John Harrison Wilson, The life of Charles Henry Dana

[436] but, as the frauds grew in extent, the receipts of the Treasury fell off, and efforts more or less spasmodic and ill-directed were made to detect and punish the offenders, but the real task of bringing them to justice and enforcing the law fell upon Secretary Bristow and Solicitor Wilson. They were not long in discovering that the ring was national in extent, that its headquarters and chief support were in Washington, and that its active operations were carried on in St. Louis, Chicago, Louisville, Milwaukee, St. Joseph, Peoria, Evansville, New Orleans, San Francisco, and many smaller places. It was composed of distillers, rectifiers, wholesale dealers, supervisors, collectors, and deputy collectors of internal revenue, gaugers, storekeepers, and various private persons, including the chief clerk of the Treasury and many petty officials, of whom, counting big and little, two hundred and thirty-eight were indicted and a large number were convicted and punished by fine and imprisonment. Something over three million dollars worth of property and taxes were recovered, but no estimate was ever made of the revenue out of which the government was defrauded from first to last. It must have reached many millions in the aggregate, but the prosecutions were so vigorously conducted by the distinguished lawyers that were called to the assistance of the government that the frauds were entirely stopped and the principal offenders were safely lodged in the jails and penitentiaries of the country. The chief clerk of the Treasury, who was probably a tool of those who had secured his appointment, was sentenced for two years, but pardoned after he had served only six months. The supervisor of the St. Louis district and his assistant were sentenced for three years, but also pardoned before they had served their full term.

The full history of the Whiskey Ring has never been written, but the newspapers of the day were filled with accounts