Rum-Running at Detroit
jr., John C. Cahalan
402 THE COMMONWEAL August 2i, 1929 RUM-RUNNING AT DETROIT By JOHN C. CAHALAN, jR. HE first phase of "the rum war on the Detroit river front" has apparently ended in a victory for...
...The vigilance with which the coast guard has been obliged to proceed has entailed no end of trouble for the government...
...In this connection I might mention an interesting case that is soon to be tried in the United States District Court in Detroit...
...It is not alone the violators who have complained, however...
...Granted that imports cease altogether, which is improbable, what is to be done with the native manufacturer ? e_~ga d0 g~)s If God annulled all meadows, Ordaining these should be Divided between cities And the glutted sea, Should men by slow gradations Grow black and slim like eels, Or find their urban ankles Had sprouted into wheels...
...In pre-Volstead days, good beer was aged for at least three months...
...Those bootleggers who were found to be falsifying their returns were arrested when next they attempted to cross with a load, and the law was allowed to take its course...
...True, it is green: not sufficiently aged...
...Along the river front tales of big cargoes and big money were common...
...Along the American side of the border, Canadian whisky and Canadian bottled beer are still plentiful...
...One bootlegger has been killed and two have been wounded...
...Dry advocates make much of the term alley beer, which has in it an implication of filth and garbage...
...Whether or not the dry forces succeed in their Herculean task of enforcing the law which prohibits the importation of intoxicants from across the river, it is going to be a very difficult work to dry up the border cities and towns...
...The money is there, however, for the asking, and the smugglers are but too anxious to find some way of putting it to work...
...I know of but one case where the enforcement officers have been fired upon...
...Not a week passes without a Detroit paper carrying a story under a two-column head to the effect August 2i, i929 THE COMMONWEAL 403 that the rummers have quit the Detroit River...
...The larger boats have gone south to Lake Erie, some to Lake Ontario...
...Before the advent of the coast guard and the augmented border patrol, bootlegging had not been an extremely arduous or dangerous business...
...LOUIS GOLDINO...
...That the government took the rum-runners by surprise is the excuse of many of the hitherto big importers...
...If the law boat is successful in picking out one of the loaded boats the load is thrown overboard...
...This procedure was well established and thoroughly understood by all parties concerned in the transaction...
...How great a reduction has been forced in the importation of hard liquors is not known...
...There is an acknowledged shortage of Canadian draught beer...
...The figures given cover all so-called intoxicating liquids shipped by Canadian distilleries and breweries to their thirsty neighbors on this side of the river...
...Members of Detroit River yacht clubs and owners of pleasure boats have protested and are constantly protesting the interference of government boats in their legitimate pleasures...
...Last summer I had it on good authority that in one night I5,OOO cases of whisky crossed the river to the tune of $15,ooo...
...The designation is misleading...
...Brennan, whom I have quoted above, admits this when he speaks of alley breweries and American-made liquor...
...The story was that the swimmer was struck at several times with a pike pole in the hands of an officer...
...Fifty cents was paid for each case of bottled beer and one dollar for a quarter-barrel of beer...
...As a consequence the figures have little informative value...
...According to prohibition headquarters in Detroit, this decrease is directly traceable to the 400 extra customs and prohibition agents concentrated in the Detroit area...
...The defendant is charged with dumping burlap bags, which are commonly used in the smuggling of liquor and beer, into the Detroit River...
...Caught napping, the bootleggers were for the moment almost disconcerted, but as time goes on their morale continues to improve and it may be that the government will score no easy victory, if any...
...There has been shooting on both sides...
...Now, the alley brewery gets its name from the fact that it is generally situated on an alley for the purpose of facilitating the trucking of its product...
...This talk, true or not, is passed along and believed by the smugglers, and consequently the situation is often very tense...
...During the investigation conducted by the Treasury Department which resulted in the indictment of twenty customs agents, it was brought out that while part of the border patrol was on duty, those on leave or furlough were sent to the Canadian export docks to check the shipments...
...Alley breweries, as has been proven by numerous raids on them, are for the most part nothing more nor less than small breweries, fully equipped and immaculately clean...
...When running at full speed they are noisy, but when under sufficient check they make hardly a sound...
...There are many very ugly rumors about concerning the brutal action of various officers, but it is almost impossible to verify them and, of course, the bootleggers tend to color maliciously any action of the government men...
...Bootleggers who formerly supplied out-oftown and out-of-state customers in Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Missouri and points west, are now devoting their time to supplying the local and home-town speakeasies...
...This is admitted by the prohibition department...
...Not alone are small boats employed to outwit the minions of the enforcement department, but other, and sometimes very successful, dodges...
...this year but II2,878 gallons...
...Not all are captured, as is evidenced by the supply of Canadian whisky and bottled beer and ale that Detroit is still able to boast...
