1) Soft-soap ingredients 
[gang] The Potashes were a 19th-century Irish-American street gang active in Greenwich Village and the New York waterfront during the early to mid-1890s. One of the many to rise in New York City during the `Gay Nineties`-period, the gang was led by Red Shay Meehan and based near the Babbit Soap Factory on Washington Street (hence their name...
• (n. pl.) Potash.
Pot'ash`es noun plural (Chemistry) Potash. [ Obsolete]