HISTORICALEIGH - A Customs Officer's Lot is not a happy one

March 29, 2015 by Carole Mulroney

A Customs Officer's Lot is not a happy one.

There had been a customs presence in Leigh for many centuries. A seafaring town will always be ripe for stories of smuggling and so the Customs man was a necessary resident.

When goods were seized, as they often were, a sale of contraband was held. At one such sale in 1781 a sale the haul included 680 gallons of gin, 82 gallons of brandy, 47 gallons of rum, 275 quarts of port, 120 quarts of claret, 33 yards of calico, much foreign china and a sloop and small sailing boat.

In 1802 the Customs Officer noted that he had made a seizure every day in the month of July. In 1872 the Customs Officer reported the canniness of the Leigh men. The fishermen came crowding in on the tide so that the coast guard could not hope to board all of them (he only had one boat). The fishing boats moored at their back doors and were able to whisk the goods away before the Customs man could collar them.