Buckley's Serenaders was an American

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 blackface

Blackface

Blackface is a form of theatrical makeup used in minstrel shows, and later vaudeville, in which performers create a stereotyped caricature of a black person. The practice gained popularity during the 19th century and contributed to the proliferation of stereotypes such as the "happy-go-lucky darky...

 minstrel

Minstrel show

The minstrel show, or minstrelsy, was an American entertainment consisting of comic skits, variety acts, dancing, and music, performed by white people in blackface or, especially after the Civil War, black people in blackface....

 troupe, headed by James Buckley. They were an influential troupe in the United States; while they toured England from 1846 to 1848, their absence allowed Edwin Christy's troupe to gain popularity and influence the development of the minstrel genre. Back in the States, the Buckleys became one of the two most popular companies from the mid-1850s to the 1860s (the other being the Christy and Wood Minstrels). By the 1853–4 season, the Buckleys began to burlesque

Burlesque

Burlesque is a literary, dramatic or musical work intended to cause laughter by caricaturing the manner or spirit of serious works, or by ludicrous treatment of their subjects...

 popular opera

Opera

Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. Opera incorporates many of the elements of spoken theatre, such as acting, scenery, and costumes and sometimes includes dance...

s and boasted of their ability to reproduce such works. Some of these were Cinderella, La Sonnambula, and Don(e) Juan; or, A Ghost on a High horse (Don Giovanni). Another popular act involved Bishop Buckley's trained horse, Mazeppa. G. Swaine Buckley was another member of the company.

Overview

In 1853, they leased a New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

 theatre at 539 Broadway

Broadway (New York City)

Broadway is a prominent avenue in New York City, United States, which runs through the full length of the borough of Manhattan and continues northward through the Bronx borough before terminating in Westchester County, New York. It is the oldest north–south main thoroughfare in the city, dating to...

, a hall they called Buckley's Opera House, the Ethiopian Opera House, and the American Opera House. In 1856, they moved to 585 Broadway. By 1857, they were spending as much as six months there between tours. They also gave regular Sunday-evening concert

Concert

A concert is a live performance before an audience. The performance may be by a single musician, sometimes then called a recital, or by a musical ensemble, such as an orchestra, a choir, or a musical band...

s in whiteface at this location.

However, like other minstrel companies, the Buckleys toured extensively. Upon their return to New York after a late 1857 tour, they published this advertisement:

Although we look ragged and black are our faces.

As free and as fair as the best we are found;

And our hearts are as white as those in fine places,

Although we're poor niggers dat travel around.

Charles Dickens

Charles Dickens

Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English novelist, generally considered the greatest of the Victorian period. Dickens enjoyed a wider popularity and fame than had any previous author during his lifetime, and he remains popular, having been responsible for some of English literature's most iconic...

 wrote of the Buckleys during an 1861 trip to the United States:

Wilkie and I . . . went to the Buckley's last night. They do the most preposterous things, in the way of Violin Solos, Deeply Sentimental Songs, and Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia

Lucrezia Borgia [luˈkrɛtsia ˈbɔrʤa] was the illegitimate daughter of Rodrigo Borgia, the powerful Renaissance Valencian who later became Pope Alexander VI, and Vannozza dei Cattanei. Her brothers included Cesare Borgia, Giovanni Borgia, and Gioffre Borgia...

 music, sung by a majestic female in black velvet and jewels with a blackened face! All that part of it, is intolerably bad. But the real Nigger things are very good; and there is one man—the tambourine—who attempts to do things with chairs, in remembrance of an acrobat he has seen, which is the most genuinely ludicrous thing of its kind, I ever beheld. Nor have I ever seen so good a presentation as his, of the real Negro.

The troupe roster stayed relatively consistent until 1855, with only non-members of the Buckley family coming or going. The Buckleys closed the Opera House when the Concert Saloon Bill of 1862

Concert Saloon Bill of 1862

In 1862 in New York City, "concert saloons" were the fare for evening entertainment for the male population of the thriving metropolis. To cut down on the growing decadence and crime that came with it, the Concert Saloon Bill was passed to rein in loose morality in the city.The concert saloons...

 forbade the combination of stage entertainment, female waitresses and sale of alcohol

Alcoholic beverage

An alcoholic beverage is a drink containing ethanol, commonly known as alcohol. Alcoholic beverages are divided into three general classes: beers, wines, and spirits. They are legally consumed in most countries, and over 100 countries have laws regulating their production, sale, and consumption...

and in New York theaters and saloons.