ILLICIT WHISKY

Hokitika Guardian, 25 March 1933, Page 6

ILLICIT WHISKY

RAID ON THE BOOTLEGGERS

LONDON, March 10,

Illicit whisky distilling in the North of England, is being stamped out. Most of the bigger bootleggers have either been heavily fined and put out of action financially or have been sent to gaol. Tiie evil has been more widespread than anyone would have imagined but to Lancashire \and Yorkshire belongs the distinction of being the centre of the pernicious trade in Britain-. The majority of the persons founds guilty of manufacturing these illegal spirits are aliens, principally from Poland and Russia.

11 licit, distillation bs not carried out in ignorance of the law, nor for sheer fun. This is the reason why: An. outlay of a shilling will yield twenty-five shillings profit. “One extraordinary fact about it all,” an ’excise official said recently, “is that the manufacture of the spirits take.-* place in attics and bedrooms, always under thoroughly unhygienic conditions.”

The wash is invade bv dissolving maltv cd grain or • sugar—proper distillers use the first, illicit distillers the second. Yeast is /added, and the mixture is left to stand , for a. few clays. Fermentation takes place in due course, the spirit is formed, land is then put in a still. The “hootch” is never allowed to remain in proof for the three yehrs’ period demanded under the Immature Spirits Act. It is always sold in its crude, unpurified form. This so-called whisky smells like ditch water and tastes worse. But it is being sold at six shillings a bottle.