...In an interview in the Detroit Free Press, July Io, i929, Thomas H. Brennan, Assistant District Prohibition Commissioner, is quoted as predicting that, by autumn, "Detroiters who look upon the wine when it is red and on other colors, as long as they are sufficient in alcoholic content, will be forced to d@end on alley beer, American-made whisky and various synthetic concoctions to satisfy their thirst...
...Because of the profit to be made in its successful manufacture it has, to my knowledge, engaged the attention of graduate chemists and engineers...
...One dollar was paid for each case of whisky...
...This is cut, colored and flavored, and the result is a whisky which will stand a chemical test and for which high prices are paid...
...And you might find it pleasant To slide in the lush ooze, And you might wear with rapture Wheels instead of shoes...
...American-made whisky is but another thorn in the side of the thoroughgoing pussyfooter...
...But I--should these things happen, These dire events I sing-I should deplore the meadows And weep like anything...
...Coast guards have been accused of firing on Canadian citizens and in Canadian waters...
...To go to Canada and bring back a large cargo of liquor or beer in a slow, scow-like boat was not much more difficult than going out into the back of a farm yard and pumping a pail of water to be carried into the kitchen...
...It was conducted for the most part by bribery and was protected by the law enforcement agencies that were commissioned to stop it...
...As this is written they are beginning to adjust themselves to the new situation...
...Attempts have undoubtedly been made, and two or three of the coast guard men have been transferred with suspicious haste...
...but not a day passes without the chronicling of the arrests of many smugglers, caught attempting to run the river...
...402 THE COMMONWEAL August 2i, 1929 RUM-RUNNING AT DETROIT By JOHN C. CAHALAN, jR...
...They were not ready for the war...
...but as it means almost instant dismissal for an officer if he is caught talking to a stranger, there has been little or no talk of bribery...
...They are used at night, bring over small loads, and are devoted for the most part to the carrying of whisky and bottled ale and beer...
...What the outcome will be no one is foolhardy enough to predict...
...Occasionally in the winter the "pullers" or "sailors" were hard put to it, not by the law but by the ice...
...Fishermen have complained of undue and illegal search and seizure, and it seems to be the attitude of the government that the burden of proof of innocence is upon anyone abroad on the river, no matter what his status...
...No analysis of the falling off in this class of exports was attempted...
...A recent report to the Ontario government on the exportation of alcoholic beverages through the port of Windsor, directly opposite Detroit, showed that, in comparison with the same month in I928 , the cargoes clearing had fallen off about 75 percent during June, 1929 . In June, 1928 , there came across the river 470,033 gallons...
...The scale of bribery was fixed...
...Beer is the summer drink of the scofflaws...
...Because of their flat bottoms they have little draft and can be navigated in very shallow water...
...They are capable of great speed and can also be checked down so as to make but bare headway...
...I do not mean to imply that chemists and engineers are engaged in the actual making of this whisky, but I have known them to build the stills and inaugurate the process for a share of the profits...
...Not a few have gone north to Lake Huron, and the killing of Henry Virkula at International Falls, Minnesota, would seem to indicate that Lake Superior is also being used by the smugglers...
...It is not unusual for ten or more "scooters" to try to cross the river at the same time, each one on a different course, and but three or four of them loaded...
...In gathering material for this article I was told of an attempt by customs men to drown a swimming "puller" who had taken to the water to avoid arrest...
...The river is full of coast guard and customs boats, some of the former being 75-footers and mounting one-inch guns, and to date, anyhow, the business men among the importers have been unable to corrupt any of the enforcement officers...
...They have been replaced by small, flat-bottom craft called "scooters," operated by outboard motors...
...Now things have changed...
...And because of its bulk, kegged beer is the most difficult of contrabands to smuggle...
...There is also a marked shortage of whisky and beer for the interior trade...
...This beer is made, as a general thing, by brewmasters who found themselves out of employment when prohibition closed down the old-time breweries...
...They then buy moonshine whisky, which is nothing more than alcohol made inexpertly by home methods, and redistill it, using a process known as fractional distillation...
...It is admitted, however, that the government has been most successful in its efforts to stop the flow of draught beer, that is the beer contained in kegs, mostly of the quarter-barrel variety...
...They must brew a potable beverage, for competition is keen and there are many of them...
...As the imported brew becomes harder to get, so-called alley beer becomes the beverage of the thirsty...
...That is the present situation in a nutshell...
...In the river the larger boats have been abandoned...
...These men erect stills comparable to the stills of the old-line distillers in everything but size...
...HE first phase of "the rum war on the Detroit river front" has apparently ended in a victory for the United States government...
...Their product is a very fair grade of alcohol...
Vol. 10 • August 1929 • No. 16
