The Demerara Distilleries 2.0 (English)


The Demerara Distilleries 2.0
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Guyana – The Distilleries and their history

Von Marco Freyer 

A work in 10 chapters around the colonial British Guiana (Guyana), rum and its transformation to modernity.

Preamble

Map of Demerara & Essequibo (undated)
Source: www.gahetna.nl
With this article I want to inform all interested readers about Demerara rums. Its origins can be dated back to the 17th Century with the founding of the Dutch colonies of Essequibo, Berbice and in the 18th Century the colony of Demerara. Demerara rums are naturally associated today with all rums which are coming from this region in the nation Guyana, which emerged from the three dutch colonies. After several wars the British Emire took over these colonies in the early 19th Century and formed the British colony British Guiana. In 1966 this country finally gained its independence and was named Guyana. 

What is so special about this rum and what's the meaning of the marks or where do they came from? The Marks were used primarily to identify the individual Sugar Estates. These Marks were then written on the rum barrels. They practically identified the origin of the sold rum, sugar or molasses. Especially the meaning of these marks and their connection to the Sugar Estates has been lost over the past century. Many plantations disappeared and with them the rums from the respective distilleries too. It is this mystic aura of forgotten wisdom which makes the rums from this country so appealing. What's behind the names Albion and Blairmont? What is the connection between Versailles and Guyana in South America? What does the mark E.H.P. on the label of a bottle from Velier mean? In this article I would like to go into the details regarding the sugar cane plantations and in addition to these questions as well. 

Besides Sasch's work there were only a few articles which have treated this issue seriously. Most of them remained rather vague and sketchy. They didn't go into the details regarding the origins of the sugar cane plantations and their history. These origins are inseparably linked with the rum in this country, because these plantations with their distilleries were the source of this spirit. Only the most famous plantations are known to the connoisseurs and rum-lovers. However, when it came to the establishment or the founder of the respective plantations and when they were closed down forever I encountered a huge lack of information. Not even the last remaining fistillery in Guyana from the old days with the name Diamond (Demerara Distillers Limited = DDL), which brought some of the stills of these lost distilleries in their possession, could fill these information gaps. 

This article is dedicated to all those readers and connoisseurs who care for Demeraras and want to know something more about the history of this unique rum and the vanished distilleries and plantations.

 
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Chapter 1 
-
The formation of British Guiana 

Following is a brief account of the history of British Guiana, starting with the Dutch colonies in the 17th century. Since this is only a hobby of mine, I hope you see this work about the history of British Guiana as what it is: The work of an amateur. I am not a learned professor of history and therefore one may find here and there a wrong date. Also, I could not go into all the events in some time periods. It would be beyond the scope of this article. I ask for your understanding of these facts.

The Durch colonies Essequibo (Isekepe) & Pomeroon (Bauroma)

The West India House in Amsterdam. 1655
Source: commons.wikimedia.org
The history of this colony begins for many authors in the year 1616. In was in this very year that the first Dutch West India Company allegedly built the Fort Kijkoveral along the river banks of Essequibo. However, there are evidences who are not supporting this theory. First of all, the first Dutch West India Company was only established on June 3 of 1621. There are also some uncertainties and inconsistencie regarding the exact year of founding of the Dutch colony on the Essequibo. One source is listing some interesting arguments which speak against a fortified settlement before 1624. There is also another source which refers itself to the year 1616 and the later English governor and notorious Major John Scott (1665-1666). [227]

Pieter Marinus Netscher also doubts the statement of John Scott concerning the founding of the colony in 1616 and the first commander "Captain Gromweagle". Netscher suspected a misunderstanding and brings the later commander of the colony Aert Adrianszoon Groenewegel into play, which was the commander of the colony between 1657 and 1666 (English occupation included). He argues that Gromweagle is a distorted English version of the name Groenewegel, which as I already said actually existed. If this man would have built this fort, then he would have also managed the colony from 1616 until his death in 1664. This would haven been full 48 years (!) in a tropical climate. This sounds more than unlikely. But you can see clearly from the letters of the Dutch West India Company and the addressed commanders in them that this was not the case. [228]

The West India House in Amsterdam. Today
Source: commons.wikimedia.org
In a letter of 1624 September 16, the company expressed its interest in this coastal region of South America. [229] Another interesting fact is that the probably first commander Jacob Caniju or Conjin is allowed to return home on December 10 in 1626. He was Supposedly stationed there since 1624. [230] Two further letters about his successor Jan Adriaenss van der Goes and the low salary of 5 Flemish pounds per month underlines the suspicion that it was only a trading post and not to a thriving colony with plantations. [231] [232] It is also mentioned the need of a fort on the Essequibo in a letter of 23 August of the year 1627. Either it was meant that they wanted a completely new building, or the repair of an already existing fort. But why then the word “make” ("maecken" in the original) and not build or repair? [233] The pitiable condition of the “colony” was more than likely the reason, why the Council of the IX discussed on April 5 May of the year 1644 to give up the colony. However, they rejected the idea. [234]

