After handguns were criminalised in New South Wales, razors became the weapon of choice amongst Sydney gangsters. Shortly after the Pistol Licensing Act 1927 was passed, a visiting sailor used a cutthroat razor to defend himself from attackers. As a result, razors became a default weapon due to its ease of purchase from barbers shops for a few pence, its ease of concealment (hidden inside a piece of cork), and its use as an instrument of intimidation and threatened or actual mutilation, physical impairment or murder against one's adversaries, prey or hostile spouses. It has been estimated that there were over five hundred slashings within Sydney during the heyday of intensive razor gang criminal activity. Macquarie Street's Sydney Hospital and St Vincent's Hospital, Sydney in Darlinghurst treated many of these casualties of gangland hostilities.