Although Mifflin County was an early adopter of official Prohibition, its leaders could hardly brag about how dry it was. Booze was moving through Lewistown frequently in the early 1920s, and authorities got word that it was coming from the hills of western Snyder County. The Mifflin County district attorney hired as an investigator M.A. Davis, a Pennsylvania Railroad patrolman who also owned two hotels, two restaurants, a boarding house, a pool room, and a barber shop, all in Lewistown. Davis was connected and ambitious, and he’d been instructed to find out where all the whiskey was coming from. In the 1920s, that meant watching and following automobiles that regularly came through town. Their paths, their patterns, and their occupants could tell tales about an economy that lay just below the surface of everyday life.
In late November 1924, a sting operation orchestrated by Davis brought state police to the farm of 56-year-old John Gill (known locally as “Reverend Gill” or simply as “Preacher,” for his itinerant ministries in the 1890s). Gill and his three sons, Charles (32), Rush (30), and Lester (24), had a reputation for being prickly toward anyone who was not their immediate neighbors. Rush, especially, was said to hold grudges against just about everyone. He was known to carry a revolver.
The Gills’ property sprawled along either side of Back Mountain Road, at the base of Jack’s Mountain in West Beaver Township. This was remote land, just a dozen miles from the county seat but seemingly designed to turn away outsiders. There weren’t paved roads off the main highway in this section before the 1940s. The Lewisburg Journal deemed the homestead “ideally situated for the manufacture of moonshine.” Dense trees lined all approaches, and the property extended up into steep, wooded hillsides. Fifteen state policemen raided their farm in search of a bootlegging operation. The police expected a fight that night, but the Gills conceded to a search without resistance.
In a hothouse on the property, the officers found two stills and two quarts of moonshine hidden behind a false wall. Outside, they found roughly 500 gallons of liquor mash in molasses barrels that had been buried under a vegetable garden. The Gills were driven to Middleburg, booked, and placed in the county jail.
All four men were bailed out within hours. John and Lester both paid $1,000 on their own (the equivalent of just under $15,000 in 2018). Charles and Rush were bailed out for the same amount by Ammon Jordan, a fruit farmer who was described by the Selinsgrove Timesas “one of the substantial citizens in that end of the county.” Jordan and the Gills were useful to each other when it came to legal entanglements. When Jordan was arrested five years later for violating a state law against spotlighting deer, he said he hadn’t even been hunting when he was caught. He was simply delivering a load of potatoes to the Gill house. The Gills confirmed the story. Eyes must have rolled in the courtroom.
The Gill men were charged with illegal manufacture, possession, and sale of alcohol. At their arraignment, witnesses said that the Gills routinely leveled shotguns at their customers, threatening them that they’d suffer if they ever told the authorities about the family. Mary “Ma” Gill was said to be particularly violent, quick to hit people with sticks or slap them across the face if she thought they wished her family ill will.
The case against the Gills collapsed at the first trial in December 1924. The witnesses presented to testify against the men were all shady characters who claimed to have bought gallon after gallon of booze from the defendants but could not explain what they had done with it all. The Selinsgrove Times described the witnesses as “fresh air boys,” unattached men in their twenties who spent their money driving around the county on drunken joyrides.
The jury found John Gill not guilty—but required him to pay court costs of almost $200. This type of decision, the so-called “Scotch verdict,” was usually interpreted as the jury’s conclusion of guilt in an absence of evidence to prove it. In this case, it was also seen as a local statement against the Volstead Act, and a slap on the wrist of a man who dared to violate it. Once the case against the Gill patriarch fell apart, the prosecution dropped the charges against his sons. Everyone suspected that the Gills were up to their necks in moonshining, but they hadn’t been caught with definitive evidence against them.
Recriminations and second-guessing followed. The Gill case was soon swept up in an inter-county rivalry. Ever since the start of Prohibition, Mifflin County authorities and newspaper editors had charged their Snyder County counterparts with ignoring the liquor that was flowing across county lines into Lewistown. Snyder County defenders replied that if there was booze running westward, it was merely a drop in Mifflin County’s sizable bucket. Two public views of the Gill affair emerged:
(1) Investigator Davis, Snyder County voices claimed, wanted to score a victory against Snyder County law enforcement by staging a raid without the participation of its sheriff—that’s why he led state police across county lines without warning. Why didn’t he stick closer to home, they asked, and bust the owners of a Mifflin County truck that allegedly delivered $5000 worth of whiskey each week in Lewistown?
(2) Snyder County officials, Lewistown voices declared, were not interested in cleaning up the western part of their county if it meant admitting that the officially dry county was soaking wet. Why did the Snyder County sheriff do nothing, they asked, when everyone knew that the Gills were violating the Volstead Act?
