The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1895-02-08
LAIR OF THE BLIND TIGER.
STARTLING DISCOVERY IN THE
BOWELS or THE EARTH.

Revenue officials Make Raid on
"a Grocery at Columbia and Find
an IngcniOUsIy Concealed DistiI-
Iery Underneath the GrOund-They
seize 800 or 400 Gallons of Liquor
Valued at 300 DOIIars-The Place
Hard TO Beat.
Columbia, S. c.. Feb. slick moon
sinners who have for years been making
a study Of ingenious methods to evade
the United States revenue laws are not in
it with the South Carolina dispensary
law evaders.
To-day a lair was unearthed right in
the heart Of Carolina's capital. which was
in the bowels of the earth-a lair which
rivals that Of the North Carolina moon
sinners. who dived through rivers wa
ters to reach the mouth Of their under
ground distillery. It was way down under
the cellar of the grocery store of Messrs.
Platt, Hook & Shun The whole construc-
tlon and all Of the under ground tunnel,
particularly the manner Of concealing the
way Of entrance, was the acme of ingen-
uity.
About 1890 worth Of liquor was bagged,
for between 800 and 400 gallons of liquor
were found and conhscated. The search
OF the place was made by the liquor con-
stables and police. The owners of the
store refused to allow the officers to go
into the store. but opened up the cellar
The building is a very long one, and the
cellar the officers were ushered into, ran
only about half way. At the rear end was
solid earth. The officers knew what they
were doing, however for they sent for
shovels and spades and began to dig into
the wall of earth. After digging forward
about six feet. their instruments struck
air and they soon got into the rest of the
cellar. They went in and searched all
around. On one side next the brick wall
was what appeared to be the solid foun-
dation of large chimney running on up
through the building. on this,
their attention centered. Pretty soon
they began to cut into the brick. and in a
short time they gazed through. and by
the hickering light of a candle they could
see that the chimney was a false one
that inside ladder ran upward, and there
was a neat little bar with all the neces-
saries inside. They cut the hole larger
and got inside. They could see the bottom
VI eAA AAAhNAlAO4H Trap uDOI III lnG UOOF
above, which could not be detected above,
as it was covered by shelving. But the
liquor had not been found, and the real
ingenuity of the hiding place was yet to
| be seen. The constables looked around
| the inside walls of the chimney, and to-
ward the outer wall they finally discovered
n door about four feet high. They broke
| this downs and stood at the mouth of n
long. dark tunnel running back into the
bowels of the earth. 4 man could almost
stand erect in the neatly constructed tun>
mel. Then the exploration of this tunnel
began. The constables went on and on
until they struck point where the tunnel
! divided and branched in opposite direc>
tions, and then the liquor was in sight
There was about forty feet of tunnel
ing, and the earth taken out Of it had
been used to make the false back to the
cellar. 1t took the constables several
hours to get all the liquor stored in the
tunnel out. There was lots of it. In all
the constables estimate they got nearly
400 gallons.