Bootlegging or smuggling of hard liquor was quite common on Bell Island, especially in the early days of mining. At the peak of mining on Bell Island, the population rose to over 12,000 people. There were 2300 men employed in the mines alone, and boy, were they ever thirsty after spending a day down in those dusty mines. This made for rich and quick bucks to those people selling hard liquor under darkness. I will tell you a few ways this was done.

The iron ore mines started on Bell Island around 1892. This meant building tramways to the loading docks at the front of the island. Meanwhile the mining of iron ore was going on on the surface of the island. In December of 1895 the first shipment of ore was ready to be sent to Sydney in Nova Scotia, Canada.

The miners would come back about a half mile or more and drive a tunnel down to the water’s edge. Rooms would be drilled off this tunnel so that a person not familiar with these crosscuts could get easily lost.

A large ship would anchor after dark about a quarter of a mile from one of those openings. These are still there today for anyone to see. The sailors in small boats would bring the liquor ashore and money would be exchanged. The names of some big business people were whispered as being the biggest buyers The sailors would then go back to their big ship and disappear.

Large ore carriers would anchor off Little Belle Isle waiting their turn to go to the dock to get loaded. The customs boat was always patrolling around these ships so that no cheap booze would change hands. Fishermen from Lance Cove would always be out fishing or just out for a joy ride They, the Bell Island fishermen, would ask the sailors on the ore boat if they wanted to buy some fish. The answer was yes The man on the ore boat would lower a line, and the fishermen would put a fish on it with the money to buy a flask of rum. The sailor on the ore carrier would send back the fish saying, “too small, too small” but in the fish would be a flask of over proof spirits. This went on until almost all of Lance Cove was supplied, especially at a wedding or a wake.

In the meantime the custom boat was making its rounds, but whether these men looked the other way will never be known to this day.

There was an old wooden schooner, the Margaret Ann, which was wrecked off the Scotia pier. She was almost buried in sand, but the cuddy was opened so that it could hold a bag or two of booze. We as young fellows would see it there but we were told that if we “squealed” it would be curtains for us, so we were afraid to say a word

At the Scotia pier loading dock a long ore chute went down into the hold of the ship to fill it with ore. At the end of this long chute was a piece of machinery called a trimmer. A workman would control this trimming by putting so much ore to one side of the hold, then the other, and also in the centre so that everything was kept in balance.

A customs officer was always on duty walking back and forth on the deck of the ship so that no cheap liquor went ashore. But above this officer was an operator about 100 feet up who controlled this loading chute. This operator would bring the chute up to a horizontal position and using a hammer while pretending to be making repairs, would go out to the trimmer and bring in the bag of booze which his buddies had put there. After dark they would divide the spoils of their ill-gotten goods.

I, personally, knew many of these customs officers. They were all good hard working men, doing their duty as laid down by the law. But there was only one man on a shift on these ore carriers, while you had at least a dozen characters who could take the necktie from around your neck and you would not know it  

Time seems to have no meaning as regards smuggling or selling of illegal goods. Then, as now, these crimes still go on and will continue, I suppose, until the world stops.