corsica, he opened a barber shop here in Baltimore.
1:04.8	He also took up the Confederate cause, and his shop became a gathering place for fellow secessionists.
1:10.7	Seeing you approach, he nods for you to sit.
1:13.0	Can we get you something? A whiskey perhaps.
1:15.0	Yeah, that'd be nice, thanks.
1:17.0	You take a seat as a bartender pours you a drink.
1:21.0	Farandini stares at you with piercing eyes.
1:23.4	So our friend here tells me you're one of us.
1:25.9	Do nod and raise your glass.
1:28.3	I think it's admirable what you and your men are doing.
1:30.7	Yours is a noble cause.
1:32.4	It's more than noble. The future of the country's at stake, this is life and death.
1:37.0	Well agreed, may I ask what are you planning to do about the new president?
1:41.0	The man who helped set up this meeting has assured you that
1:44.3	Farandini thinks you're a secessionist and a friend of the South. You know his group is
	...

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