During the late nineteenth century, the Pinkertons were also hired as guards in coal, iron, and lumber disputes in Illinois, Michigan, New York, Pennsylvania, and West Virginia.

Tensions between the workers and strikebreakers erupted into violence which led to the deaths of three Pinkerton agents and nine steelworkers. During the Homestead Strike of 1892, Pinkerton agents were called in to reinforce the strikebreaking measures of industrialist Henry Clay Frick, who was acting on behalf of Andrew Carnegie, the head of Carnegie Steel. During the labor strikes of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, businesses hired the Pinkerton Agency to infiltrate unions, supply guards, keep strikers and suspected unionists out of factories, and recruit goon squads to intimidate workers. įollowing the Civil War, the Pinkertons began conducting operations against organized labor. At the height of their power, the Pinkerton Detective Agency was the largest private law enforcement organization in the world. The Pinkerton National Detective Agency hired women and minorities from its founding, a practice uncommon at the time, as they were useful as spies. Lincoln later hired Pinkerton agents to conduct espionage against the Confederacy and act as his personal security during the Civil War. Pinkerton became famous when he claimed to have foiled a plot to assassinate president-elect Abraham Lincoln in 1861.

Pinkerton, founded as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, is a private security guard and detective agency established in the United States by Scotsman Allan Pinkerton in the 1850s and currently a subsidiary of Securitas AB. Security management, risk management consulting, investigations, employment screening, protective services, security, crisis management, intelligence services

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