Queen of the Burglars: The Scandalous Life of Sophie Lyons

by Shayne Davidson

Born in the mid-nineteenth century, Sophie Lyons was a master thief, con artist, blackmailer and smuggler. Much of her success as a criminal was due to the fact that she was fearless, reckless, sharp and cunning--everything a woman of her time was not supposed to be. As a young child, Sophie's parents forced her to steal when she showed a talent for pickpocketing. Strong-willed and smart, she blossomed into a beautiful teenager who caught the eye of many men in the underworld of New York City. By the time Sophie reached her late teens she was married to her second husband--a notorious bank burglar named Ned Lyons--and was a professional criminal in her own right. Despite her prominent place in crime history, Sophie Lyons has never been the subject of a full-length biography. This book chronicles Sophie's fascinating and tragic life, from her beginnings as a criminal prodigy, through her ingenious escape from Sing Sing prison and her lifelong struggle with mental illness.

226 pages, Paperback

Published August 14, 2020

About the author

My interest in tracing ne’re-do-wells goes back to my grandfather’s family tree. He was famously tight-lipped about his family, but he did let slip one intriguing detail: He claimed that his uncles, August (known as “Gussie”) and Willie, died in six inches of water.

The implication was that they both were so drunk they fell into a puddle of water, couldn’t get up and drowned. As a kid I thought it was a funny story.

As an adult I came to realize the story is heartbreaking and it was no wonder my grandfather didn’t want to dwell on his family history. By then he was long gone but I had become quite interested in genealogy. I wanted to know if there was any truth to the story, so I began to research my grandfather’s family tree.

It turned out that the story probably wasn’t true or at least it couldn’t be proven. Gussie died at age 67 of “creeping paralysis” from an illness that was likely related to lead poisoning — he’d been a house painter all his life. However his wife died of liver cirrhosis when she was only 38, so drinking to excess may have been a lifestyle choice in their household.

The other uncle, Willie, was alive and well in June 1910, when he was counted for the federal census, but he was dead by mid-September 1910. He left behind a wife and four small children. No death record has ever come to light for him. His granddaughter heard a story that his body was unidentified and was buried where it was found. Then somehow he was identified, dug up and reburied in the same family plot where his brother would join him 23 years later. The story has a lot of holes, but it could be related to the “drowned in six inches of water” story. At any rate there’s a mystery about his death and I’ve never been able to solve it.

I also discovered that Gussie had served a term at Leavenworth in the late 1880s, when it was still a military prison. He had gone AWOL from the army. Eventually he was caught, court-martialed, tried, found guilty and sent to prison for three years. (He was lucky there was no war on at the time. If there had been he might have faced a firing squad). I searched for a photo but there was no mugshot of him because Leavenworth was not photographing prisoners when Gussie was incarcerated there.

My search for a prisoner photo of Gussie led to my interest in vintage mugshots. I began to collect them and research the people in them. There’s always a story behind a mugshot if you’re willing to dig to find it.

My book newest book, Queen of the Burglars, is a biography of Sophie Lyons.

Reviews

[Stefanie Robinson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sophie Lyons was born in Germany in 1848. As a child, her mother taught Sophie to pickpocket and steal. Sophie upped her game, becoming a career criminal, known for pickpocketing, shoplifting, and being a confidence woman. A confidence woman was a term I had never heard before this book, so if you are unfamiliar, it basically means a good actress that is a scam artist. Her life of crime was interesting, but her life after "retiring" from crime was equally interesting. This book is available currently on Audible Plus, but is expiring soon. I listened to it during the second half of my shift at work today.

[Elizabeth Gauffreau · Rating 5 out of 5]

This will probably sound silly, but my immediate reaction to Shayne Davidson’s biography of 19th-century pickpocket extraordinaire Sophie Lyons was excitement over the citations. Every fact had a superscripted number with a corresponding endnote!!

In all seriousness, though, those citations represent Davidson’s extensive research into the life of Sophie Lyons and meticulous attention to documentation of sources. This is history scholarship you can trust.

At the same time, the writing is very engaging. I would go so far as to say conversational, which made for a smooth and enjoyable read. I also appreciated the interior layout of the book with plenty of bolded headings to keep the complexities of Sophie’s life and times from getting confusing.

Sophie Lyons was born in 1848 in Bavaria. She emigrated to the United States at the age of eight. Although she would claim in her 1913 autobiography that “crime does not pay,” when she died of a cerebral hemorrhage in 1924, she left a substantial estate behind.

The following quotation from the introduction of Queen of the Burglars will give readers interested in picking up the book a good sense of what is in store:

“[Sophie] robbed banks, married bank robbers, seduced wealthy men (then blackmailed them), escaped from Sing Sing Prison, ran with a gang of thieves in New York, and committed crimes on two continents.”

Each chapter of Queen of the Burglars starts with an epigraph from Lyons’ autobiography, Why Crime Does Not Pay. I just found several full-text copies of Why Crime Does Not Pay on Internet Archive. I plan to read Sophie’s book; however, forewarned by Davidson’s scholarship, I plan to read it as a work of fiction.

[Jim Potter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Exceptional Book about an Intriguing Woman
Time Magazine recently listed the 100 best books of 2020. However, they made a glaring error.
Queen of the Burglars: The Scandalous Life of Sophie Lyons, by Shayne Davidson, belongs at the top of any worthy publication list. It’s an outstanding book, only possible after an incredible amount of top-notch, meticulous, historical research.
As a bonus, Author Davidson includes rogue’s gallery photographs of Sophie Lyons and other 19th-20th century career criminals. The photos enhance the exceptional story of an intriguing woman.
If you like history, especially if you’ve been wondering where the women went, you’ll love this book.
--Jim Potter, author of Taking Back the Bullet: Trajectories of Self-Discovery

[Sean Kottke · Rating 4 out of 5]

Someone should option this for a Netflix series

[Wayne Webb · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating characters but it felt like a decline and fall from the very start. While she died rich, the mental illnesses and tragic relationships grow very weary on the reader (this one anyway) and I just felt tired and sorry for Sophie by the end. Ground down to a numb, agitated and deluded end, like much of her life to that point.

Also for the Queen of the Burglars, she got caught an awful lot?