FISHERMEN AND SMUGGLERS IN ST PIERRE ET MIQUELON

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Raphaële Goineau draws the triptych fishermen and smugglers engraved by Louis Genty

Saint Pierre and Miquelon issues a new triptych in the series on the prohibition period.
On August 31, 2024, Saint Pierre and Miquelon issues the triptych fishermen and smugglers drawn by Raphaële Goineau and engraved intaglio by Louis Genty .

The artist made a reduced use of colors, in relation to the idea that one can have of old documents: black, brown, a little blue. The subject is based on local history and anecdotes reported to Raphaële Goineau. The artist interviewed tells us that the prohibition, which marked all the families of Saint Pierre, was decreed at a time when fishing was in crisis, it was then an opportunity for fishermen.
This year's triptych shows different situations that one might encounter, different ways of getting around the American ban: transhipment at sea between two schooners to get around customs; a fishing dory arriving on the coast of Newfoundland, awaited by the Canadian police. In the center, we have a mother from Newfoundland who comes to collect some contraband alcohol.
Below are images of the punches that were used for the triptych.

https://www.artdutimbregrave.com/raphae ... -triptyque

If cod fishing brought prosperity to Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon for several centuries, alcohol smuggling ensured its fortune for around fifteen years:
the Prohibition years .

" Bootlegger " is an American term meaning "the man who hides a bottle in his boot" and refers to a smuggler of alcohol.
Appearing during the Civil War, the term was later used for smugglers during the Prohibition period which was established in the United States and Canada between 1919 and 1933.
The bottles could then have a curved shape (the flask), to fit better into the boots.

Prohibition brought prosperity to clandestine distillers, small cross-border smugglers, dealers, bars selling often adulterated alcohol (the " speakeasies "), ship captains involved in the transport of prohibited liquids and, above all, gangs with mafia roots who controlled all these networks, from New York to Chicago, to pocket juicy profits at the cost of often bloody settling of scores.
Al Capone was the most famous and important leader of these mafia gangs:
He was the one who had control over the traffic coming from Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon !

During this fifteen years, alcohol import trafficking was marked by some salient facts:

- the importation of rum from British Guiana (from Georgetown), particularly Demerara (Black Diamond), on board schooners that anchored three miles off the coast, the limit of American territorial waters. The merchandise was then transhipped (often at night) on board fast motor boats (the " rum runners ", the " banana boats " or the famous Canadian schooner schooner  Nellie J. Banks ) tasked with unloading as quickly as possible, in secret places on the coast, the merchandise awaited by the bootleggers.
- the golden age of the Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon islands, a providential hub for traffic from Europe. Alcohol was transported by full cargo ships (schooners or steamers) from metropolitan France, then it was unloaded and repackaged in jute bags (easier to throw overboard in order to erase any evidence in the event of a customs boarding) and declared to customs (destination the high seas) for derisory sea rights.
- small units loaded the crates and ensured their transport to the rum runners (see above). Notable Saint-Pierre importers were Henri Morazé and R. de la Villefromoy who communicated with their buyers using coded telegrams 


The Bootleggers' Golden Age

The archipelago played a major role during prohibition in the United States since, due to its status as a French colony, American law (the "Volstead Act") was not applicable there. The island therefore experienced real prosperity from 1919 to 1933 thanks to the trafficking of alcohol, French wines and whisky, clandestinely transported to the Canadian and American coasts by schooners, steamers or speedboats ( rum runners ) built in Canada and manned by Saint-Pierre residents.
It was the era of bootleggers.
The fishermen then became dockers and transporters.
They even equipped some of their boats with aircraft engines (!), smoke machines and encrypted communications systems ((TSF – Wireless Telephony – appeared on boats in the early 1920s), in order to throw off the American coast guard.
Fisheries are converted into warehouses, bosses become brokers...
American gangsters get their supplies from them.
Al Capone is said to have paid a visit there: he spent a night at the Robert Hotel and even left his hat there.
But in truth he was rather represented by one of his lieutenants who offered a grand banquet for the occasion to the sailors of the archipelago to seal their alliance of a new kind. 

In 1923, 5 million bottles passed through Saint Pierre!
Until 1933, when prohibition was lifted, some 300,000 cases of alcohol passed through the archipelago each year. The wood from the abandoned alcohol cases was used as fuel and for the construction of many houses, including the Cutty Sark villa , made entirely from cases of the eponymous whisky.
In the 1970s, one could still see in Saint-Pierre a hangar lined with crates of alcohol and French champagne.

The sailors of the archipelago therefore received the alcoholic beverages in crates. They transferred them into jute bags and recovered the wood. In the event of a smuggling boat being intercepted by the American coast guard, it was enough to throw the bags into the sea from the side of the ship opposite the one towards which the customs forces were advancing. The bags sank instantly. When the control crew boarded, there was no longer any trace of the fraud that had gone to the deep. The cargo was lost, but this prevented the offenders from rotting in prison. The risk of being boarded in this way was part of the cost of the expedition and justified the staggering price paid by the recipients.
This also explained the proliferation of counterfeit drinks that were perhaps cheaper than those actually coming from Europe.

https://www.xn--francophonieactualits-u ... quelon.htm
Sr Pierre et Miquelon 2024 2 x 1.96 € sg?, Scott?