 In 1854 Hyer was scheduled to fight Irishman John Morrissey, at one time the head of New York's mostly Irish Dead Rabbits gang, who were rivals of Hyer's anti-immigrant gang, the Bowery Boys, but Morrissey did not show for the fight.Morrissey and Hyer were later scheduled to fight a duel in mid-February 1855 over a sum of money, around $100, owed to Morrisey from Hyer as a result of the fight not taking place, but though Morrissey arrived, Hyer and Hughes, the party to duel Morrissey, did not.Morrissey would defeat "Yankee" Sullivan, on September 1, 1853, and later become a United States congressman from New York in 1867, backed by New York's corrupt political machine, Tammany Hall.