William G. Kerbin

In the record (5)

1. 1903 · 1903-03-14

   The Ocean City life-saving crew charges its keeper with neglect, liquor at the station and a punitive Christmas Eve — Washington sends a judge, takes ten days of testimony, and keeps Capt. Dunton in post.

   Democratic Messenger, 14 March 1903: "There seems to be a considerable scrap on between the Captain of the Ocean City Life Saving Station and the crew of the same. Lawyer Clayton J. Purnell as the representative of Dunton and William G. Kerbin representing the crew have been at Ocean City for the past ten days engaged in examining witnesses for the belligerents. The men charge Captain Dunton with neglect of duty, ungentlemanly conduct toward the crew, keeping liquor at the station and with compelling them to perform unnecessary duties last Christmas eve. In regard to the last charge Captain Dunton claims that the men were intoxicated and what he did was for the good of the men and the service. The whole affair is to be regretted." The outcome came on 11 April: "The surfmen's charges against Keeper Dunton, of Ocean City L. S. S., which were under investigation for ten days by Judge Summers, who was sent from Washington by the Life Saving [Service] to take the testimony at Ocean City, have been passed upon with the result that the keeper has been retained." Dunton had been keeper since at least 1892 and was still in post in September 1903. The town's ex-mayor defended him; the crew's lawyer was the same William G. Kerbin who a year earlier had been on the other side of the town's business.

   United States Life-Saving ServiceCapt. Joshua J. DuntonClayton J. Purnell

   Source · checked 2026-08-06

2. 1906

   1906 puts a state senator's cottage on the board walk and four Snow Hill boys camping at the end of it.

   Two independent 1906 items place the board walk as a fixed address rather than a plank path. The Messenger of 14 July: "Senator and Mrs. John P. Moore and family are occupying their cottage on the boardwalk at Ocean City. Senator Moore and son, John P. Moore, Jr., will spend most of their time in Snow Hill, making week-end visits to Ocean City." And on 4 August: "Messrs. William G. Kerbin, Asher Richardson Smith, Harlan Payne, and Ben. Richardson have been camping at Ocean City this week. Their camp has been pitched at the end of the board walk south of old Congress Hall. The boys have been having a glorious time." The second item is the campaign's best fix on the walk's southern extent in this decade: it ended somewhere south of Congress Hall, and beyond it there was open sand to camp on.

   You can date a boardwalk by where people stop calling it a walk and start calling it a location.

   Source · checked 2026-08-06

3. 1922

   Prohibition officers raid a hotel keeper at Ocean City in March 1922, and the town's stills go into the bay — some floating, some washed back up on the sand.

   The Democratic Messenger of 25 March 1922: "On Saturday the officers swooped down on Roger Adams at his hotel in Ocean City. They were accompanied by Deputy Sheriff Dennis. It is alleged that Adams was in the act of filling two quart bottles with corn whiskey for two men standing by. Several gallons of whiskey were found on the premises. Adams was locked up until he secured bail in the sum of $1,000 for his appearance in the Federal Court in Baltimore. It is said there was some hustling around Ocean City to get rid of stills and evidences of liquor making, as soon as it was known officers were really after violators of the Volstead law. Stills were seen floating on the bay and others were washed up on the sands." The paper also described "A Floating Distillery" — "the most thrilling hunt was made about eleven o'clock Saturday night when a revenue officer and Deputy Sheriff Dennis boarded a boat in the bay down near the Ocean City Inlet." State's Attorney William G. Kerbin explained that the arrests were made under federal law so the cases would be tried by the government and save the county the expense. Two months earlier the same paper had run DETECTIVES FAILED TO FIND MOONSHINE LAW VIOLATORS: "as soon as they learn of detectives being in the county ... word is passed on and on to close up tight." — 1922 RECTIFICATION, 2026-08-10: Worcester Democrat, 25 March 1922: "On Saturday last a still of about **20 gallons** was captured on a **houseboat three miles south of Ocean City in the Sinepuxent Bay**, with considerable liquor and mash aboard. In fact it is reported that **two hundred gallons of corn whisky** of an excellent vintage was poured over in the bay… Nobody claims the still found on the houseboat and nobody blames them. It is also reported that a proprietor of one of the hotels at Ocean City was arrested on Saturday last for having a little whisky in his possession." The existing fact has the Messenger's "down near the Ocean City Inlet"; the Democrat puts it three miles south in the bay, which is consistent — the 1920 inlet was two miles south — and adds the quantities. The same paper editorialised for concurrent state legislation so cases need not go to Baltimore.