It does occur to me that when a section of country, be it Snyder County or Mifflin County, becomes so saturated with corruption, that it utterly fails to absorb a single drop of decency, and spreads this corruption to its neighboring counties, in direct violation of all federal, state, and municipal laws, it is time some action was taken by some one. — James Yeager, Lewistown, December 11, 1924
John Gill’s critics noted that he had conducted the courtroom like a maestro. An anonymous letter to the editor of the Selinsgrove Times narrated: “So deaf that it is difficult to converse with him, he looked the picture of an abused, injured old man, who wanted to inform the Court and jury, cooly, of the humiliation heaped upon him by these minions of the law.” The same writer described Gill’s wife, Mary, as “a violently inclined, saucy, curt, snarling old Pennsylvania Dutch woman.” Months after the case collapsed, newspapers still reprinted the names of the jurors, as if willing readers to heap scorn on the men who let the Gills escape justice.
As newspapers outside Snyder County told the tale, the Gills were protected. In April 1925, when five men were caught in Lewistown in a car laden with alcohol suspected to have come from the Gill farm, the Altoona Tribune claimed that the men would be prosecuted, but the producers untouched. The writer explained…
Mifflin County authorities say they will ignore the connection of the Gills until such time as the Snyder County authorities, especially William K. Miller, district attorney, and his staff, awake to the fact that the Eighteenth Amendment is a law in Snyder County as well as in the other sections of the United States and show some inclination to enforce the laws against the manufacture, sale, and possession of liquor.
The following August, Mary Gill launched an attack on Davis and company, claiming they “assaulted her, tried some caveman stuff, broke locks on the garage and household furniture, and willfully and maliciously destroyed two hives of bees, valued at $40.” She dropped her case right before the September 1925 court session began, depriving Snyder County newspaper readers of a noteworthy saga.
The story didn’t end there. One Saturday night in September 1925, Rush Gill went tearing through Middleburg in an automobile that he’d customized to look like a racing car. He could often be seen—and heard—roaring around the county’s back roads, with seemingly little thought toward pedestrians or fellow motorists. This behavior was part of Rush’s persona, and it made locals believe that he was itching for a fight with law enforcement. Constable Francis Gemberling attempted to stop him to see if the car was properly licensed; Rush almost ran him over. The constable jumped in his own car and chased Gill westward to Beavertown. Through a series of quick turns, Rush escaped Gemberling there and went into hiding.
Incensed, the constable picked up Lester Gill and demanded that he tell him the location of a still—any still—that he knew about in the county. Lester took him to an abandoned farm five miles northwest of Middleburg, in an area that the Lewisburg Journal called, “country that vies with the hills of Kentucky for ruggedness.” In an abandoned, dilapidated house that Rush rented for $3 a month, they found a still and about 100 gallons of whiskey mash. Lester claimed to have nothing to do with it. He knew about the spot from his brother, but he’d had no idea what went on there.
One month later, the Gill farm was the scene of another raid, when six state policemen and Constable Gemberling moved in. Here, finally, was Snyder County’s play against the Gill family. Mary Gill managed to smash a few bottles of suspected whiskey and drain a barrel before the officers could stop her. John, Mary, and Charles were arrested, booked, and then bailed out quickly for $1,300 each. Ammon Jordan again provided bail for his neighbors. A jury found John Gill guilty in December 1925, after which Charles changed his plea to guilty. While the trial was occurring, officers finally found Rush Gill, who’d been hiding out for three months, since the run-in with Constable Gemberling.
John was sentenced to twenty-one months in jail and a fine of $2,000. Charles was sentenced to eighteen months in jail and a fine of $1,500. A few weeks later, Rush was given the same sentence as his brother: one year in jail and a fine of $1,500. John was paroled in March 1926, after serving only three of his twenty-one months. His attorneys sought the release by claiming that imprisonment was seriously affecting Gill’s health.
Shortly after this, Lester Gill moved house, relocating across the Susquehanna River to Lower Augusta Township, Northumberland County. By the end of the summer, Lester was implicated in a new moonshining operation. Lester had apparently decided that Northumberland County was even friendlier to bootleggers than Snyder County, and he eyed the lucrative Sunbury market. Police raided the mountain farm in August 1926 and found a still, whiskey mash, and cooling tubs.
The case was brought before federal court, an early example of a trend that was soon implemented for all liquor cases in Northumberland County. State police and Prohibition agents agreed that Northumberland County grand juries were reluctant to indict anyone charged with a liquor violation. So federal court proceedings came to the region, with hearings held in the Union County courthouse in Lewisburg. In such a proceeding, in January 1927, Lester Gill was sentenced to six months and a fine of $250.
