KNEW OF 20 STILLS —“2O YEARS AGO”

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30230, 7 September 1963, Page 15

KNEW OF 20 STILLS —“2O YEARS AGO”

(New Zealand Press Association)

INVERCARGILL, Sept. 5. The chances of buying locally distilled whisky are apparenty remote. If there are private stills left in the province no-one seems prepared to say so. On Wednesday night Mrs P. Beaumont, of Dunedin, was reported in a Press Association message to have said to the Dunedin branch of the National Council of Women that she knew 20 stills existed in Southland, “one even in Invercargill.” Today Mrs Beaumont said she had been misreported. “I did know of 20 stills there—--20 years ago,” she said. Mrs Beaumont said she had been away from Southland 20 years, and was referring to the time when she lived there.

“But they're still operating. I know, and I know where. But I’m not saying where. And I’m not giving any information of what I know—or what I did know.” Mrs Beaumont said the report was wrong in saying she knew of a still in the main street of Winton. “What I did say was that you could see the location of stills from the main street —but that was 20 years ago, too." The last conviction in Invercargill for having possession of a still was in September, 1957, when a man was sentenced to six months* gaol.

He was further sentenced to six months* gaol on a charge of unlawfully making spirits. The maximum penalty for keeping a still is a two-year prison term or a £5OO fine. Hokonui whisky could be bought—-if a person was “in the know”—up to about two years ago.

Occasionally people from overseas want to sample Southland Hokonui. They are usually fruitless quests. A few years ago Hokonui could be bought for £1 at bottle in central Southland—but it tasted like poison. A man who has been connected with the Hokonui whisky industry said today that given a good place to manufacture it he would be on top of the world, and it would be a saving on his pocket. But “these amateurs know nothing about Hokonui whisky.’ 1