Wellington County’s High Constable George Green, who had responsibility for the western and northern portions of the county in the 1920s, has appeared several times in this column, and as recently as last week, when he was responsible for solving a lurid murder case in the early 1920s.
By all accounts Green seems to have been a very competent and perceptive man, alert to rumours, fragments of information, and anything that seemed to be unusual.
The latter was the case in late February of 1923, when he caught a major liquor delivery in Drayton. The result was a heavy sentence and jail term for a St. Jacobs man.
On Feb. 20 Green was strolling down the street in Drayton at about 5pm. It was a typically quiet Tuesday in the village. Nevertheless, Green had his eyes wide open, alert to anything that might indicate a breach of the law.
A horse and sleigh, with two men aboard, passed Constable Green. It then headed down an alleyway to the rear of one of Drayton’s hotels. The sleigh appeared to be loaded with some sort of cargo. Green immediately concluded that there was something unusual about the sleigh and its destination, out of sight at the rear of the hotel. He went into the hotel, where he saw one of the men on the telephone. The man then went out, leaving his companion in the hotel’s parlour.
Green approached the man and asked what was in the sleigh. He replied that he did not know, as the other man was the owner. When the other man returned he refused to answer Green’s questions. That answer did the man no good, and further aroused Green’s suspicions. The constable immediately went outside and pulled the tarpaulins off the load. His initial impressions had been well founded. He discovered the wagon to be loaded with whiskey. Green at once returned inside and arrested the driver. He gave his name as Henry Seiling of St. Jacobs. Green also seized the sleigh and its cargo.
A more complete examination of the sleigh revealed that it contained quite a haul. There were more than 20 cases of Seagram’s Three-Star whiskey. Some was in the regular cases used by the Waterloo distillery.
Though prohibition was in effect in Ontario, the distillery remained in production, turning out the popular Seagram brands of whiskey for the “export” market. That was perfectly legal and, in fact, was discretely encouraged by the federal government.
As well as the regular liquor cases, there were several trunks on the sleigh that contained whiskey bottles. More was in packing cases. Green estimated the value of the load, based on a black market price range of $3 to $5 per quart, at about $1,000. That was a fortune in 1923, equal to perhaps $40,000 or $50,000 in 2013 dollars.
Green was on the telephone that evening. He notified Crown Attorney Kearns and Licence Inspector Grant of his discovery and his actions. Both expressed delight at what was one of the largest liquor seizures during that period outside Guelph.
Green dragged Seiling before Magistrate Woodman of Drayton, who had him held overnight in the tiny Drayton lockup. Seiling faced the magistrate again the next day.
Realizing that he had been caught red-handed, Seiling decided to plead guilty. Two charges were laid by Green: having liquor for sale, and having liquor in a place other than a private residence.
Woodman levied fines of $1,000 on each of the charges, and sentenced Seiling, in addition, to a six-month jail term. Should Seiling be unable or unwilling to pay the fines, he would rest his heals in the hoosegow for a further three months.
The fines were heavy ones, but the magistrate had taken into account Seiling’s record. Born in 1889, Seiling worked as a barber, but he had two previous convictions for liquor offences, and seemed unrepentant about carrying on his sideline. Woodman decided it was time to make an example of him.
Green brought Seiling to Guelph’s jail, where he was held for a brief time to allow paper work to be completed. The authorities then moved him a short distance to the Ontario Reformatory, where he would complete his sentence.
Green received much praise for his alertness in sniffing out the load of liquor. No one was more surprised than Seiling, who had believed that delivering the load to a hotel in Drayton would be a straightforward and profitable task, with little chance of discovery in an out-of-the-way village such as Drayton.
Meanwhile, Licence Inspector Grant took custody of the whiskey. He brought it to Guelph, where it was kept under lock and key at the Guelph police station. Later it would be sent to the Liquor Licence Department of the Ontario Provincial Police in Toronto. It’s eventual fate, at the remove now of 90 years, is unknown.
Such a large seizure of whiskey in a small place such as Drayton was most unusual. That is particularly so in a town that was, and had been for a couple of decades, a stronghold of temperance sentiment. Peel and Maryborough Townships were among the first municipalities in Wellington to embrace the local option, years before prohibition came into effect in Ontario.
Nevertheless, though a minority, there was still an enthusiastic segment of the population there that enjoyed a drink or two. This case leaves many questions unanswered.
It seems the authorities did not try to determine Seiling’s ongoing relationship with the Seagram firm, or whether he was involved in other liquor transactions.
Curiously, Seiling’s companion, who was not identified by name in any of the press accounts, was not charged. The other mysterious player in the drama was the unnamed Drayton hotel and its proprietor. The 1920s were desperate years for small town hotels. With the arrival of automobiles, much of their room rental business disappeared. And of course, prohibition meant the end of the relatively lucrative bar room business, which had kept many hotels afloat.
The haul of liquor pulled in by Green seems unusually large for a small town hotel to serve illegally and discretely, and the value would have been far more than any small publican could afford to keep on hand.
The hotel probably acted as a wholesaler, supplying other vendors with booze. But the police do not seem to have tried to track down any such illicit network. The key mystery is Constable Green’s presence near the hotel in Drayton at precisely the time the liquor delivery was made. It seems far more than a coincidence. Who might have tipped him off?
As is often the case with history, the evidence in this case is fragmentary, and it raises more questions than it answers. Quite obviously, the authorities wanted to nail Henry Seiling, and they devoted their energies to that end.
Quite likely, he was a suspect in other cases, but was not charged, other than in the two cases mentioned, because the evidence was inadequate. In any case, the Drayton liquor case is now 90 years old, and no one living can add anything factual to the evidence.
It is now another fascinating example of our local history.