Evening star., 1924-03-09
Chesapeake Bay Is
One Of the Favored
PointstorSmuggling
Operations, y. S. Of
fciaLs Report Pain,
Beach Vide Open
and Other Tourist
Resorts in Florida
Doing Big Business.
Liquor in Sugar Car
goes for Baltimore.

being made center for the distribu-
tlon OF every brand OF the best whfs-
kles obtainable. Large shipments are
arriving at st. Pierre at regular in
tervals, and 1t is estimated that at
present there are $4,000 cases stored
on the island. The bulk of the stock
finds its way to New York.
While the French people have moth
ing to do with the trade, the govern
ment receives full duty on each case.
The biggest ships are consigned to
New York with thousands of cases on
board.
CHoWING particularly what a tre-
mendous volume of Illicit LIQUOR
the great syndicate has been and Is
pouring into the United States, and
with easy access through the practi-
cally unguarded front of southern
Florida and the entire gulf of Mexico.
advices to the coast guard from
secret. agent at Nassau, and which
has been laid before Congress, is sig
nificant. This said that on January
l, 1928, there were in bonded ware
houses in the Bahamas 54,7e0 cases
and $500 barrels of liquors The
total exports Of bonded liquors from
the Bahamas for the years 1920, 1921
and 1922 were 445,300 gallons, 567,so0
gallons and $4,000 gallons, respec-
lively. 1t is possible to state, on the
official authority of the Bahama sta
tistics. that liquor valued at Nassau
| at $6,100,o00 was in 1922 shipped for
Illicit Introduction into the northern
ports of the United States. and to the
value OF 100000 cleared for Tampico
for smuggling into United States guif
ports. To these figures must be add
ed the unknown but considerable
shipments from West, End. Grand
| Bahama, to Florida and southern
ports.
1t may be taken that the value of
| liquor shipped to the United States
from Bahama in 1922 exceeded
! $7,500,o0o. The normal revenues OF
the Bahamas from all sources are not
$5oo,000. From duties on liquor alone
they were in 1922 s2,s0o. 900, and In
1921 nearly q million. The Bahaman
government, out Of her revenue. is
financing large undertakings, such as
hotel construction, harbor deepening
and modern power and ice plant con-
struction and road building, and is, in
! conjunction with private capital,
| Transforming New Providence into a
luxurious winter resort.
Showing how the winter tourists at
| Palm Beach and other fashionable
Florida resorts are increasing the
| business Of the rum runners and how
! a foreign government which has here
| tofore been practically dependent
upon this country for commercial as
sistance is now aiding and abetting
the big rum-running syndicates. Com
! mander Root has laid before Con-
| gress three reports from secret agents
| in Nassau, dated as recently as jan
| uary 26 and %. Among the facts
! stated are these:
! AT West End, Grand Bahama, busi-
| ness has increased SO much that this
I government has erected several large
| bonded warehouses. Being only sixty
miles from Palm Beach, all the boats
| go there for booze that used to come
| to Nassau. There is an average of
| ten to twenty boats daily calling at
J West End. carrying from 200 to 1909
| cases each. So you can see what lis
| doing. This booze is flowing into
Jacksonville via Mayport tMosquito
inlet), Palm Beach, West Palm Beach.
Stuart, Fort Pierce, ST. Augustine,
| Fernandina, main ports in Florida.
Z. From West End also quite a few
large boats are running booze to
| Charleston, S. c. From West End sub
\ chasers, ETC., are being used. Lots of
| this booze is shipped by automobiles
/ to eastern and western points from
| the above places. Quite lot goes to
| Fernandina and St. Augustine. 1t is
| being distributed wide open, and you
| can get all the drinks you want in
| any of the hotels in Florida. There
are some big rings working.
| ~ y =
stT>HIS government does all it can
L to foster this trade. Vessels
| are allowed to come here and admit
ted to pratique without any clearance
papers. Vessels can clear for such
places as st. Pierre, Halifax. etc.
with full cargoes Of booze, and still,
when they come back to Nassau.
enter prat1que as coming from tne
high seas. not showing. as Is required
by law, that they went to the port
they cleared for. Sometimes they
even bring back part of their cargo.
This same thing prevails at West
End with the American boats. No
papers. At Gun Key these Nassau
vessels that sell booze there to boats
coming from Florida and west coast
ports are doing SO illegally, as this
is a contravention of our own ifouor
laws.
Through West End, Grand Da-
hama, quite .ra6ac is done in HE
gally carrying people over to Florida
and other points. Also dope bust
ness is carried on.
"At Palm Beach one place does n
big business in selling liquors. They
have their own boats running over to
West End, Grand Bahama. Nothing
is ever done. They did their business
wide open last year, or season, and
i are at 1t again this year, and all the
other hotels In Florida are doing the
Do