Typed district-court order of destruction for seized liquor and a five-gallon still. — Open the full imageJPG, 911 × 1500 px, 0.2 MB

Order of Destruction, E.D. Pennsylvania, No. 710 March Sessions 1924 (8 October 1926)

National Archives district-court order directing the U.S. Marshal to destroy liquor and property seized from a defendant who had pleaded guilty, because it was not fit for medicinal, mechanical or scientific purposes.

Date: 1926-10-08
Kind: case-file
Source: National Archives Catalog
Retrieved: 2026-10-11
NAID: 23932797
Docket: No. 710, March Sessions 1924 (E.D. Pa.), as printed on the document
Rights: The National Archives catalog lists this item's Use Restriction status as "Unrestricted." Federal records are public domain under 17 U.S.C. § 105.

This is an Order of Destruction in the Criminal Case Files of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania (Record Group 21, National Archives at Philadelphia), dated 8 October 1926 and printed as No. 710, March Sessions 1924. The order directs the U.S. Marshal to destroy liquor and property seized from a defendant who had pleaded guilty, because it was not fit for medicinal, mechanical or scientific purposes. The seized items listed include moonshine, wine, gin, beer, mash and a five-gallon still. The defendant is named in the National Archives file as Nellie Mitchell, and George W. Coles is named as U.S. Attorney.

The copy stored here is page 2, the order; page 1 is a rotated file cover. The defendant is a private individual named only as the court file names her.

itemInformation, E.D. Pennsylvania, No. 908 September Sessions 1924 (15 September 1924)National Archives district-court information filed by the U.S. Attorney charging that on 7 July 1924, at Philadelphia, a defendant transported forty half barrels of beer above one-half of one percent alcohol, in violation of the National Prohibition Act.

itemBarrels of beer emptied into the Schuylkill River, Philadelphia (1924)Library of Congress photograph captioned "Putting a kick in the staid old Schuylkill", showing barrels of beer emptied into the Schuylkill River. The man with the axe is identified only as probably the U.S. Marshal, with an alternate identification.