SMUGGLING IN WAR TIME

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2708, 1 March 1916, Page 6

SMUGGLING IN WAR TIME

HOW DUTCHMEN GET RICH QUICKLY

FRONTIER SCENES

(By Joseph Williams Grigg, Special Correspondent of the "New York .World.") Rotterdam. Not every bank account in Holland to-day is above suspicion. Men who have never prospered before have suddenly amassed tidy fortunes. Others have built houses and retired. You are not left long in doubt about tlio causes for some of this sudden , affluence. It is the natural corollary of smuggling. I heard about smuggling as soon as I stepped; ashore, and before I had been many days in Holland I found _ scores of persons who had friends in the same business or knew persons who were engaged in this trafno, but smugglers in the flesh are not easy to meet; they do not go around with Mass bands when to send across the border into Germany things which are banned by their own Government. I -was informed by one of the highest Government officials that the principal duty of the Dutch Army just now is to prevent smuggling. "It would 1)9 a much easier task," he asserted, "if certain officials and men wcro above listening to tempting offers made them to permit things to cross into Germany." The Pro-Business-Dutchman. A well-informed trade authority in Holland told me that he believed it would be a conservative estimate to say that 15 ijer cent, of the war profits in Holland in the last _ six months were traceable to smuggling. A business man in Rotterdam,- speaking of this illicit traffic, said: "Smuggling in Holland is absolutely a matter of money. The.re is no sentiment about it. The persons who are doing the smuggling may be pro-Ally or pro-German. Above all else, they are pro-business. Of such breaches of duty on the part of the military J have heard numerous accounts. Sentry' duty along certain stretches of the border is a highly paleable commodity. The cousin, of a Dutchman with whom I had considerable talk was offered £15 to turn his back while on sentry-go at one of these strategio points. He refused. The next night : another soldier had the same post. He turned his head. As a consequence, he was able to shake in the face of his more honest compatriot a small bag containing the equivalent of £17. The bonus is not always so small. It depends on what is to cross the border. It might he oil, or horses, or automobiles. I was told that £60 bonuses had been paid. Superfluous Rallwaymen, Until a recent law was promulgated in 'Holland to regulate .the size of train crews it had become notoriously common for trains from Germany to ccmo into Dutch territory manned by three times the number of men . required. Tbey first ot all' fed themselves. Then each man carried back with him as ■ much as the law would allow. It really represented an endless chain, such as passengers carrying rubber from the United States to Germany wore meant to make. | Horse and cattle "stealing" was for a long period another method by which (the Germans got what they wanted. A Dutch merchant in Groningen who frequently goes into Germany told me that he was asked by a German why it was that Dutch pigs seemed to have such an impelling desire to enter Germany, The same Dutchman then told me of a friend who had driven a great many pigs across the border into Germany sinco war began, and was now wealthy. He had figured in twelve such transactions. It was not superstition that prevented him from negotiating a thirteenth. but fear of the Government. Nevertheless, he lias immortalised thesa twelve deals—at least for himself—by having .a gold watchcliain made, the chief motif of which, is twelve little gold porkers linked together. He also has a new house. One of the most notorious smuggling episodes in Holland was that of the tombstones. . A certain manufacturer in Rotterdam suddenly developed an enormous trade witli Germany in tombstones and milestones. A facetious Dutchman said it looked as if tliero wore to be one , tombstone "for eael Fritz at Hie front." And why should Germany buy milestones P A day cam? when it was discovered that both articles were only receptacles for the badly needed petrol. Soap that did not Wash. The Dutch Government had dammed another current, but ■ there were still others. It soon developed that an enormous quantity of soap was going to Germany. One day Government inspectors discovered that it wouldn't "wash." There was no lather in it. It was almost all linseed oil. The soap trade came to a halt. " Next it was discovered that vessels plying between Dutch and German porta were always being refitted with new anchors and new propellers.. But they never returned to,the Dutch ports with the same ones they had taken with them. These were left in Germany, because they were made of coppcr. The vessels always returned with a make* shift iron propeller or iron anchor. Tliif was one of , the smoothest schemes sup posed to have been worked, and wal ■ not discovered for a long time. Nor di(\ anyone have suspicions about the water barrels carried on the deokl, of barges that glide in and out of th« canals in Holland and so freouently find their way to Germany. Yet in. time it was found that they did have some water in them on the way back from Germany. From Holland jo Germany they were expanding their ribs, to the breaking point with oil. I found in Government quarters in Holland a firm belief that with the establishment of the proposed "twilight zone" of five kilometres denth along' the Dutch border that smuggling would lie dealt its most effective blow. It will be under the rigid control of the military, and no goods must be' stored therein.