BEER BURLOCKS AND WHISKEY CHASERS: RUMRUNNING ON LAKE CHAMPLAIN IN DEFIANCE OF PROHIBITION

Prohibition drifts into northern Vermont like the thick fog that occasionally envelops its major waterway, Lake Champlain. It is recklessly disregarded, dividing the nation and its family units, but offers economic opportunity for Armand Dubuc, a veteran of WWI returning home, finding no work but willing to risk the dangers of rumrunning on this lucrative water route.

Armand pursues a love affair with Cosette, a comely French nurse who saved his life during the battle of Chateau-Thierry. His boating cunning eventually is overcome by the U.S. Boat Patrol―the Prohibition enforcement arm on the lake―and he faces prosecution in federal court. There with the skill of his lawyer, who himself has a challenging conflict within his own family over the 18th Amendment, Prohibition itself is put on trial, the jury is led to vote its conscience, which forces the judge―mired in his own misdeeds―to take action that shakes the fabric of the community. Justice in an unexpected way is ultimately served.

Harmon S. Graves,III was raised in northern Vermont on Lake Champlain surrounded by extended family members all steeped in the history of naval battles of the Revolution and War of 1812 which were fought a little over two miles from the later site of their summer home. During Prohibition the U.S. Boat Patrol searching for and occasonally apprehending rumrunners on the lake added late evening action to the clink of ice in a strong drink. As a former U.S. Army officer, competitive sailor, and trial lawyer by profession he has weaved these experiences into into a historical novel of the Prohibition era infused with its politics, seafaring enforcement, and courtroom drama.