In 1998, when we were first working on researching the story for this film, we interviewed Leo Dutilly, who was then 91 years-old (born in 1906). Leo was in the US Army in 1929 and stationed at ft Adams, where he was an ambulance driver. Leo was also a bootlegger on the side, and he serviced the V-16 aircraft engines on the Black Duck. In our interview Leo recounts how he was picked up by the Black Duck and taken offshore to tune the engines.
On December 29th, 1929, at 2 a.m. Leo was summoned to the Ft Adams docks when CG-290 arrived with the captured Back Duck. On board were 4 crew members. Two were already dead and the 3rd died shortly after arrival. Leo brought Captain Charlie Travers to the Fort's hospital and later to the Newport Hospital under armed guard. He was then assigned to remove the dead crew members to the Fort's morgue where he was told to fingerprint them. A CG crew-member slipped Leo 2 bottles of "Golden Gordon from England", which we believe was a much-prized Scotch whiskey label. In our interview, Leo recounts how he and another soldier got drunk and finger-printed the deceased bootleggers...
Leo (who died in 2001) sat for several interviews with us, and we video-taped him using a Sony 3-chip HD camera that recorded onto a mini-dv tape. We recently were able to digitize that tape and have added a few clips of Leo in our trailer.
