Jubilation descended upon a gang of colored street laborers engaged in deepening a ditch near Hollywood Cemetery the other day, when unexpectedly the came upon what is believed to have been the cache of a bootlegger. The haul included two gallons of highly potent fluid, contained in four tightly screwed up fruit jars, and a five-gallon water bottle whose odor suggested that it might have graduated out of the H-2-O class.
Operating upon the theory that possession is nine points of the law, the finders are believed to have made a personal test of the contents of the fruit jars when their boss, Captain W.J. Simmons, wasn’t looking. At any rate, it is reported authoritatively that a brand new record for speed was hung up in the completion of that particular ditch—a record that will keep all other ditch diggers green with envy for years to come.
The liquor, or such of it as was left, is being held by police awaiting a request for it in the part of its rightful owner. Thus far, he has not appeared.
Hopeful of further discoveries, a “posse” of 25 or 30 enterprising colored folks living in that part of town the next day made a comprehensive search of all ditches in the vicinity of the find, not knowing that Chief Holmes was watching them from a hidden point of vantage. They got no results.
“If they had found liquor,” the chief commented Saturday, “I intended to follow it clear across the swamp back of the cemetery, if necessary.”
From the front page of The Daily Advance, Elizabeth City, N.C., Saturday evening, Jan. 16, 1926
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn92074042/1926-01-16/ed-1/seq-1/
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