   Ocean City Inlet & Jetty

   Source · checked 2026-08-06

4. 1922 · 1922-06-19

   A crowd breaks down the cell doors of the Ocean City lockup on the night of 19 June 1922 to free two men arrested for drunkenness.

   The Messenger of 24 June 1922, under CROWD ATTACKS OCEAN CITY JAIL — "Breaks Down Cell Doors in a Night Attack. — Bad Feeling Toward A Policeman Held Responsible": the crowd freed a Cropper and Ernest Fosky, both arrested on a charge of being intoxicated. Fosky was rearrested by Special Policeman Clarke and taken to the county jail at Snow Hill; another man, "Jim" Casper of Ocean City, was arrested and also taken to Snow Hill, Clarke claiming he was in the crowd that broke into the lockup. "The attack on the lockup caused excitement among the residents here, and State's Attorney William G. Kerbin and Mayor Collins, of Ocean City, have promised to make a thorough investigation and to prosecute the guilty parties, who beat down the doors and shattered several cell bars in order to reach the prisoners. The attack, it was generally rumored, was due to ill feeling toward Special Policeman Clarke. Friends of the prisoners were said to have charged him with being unnecessarily rough in making the arrests." — 1922 RECTIFICATION, 2026-08-10: Three fuller accounts than the one the fact rests on. (1) Worcester Democrat, 24 June, "CROWD FREES TWO IN OCEAN CITY JAIL": "a crowd of men, probably numbering **75**, broke into the small lockup at Ocean City **Monday morning** and released two prisoners **Samuel Crupper and Ernest Fosky**. Both men had been arrested on the charge of being intoxicated. Later Fosky was rearrested by Special Policeman Clarke and taken to the county jail at Snow Hill. Another man, **Jim Caster of Ocean City**, was arrested and also taken to Snow Hill, as Clarke claims he was in the crowd that broke into the lockup." (2) Wilmington Evening Journal, 20 June, with an Ocean City dateline, "MOB LIBERATES TWO DRINKERS — **Battering Rams and Clubs!** Used to Reach Cells at Ocean City, Md." — and it says Fosky was re-arrested by **Deputy Sheriff Dennis**, not by Special Policeman Clarke. (3) The item ran on the national wire: it appears in a Nebraska weekly and, translated, in a Polish-language Philadelphia daily, in a fuller form than any local account — "A mob of more than 100 men stormed the jail here… Some of the residents of the town, who claim to know members of the mob, say that **there were a number of bootleggers in it**. Three doors were smashed before the mob got to the cells in the **concrete building**. Not content with that they **tore out the bars on the windows and demolished parts of the concrete walls**." Record the crowd size (75 vs more than 100) and the arresting officer (Clarke vs Deputy Sheriff Dennis) as conflicts.

   Six weeks before an election nobody bothered to contest, the town's own citizens tore the jail apart over a policeman they did not like.

   Elbridge E. Collins

   Source · checked 2026-08-06

5. 1950

   A candidate for State's Attorney was almost certainly the paper's own Associate Editor, and the defence attorney in a 1947 murder acquittal

   William G. Kerbin, Jr. of Snow Hill stood for State's Attorney in 1950 — admitted to the bar in 1933, a graduate of Charlotte Hall Military Academy and the University of Baltimore Law School, a vestryman of All Hallows Episcopal. This is almost certainly the William G. Kerbin listed as Associate Editor on the Messenger's own masthead, and the William C. Kerbin who defended a man acquitted of murder in the October 1947 term. The masthead name carries no suffix, so father and son cannot be entirely excluded.

   Unverified — sourced but not confirmed against a primary record.

   Source · checked 2026-09-02