Allan Pinkerton Allan Pinkerton ( 25 August 1819 – 1 July 1884 ) was a Scottish American detective and spy , best known for creating the Pinkerton National Detective Agency . Early life , career and immigration . Pinkerton was born in the Gorbals , Glasgow , Scotland , to William Pinkerton and his wife , Isobel McQueen , on August 25 , 1820 . The location of the house where he was born is now occupied by the Glasgow Central Mosque . A cooper by trade , he was active in the British Chartist movement as a young man . Pinkerton married Joan Carfrae ( a singer ) in Glasgow on 13 March 1842 secretly before moving to America . Disillusioned by the failure to win suffrage , Pinkerton emigrated to the United States in 1842 . In 1843 , Pinkerton heard of Dundee , Illinois , fifty miles northwest of Chicago on the Fox River . He built a cabin and started a cooperage there , sending for his wife in Chicago after the cabin was complete . As early as 1844 , Pinkerton worked for Chicago Abolitionist leaders , and his Dundee home was a stop on the Underground Railroad . In 1849 Pinkerton was appointed as the first detective in Chicago . In the 1850 , he partnered with Chicago attorney Edward Rucker in forming the North - Western Police Agency , which failed . His older brother , Robert owned Pinkerton & Co , ( A railroad Detective Agency ) After Allan joined him , it was later known as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency and is still in existence today as Pinkerton Consulting and Investigations , a subsidiary of Securitas AB . Pinkerton ' s business insignia was a wide open eye with the caption " We never sleep . " As the US expanded in territory , rail transportation increased . Pinkerton ' s agency solved a series of train robberies during the 1850s , first bringing Pinkerton into contact with George McClellan , then Chief Engineer and Vice President of the Illinois Central Railroad , and Abraham Lincoln , the company ' s lawyer . American Civil War . Prior to his service with the Union Army , he developed several investigative techniques that are still used today . Among them are " shadowing " ( surveillance of a suspect ) and " assuming a role " ( undercover work ) . Following the outbreak of the Civil War , Pinkerton served as head of the Union Intelligence Service in 1861 – 1862 and foiled an alleged assassination plot in Baltimore , Maryland , while guarding Abraham Lincoln on his way to his inauguration . His agents often worked undercover as Confederate soldiers and sympathizers , in an effort to gather military intelligence . Pinkerton served in several undercover missions under the alias of Major E . J . Allen . Pinkerton was succeeded as Intelligence Service chief by Lafayette Baker . The Intelligence Service was the forerunner of the U . S . Secret Service . After the War . Following Pinkerton ' s service with the Union Army , he continued his pursuit of train robbers , such as the Reno Gang and outlaw Jesse James . He was originally hired by the railroad express companies to track down James , but after Pinkerton failed to capture him , the railroad withdrew their financial support and Pinkerton continued to track James at his own expense . After James allegedly captured and killed one of Pinkerton ' s undercover agents who was foolish enough to gain employment at the farm neighboring the James farmstead , he finally gave up the chase . Some consider this failure Pinkerton ' s biggest defeat . He also sought to oppose labor unions . In 1872 , the Spanish Government hired Pinkerton to help suppress a revolution in Cuba which intended to end slavery and give citizens the right to vote . If Pinkerton knew this , then it directly contradicts statements in his 1883 book " The Spy of the Rebellion " , where he professes to be an ardent Abolitionist and hater of slavery . Allan Pinkerton died in Chicago on July 1 , 1884 . It is claimed that the reason was an accident in which Pinkerton slipped on the pavement and bit his tongue , resulting in deadly gangrene . However , reports of the time give different conflicting causes such as Pinkerton succumbing to a stroke ( he had survived another one a year earlier ) or to malaria he had contracted during a trip to the Southern United States . At the time of his death , he was working on a system that would centralize all criminal identification records , a database now maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation . Pinkerton is buried in Graceland Cemetery , Chicago . He is a member of the Military Intelligence Hall of Fame . Legacy . After his death , the agency continued to operate and soon became a major force against the labor movement developing in the US and Canada . This effort changed the image of the Pinkertons for years . They were involved in numerous activities against labor during the late 19th and early 20th centuries , including : Many labor sympathizers accused the Pinkertons of inciting riots in order to discredit unions and justify police crackdowns . The Pinkertons ' reputation was harmed by their protection of replacement workers ( so - called " scabs " ) and the business property of the major industrialists , including Andrew Carnegie . Despite his agency ' s later reputation for anti - labor activities , Pinkerton himself was heavily involved in pro - labor politics as a young man . Though Pinkerton considered himself pro - labor , he opposed strikes and distrusted labor unions . Pinkerton was so famous that for decades after his death , his surname was a slang term for a private eye . Due to the Pinkerton Agency ' s conflicts with labor unions , the word " Pinkerton " remains in the vocabulary of labor organizers and union members as a derogatory reference to authority figures who side with management . In the 1956 episode " The Pinkertons " of the ABC / Desilu western television series , " The Life and Legend of Wyatt Earp " , the actor Douglas Evans plays Allan Pinkerton , who is seeking to recover $ 40 , 000 in stolen money but interferes with the attempt of Marshal Wyatt Earp ( Hugh O ' Brian ) to catch the entire gang of Crummy Newton ( Richard Alexander ) . The episode is set in Wichita , Kansas . Pinkerton ' s exploits are in part the inspiration of the 1961 NBC western series , " Whispering Smith " , starring Audie Murphy and Guy Mitchell . In the HBO series TV series , several references are made to the " Pinkertons " and fear that agents might be called in to investigate illegal activities in the lawless Deadwood mining camp in the Dakota territory prior to its being annexed by the US . Pinkerton ' s role in foiling the assassination plot against Abraham Lincoln was dramatized in the 2012 film " Saving Lincoln " , which tells President Lincoln ' s story through the eyes of Ward Hill Lamon , a former law partner of Lincoln who also served as his primary bodyguard during the Civil War . Pinkerton is played by Marcus J . Freed in that movie . Writings . Pinkerton produced numerous popular detective books , ostensibly based on his own exploits and those of his agents . Some were published after his death , and they are considered to have been more motivated by a desire to promote his detective agency than a literary endeavour . Most historians believe that Allan Pinkerton hired ghostwriter s , but the books nonetheless bear his name and no doubt reflect his views .