The Savannah morning news., 1902-02-16

erwards found to be about eight hum
dred feet in hight a glare of ice and
a tangle of laurel thicket. AS the bot
tom was reached, the snow covered
banks of the stream could be family
distinguished in the starlight, and
then a mass of dark objects from which
a thin column of smoke appeared to
be rising. We closed in on the dark
mass before us. There was row on
row of huge mash tubs, filled to over
flowing with beer There was
wide stone furnace in which were a
few glowing embers. But the copper
still and worm were gone, and not a
moonshiner was in sight.
The possibility yet remained that one
or more of the gang might be lurking
in the brush near by. With whispered
instructions, therefore, to hold up the
first man encountered the raiders sep
arated as the morning began to dawn,
taking different directions in their
search up and down the ravine.
For long time nothing came of this
effort. But as I neared the rendez-
vous at the still l heard a rustic,
stealthy tread in the laurel thicket
ahead of me. The desperado was COM
ing directly toward me. I got my gun
ready, and then hestated as / remeln-
bered that l had not been told the
occasions. Stand, in the Kings
name!" sounded well. Under which
King, Bezonian. speak or die?" had
also done good service in Pistols day
But, though excellent in themselves.
neither of these adjurations appeared
particularly appropriate to moon
sinners in West Virginia. Fearful,
therefore of displaying ignorance of
moonshine etiquette, / determined 20
say nothing. l would simply get the
drop on the moonshiner. With my
gun all ready l calmly waited. The
laurels swayed. then parted-and the
burly form of Dan, the detective, stood
before me.
AS the sun swept down the surround
ing hills Cunningham destroyed the
plant that the moonshiners had been
forced to leave behind them. About a
thousand gallons of beer or mash"
were thus poured into the brook. This
represented a net value of at least $500.
Then, we followed a path that led us
straight to a house that we knew to be
the headquarters of this particular
gang of moonshiners. 1t was the home
of Lens Lilly They are all Lillys in
| this wild community. Lilly seems to
be a tribal name among them, due,
probably, to the fact that century or
more ago a family of Lilly settled here
| and in time spread over the country.
| the history of creation is frequently
| re-enacted on a small scale in these re-
mote corners of West Virginia.
| Lens, of course, was not at home
/ when the raiders entered his cabin.
| His wife, a wild-eyed woman dividing
her attention between a spinning wheel
and a child who was dying of whoop-
ing cough, persistently denied any
| knowledge of her husbands where
| abouts. Probably the primitive cabin
had never held so many strangers be-
| FORE and its mistress with her half
| starved children clinging about her, re-
| garded the unwelcome intruders with
| the gaze of some female wolf at bay,
| until the detective asked some ques-
tions about her dying child and tried
| to soothe its cough. This show of in
| terest had a humanizing effect on the
woman, although it failed to elicit any
| information regarding the absent hus-
| band AS we left the house the wo-
man crept out after us and COM
menced calling the cows, favorite
| signal among these people to warn
moonshiners lurking in the brush that
they are in danger.
For the next two days and nights we
secured the adjacent country and sue
ceeded in capturing three of the gang
| More than once in the chase we were al
| the mercy of anfbushed moonshiners
| and the aim of these outlaws is un-
| erring. We spent three days vainly try
| ing to capture the leader. For the past
| thirty years he has had master hand
in most Of the mOonshining in the
neighborhood, and his arrest would go
a long way toward breaking UP the
open outlawry that fiourishes in this
~ rNf LA f,sxy Mfsr-a hn nnG
| deputy marshal and revenue officer has
lost his life tracking him to his liar,
and Willy has confidently announced he
will never be taken alive.
For the past twenty-five years the
! government, through its marshals and
revenue officers has been waging war
on moonshining, and undoubtedly the
| latter is less prevalent than at the time
| when the first serious effort to abolish
| it was made. Ex-Gov. Atkinson of
| West Virginia, who was the first to
make effectual headway against this
! class of outlaws, the first marshal to
enforce the present revenue policy of
the government, declared that during
four years of warfare between moon
sinners and officials in the Southern
states, nearly five thousand stills were
| seized and eight thousand moonshiners
captured. This was accomplished at a
sacrifice of twenty-five government off,
GERS murdered and sixty-three seriously
wounded. The saving in revenue to the
government by the capture of these dis
tilleries Gov. Atkinson places at $7,042,-
500 annually. From these figures the
extent and seriousness of moonshining
can be estimated, although to-day,
judging by Gov. Atkinson's thrilling
"reminiscences, the moonshiner is not so
formidable as he used to be. Indeed
with the continuance of the present Off
cial activity, by another generation the
moonshiner, with all his strange social
environment may become as much a
matter of fiction as the Highlander of
Scotland or the outlaws of Robin
Hoods England. Meantime many a
brave deputy marshal may bite the
dust amid the solitudes of these South
ern hills many daring outlaw spread
The terror and fame of his deeds over a
country that he dominates with the au-
thority of a cheftain of old.
-Kubelik, the violinst, says in Chi
oago that American cities are 800
- III nj