John McDonald and the Whiskey Ring

From Thug to Grant's Inner Circle

Edward S. Cooper

The most flamboyant, consistently dishonest racketeer was Supervisor of Internal Revenue John McDonald, whose organization defrauded the federal government of millions of dollars. When President Grant was asked why he appointed McDonald supervisor of internal revenue he responded, “I was aware that he was not an educated man, but he was a man that had seen a great deal of the world and of people, and I would not call him ignorant exactly, he was illiterate.” McDonald organized and ran the Whiskey Ring but he always credited Grant with the initiation of the Ring declaring that the president “actually stood god-father at its christening.” The demise of the Ring rivals anything that the real or fictional Elliot Ness and his “Untouchables” ever accomplished during the prohibition era in America.

University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

Pages: 208 • Trim: 6½ x 9¼

978-1-68393-012-9 • Hardback • October 2016 • $98.00 • (£75.00)

978-1-68393-013-6 • eBook • October 2016 • $93.00 • (£72.00)

Subjects: History / Military / United States, History / Modern / 19th Century, History / North America

John McDonald and the Whiskey Ring

From Thug to Grant's Inner Circle

Hardback

eBook

Summary

The most flamboyant, consistently dishonest racketeer was Supervisor of Internal Revenue John McDonald, whose organization defrauded the federal government of millions of dollars. When President Grant was asked why he appointed McDonald supervisor of internal revenue he responded, “I was aware that he was not an educated man, but he was a man that had seen a great deal of the world and of people, and I would not call him ignorant exactly, he was illiterate.” McDonald organized and ran the Whiskey Ring but he always credited Grant with the initiation of the Ring declaring that the president “actually stood god-father at its christening.” The demise of the Ring rivals anything that the real or fictional Elliot Ness and his “Untouchables” ever accomplished during the prohibition era in America.

Details

University Press Copublishing Division / Fairleigh Dickinson University Press

Pages: 208 • Trim: 6½ x 9¼

978-1-68393-012-9 • Hardback • October 2016 • $98.00 • (£75.00)

978-1-68393-013-6 • eBook • October 2016 • $93.00 • (£72.00)

Subjects: History / Military / United States, History / Modern / 19th Century, History / North America

Author

Edward S. Cooper is author of The Brave Men of Company A: The Forty-First Ohio Volunteer Infantry (2015) and Louis Trezevant Wigfall: The Disintegration of the Union and Collapse of the Confederacy (2012).

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction

1The Story
2Cape Girardeau-Sainte Genevieve-Paducah
3Forts Heiman, Henry, and Donelson
4Court Martial and Profiteering
5Supervisor of Internal Revenue
6The Fraud
7The Utes
8The Operation
9Grant’s Horses
10The Unraveling
11 Indictments
12Trials
13St. Louis Jail
14Grant Saves Babcock
15Missouri State Penitentiary
16Pardons
17Domestic Troubles
18Books Wars

Biographical Notes
Notes
Bibliography
Index
About the Author

Reviews

Unreservedly recommended for community and academic library 19th Century American History collections and supplemental studies reading lists.
— Midwest Book Review

John McDonald and the Whiskey Ring

From Thug to Grant's Inner Circle

Edward S. Cooper

John McDonald and the Whiskey Ring

From Thug to Grant's Inner Circle

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