It was several years before the Gills made it back into the legal spotlight, although it’s likely that county and state officials were watching them the entire time. In February, Lester Gill was arrested for liquor law violations after police found a 10-gallon still and 100 gallons of whiskey mash on his farm along Penn’s Creek, just north of Selinsgrove. A federal grand jury in Harrisburg failed to indict Lester in May. Two items were mentioned in connection with the case being thrown out: (1) Lester Gill had seven children who would have to be supported by the county poor supervisors if Lester was jailed, and (2) the Prohibition agent who purchased whiskey from Gill had pretended to be a frozen traveler looking for a lifeline during a bitterly cold night in the winter of 1929. The jury seemingly balked at indicting the head of a destitute family who had been tricked into an act of questionable charity. Lester found work on the railroad, but he was arrested again in November for transporting illegal liquor by car.
Two months later, state Prohibition agents returned to Back Mountain Road and found a twenty-five-gallon still, twelve gallons of whiskey, and five gallons of flavoring syrup. John, Mary, and Charles were again arrested. The Shamokin Dispatch noted, ““Preacher” Gill and his product are widely known not only throughout Snyder County but in this section as well, and his manufacturing had quenched many thirsts.” The Gills were ordered to appear the following month before U.S. Commissioner William Marsh in Lewisburg, but they fled to Ohio instead. When they returned to Snyder County four months later, they were picked up and placed in the Northumberland County jail.
This was the most serious legal scenario for the Gills up to this point, and the penalty was stiff. Both John and Charles were found guilty and sentenced to eighteen months and a $250 fine. But, given that this was a federal court, the prison terms were to be served in a federal penitentiary in Atlanta. Mary received two years of probation.
On January 27, 1930, the sheriff of Union County and a deputy federal marshal accompanied John and Charles Gill to the federal prison in Atlanta. Sheriff Crabb told the Shamokin Dispatch that “Preacher” Gill told his captors that he had been merely following Scripture’s instructions to “till the soil and reap the harvest.” After a few weeks, the McClure Plain Dealer reported on the efforts of unnamed people to secure a parole for the men. It was not clear whether these efforts were for the sake of the Gills or their former customers.
After eight months, the men were paroled for good behavior. Area newspapers reported on their homecoming with great drama. Would they behave themselves after this brush with the law? How would they support their families? Was this the end of the wild days of the Gill family?
It likely surprised no one that legal scrutiny of the Gills was not over. But few could have guessed how the next chapter would unfold. In June 1931, Vina Kauffman, the 31-year-old daughter of John and Mary Gill, was shot in the abdomen from a rifle fired by an unknown person in the woods outside her Shade Mountain house. She was emptying wash water when the bullet struck her. Vina lingered for three weeks in the Lewistown Hospital but eventually died of organ failure. Newspapers speculated that the shot might have come from someone in the Booney family, who were rumored to be in a feud with the family of Vina’s husband, Charles Kauffman. Feuds in the hills of western Snyder County were traditionally a source of great interest to newspapers editors in Middleburg, Selinsgrove, and Lewisburg. It’s hard to know how real they were, but they certainly made great news stories.
An alternate theory floated by the Selinsgrove Times connected the shooting back to the family business: “Investigators on the case are not overlooking the possibilities that the shooting of Mrs. Kauffman may be a bit of retaliation in a booze war in that section of the county, where territory right in the illicit traffic of “mountain dew” are guarded zealously.” That theory was soon dropped when it became clear that the shooting was likely a hunting accident, although no one was ever charged.
As Prohibition came to an end, the mayhem of the Gills continued. In May 1933, John Gill filed charges against a man whom he claimed enticed his 14-year-old granddaughter across state lines. In November 1933, John Gill was pinned by his automobile when it crashed near McClure. He was pulled from the wreckage by passing motorists. Charles Gill was arrested again for selling liquor without a license in February 1934. That October Lester Gill was arrested for operating an illegal still. He was found guilty and sentenced to a year in the Snyder County jail.
While he was serving his sentence, a 29-year-old man staying on Lester’s farm was arrested for murdering farmer Charles Gabel. Gabel lived outside of Kantz, and when he was shot dead in his barn on February 12, 1935, police quickly found that his pocketbook had been stolen. The dead man’s money was found in Lester’s barn. The arrested man, Sherman Strawser, was the boyfriend of 16-year-old Zella Gill and a former farmhand of Gabel’s. After a week of questioning, Zella confessed that Strawser had killed Gabel to steal enough money to get Lester out of jail. The would-be couple needed Lester free so he could sign the marriage certificate. Strawser pled guilty and was sentenced to death; Zella was found incorrigible, put on probation, and threatened with commitment to the State Industrial Home for Women at Muncy.
But six weeks later, Strawser signed an affidavit saying that he had planned the murder with Lester Gill and his wife, Bertha. Lester, Bertha, and Zella were all arrested and charged with aiding in a murder. At their trial in June 1935, they were acquitted.
Almost simultaneously with their acquittal, Charles Gill was again found guilty of illegally selling alcohol and was sentenced to a year in the Snyder County jail. Under the headline “ANOTHER GILL SENT TO PRISON,” the Shamokin Dispatch observed, “there is seemingly no end of legal complications for the Gill family of Snyder County’s remote rural section.”