The Houston daily post. [volume] (Houston, Tex.) 1886-1903, 1899-04-26
THE BOGUS REVENUE STAMPS
AN INTERNAL REVENUE OFFICER
LOOKING THEM UP
In This City-Numbers of the Con-
traband Cigars Are Being
Found Here.

Houston promises to yield large harvest
of the counterfeit revenue stamps with
which the country has been flooded by
cigar manufacturing concern at Lancaster,
Pa, and which the revenue officers are
taking in charge Deputy Collector Web
ster Wilson arrived in the city yesterday
morning from Galveston, where he has
been working on this case. He put in the
day visiting the wholesale and retail houses
that handle cigars in quest OF brands that
bear the spurious stamp, and while he
was very retcent when seen by a Post man
and would not give names OF dealers who
have these cigars in stock, nor the mum
Der which he had found, yet, to use his
own words there are plenty OF them, and
they are well distributed over the city"
AS a rule the cigars are cheap brands,
and have been sold with premiums in
small lots. in most instances, 10 the retail
grocery dealer hence no one will be hurt
to any appreciabe amount should the gov
eminent contscate and sell them az auc
ton. This, however, will hardly be the
case, as no blame is attached to the
handlers OF these goods. and only the fac
tories where the pgars are made Will be
held responsible. and the only loss that
the dealer will sustain Will probably be
the cost Of placing genuine stamps on the
boxes, which amounts to $3.50 per 1909
cigars Nothing definite has been decided
upon as TO what disposition IL to be made
of these goods by the revenue authorities
and Collector Wilson is only hunting out
/ the places where they exist and having
/ them boxed and held for further orders
! One dealer who had 5000 of these cigars
/ says he Will lose nothing. az he will fall
( back on tho firm from whom he purchased
them. This will probably he the case with
all the retail dealers, and those who may
suffer will he the buyers direct from the
] factories. Somebody. however Ia bound 10
lose, and II remains TO he seen what dis
position the government will make of the
case There is no chance for the iobber to
recover from the factory where they have
paid for the goods for the factories have
been conhscated by the government an(
the only show that any OF them have Is
that they may have the goods on consign-
ment and were only 10 remit for them a,
> they were sold
Tho whole matter lies with the gov
eminent and the iohber; that is, II the iop
her proposes TO protect the retailer II
whom these cigars were sold
Up TO last night Collector Wilson ha(
not completed the search for the counter
felt stamps and will continue the worl
| today. He says that II would be grea
, deal better for those who have thes
cigars to make the fact known and not tr
to hold them back. az some are now doing
: This search Is not only for a few days
but will be continued until the counterfeit
stamps are all gathered in and dealer
will have no chance to dispose of then
without being detected, which woulS caus
, them some trouble after knowing thnt tn
stamps were bogus. The revenue official
know every brand Of cigars that is stampe
with the worthless stamps, hence they ca
readily ind them.
The counterfeit stamp is a very goo
! imitation. so far as the engraving is con
} cerned. but the printing Is sorry work an
! can be readily detected even without
, comparison with tho genuine stamp, an
when placed by the side Of the genuin
there is no trouble In readily designatin
the government printed stamp