Interestingly, the old fort Kijkoveral is mentioned in a letter dated 5 May 1644 for the first time. Previously, one finds no mention in the written archives according to Netscher. Also, a Fort named "The Hooge" or "Ter Hooge" (named after the director of the Zeeland Chamber Joost van der Hooge) is also not mentioned. Supposedly the Fort Kijkoveral should have borne this name originally. So why is this name not mentioned in the letters in any way? Such behaviour would be not only embarrassing to the director and colleague Joost van der Hooge, but would also have been a certain lack of respect of the other directors testify against him. [235]

After the loss of Brazil in 1654 and the associated costs of the war the DWIC produced only losses. [236] Thus, it appears more than understandable that the Zeeland Chamber was trying to get rid of the not profitable colony of Isekepe (Essequibo) around 1657. The state Zeeland was not averse to a takeover of this colony. According to PM Netscher, an agreement has not been reached. Therefore it was no surprise, of course, that the WIC accepted the offer of the three cities of Middelburg, Vlissingen and Veere. These offered to take over the management and maintenance of the colony under the auspices of the Zeeland State. The agreement finally came into force on November 1, 1657. The colony was for a short time called Nova Zeelandia and was managed by eight directors. [236] A year earlier, on 12 October 1656, one can found a letter with rules and regulations for (free) colonists determined by the Zeeland chamber. The Trade with annatto was expressly forbidden to the colonists. [237] So it seems that there were probably no free settlers in this region before this year.

Another fact seems also to confirm the assumption that there were only employees of the company in Essequibo. I quote: 

„By "colonists," however, must not be understood tillers of the soil, much less free planters. "The colony of Essequibo," said the Zeeland Chamber itself in 1751, in the memorial resulting from its search through its own records, "from the beginning on, down to the year 1656 was inhabited only by such persona as were employés of the Zeeland Chamber, and who … at that time were called 'colonists' and were kept there for the carrying on of trade, which soon grew to such proportions that in some years a hundred barrels or more of annatto dye came over at once."---(Nederlandsche Jaerboeken, 1751, p. 1097.)“ [238] 

Until 1656 there were therefore no free settlers or planters in Essequibo. The DWIC seems to admit it in the said Yearbook of 1751. Thus, also free planters or plantations, which were not owned by the company, were more than unlikely. With this confession of DWIC the very first colony there was established between 1656 and 1658. Before this time period the said “Colony” was nothing more than a fortified trading post. So it doesn't really matter when this trading post was exactly established or not. Thus, Major John Scott statement about Gromwaegle (Grone paths) gets new substance. He was at that time that is really the commander of the trading post, which developed into a colony.

Sugar cane
Source: commons.wikimedia.org
In a letter, which is apparently attributable to the year 1657 (an exact date is not mentioned),the request for an allocation of land for colonization on the coast of Guiana (ie Essequibo or Pomeroon) was mentioned. [239] The interesting fact now is: A certain Aert Adriaanszoon Groenewegel was determined by the Directors as the new commander and sent along with Cornelius Goliath on February 2 of the year 1658 to the colony. The latter should fit bthe role as a customs officer and engineer of the colony. After his arrival Cornelius Goliat planned a new village on the banks of Pomeroon named "Niuew Middelburg" and on the coast a fort named Nova Zeelandia. So this is the man that Major John Scott has probably meant by "Captain Gromweagle". Netscher also mentions that in the years 1658 and 1659 four or six ships with new colonists reached the colony. Some of them were refugees and were from the former colony Brazil. [240]

From 1658 on sugar cane had been planted in the colony, because Netscher said something about sugar from Nova Zeelandia was mentioned in the year 1661. According to his statements the cultivation of this plant has been focused at that time. The extracted sugar from those days but was still pressed by hand. This must have been a real tough job. [241] It was only in 1664, we find the petition of a man named Jan Doensen who wishes to build a sugar mill in Brouwersboeck on the northern banks of the confluence of the two rivers Cuyuni and Mazaruni. This mill was powered not by hand but by a horse. [242] [243]

The Four Days Fight, 11–14 June 1666
Second Anglo-Dutch-War (1665 - 1667) 
Source: en.wikipedia.org
However, there were many wars in the past centuries that swept across the face of Europe. In 1665, the second Anglo-Dutch-War began, which lasted until 1667. [244] And, as so often, the colonies were always directly affected. The English conquered the colony Essequibo in 1665. Later, the then British colony was sacked by the French. In the following years the English were expelled by a Dutch expedition coming from Berbice. The colony was probably mainly looted by the French because she was temporarily in the hands of the English. Netherland and France were allies in this war. Unfortunately, the French could not conquer the fort and so the colony remained in English hands until the arrival of the commander Mathijs Bergenaar from Berbice in 1666. [245] [246]

According to Netscher this raid by the British and the French threw the regions Pomeroon and Moruca back for a long time because they had to bear the brunt of the looting. Essequibo, however, was left relatively untouched by comparison. [246]

After the English invasion and the occupation of the colony from 1665 to 1666 the three cities of Middelburg, Vlissingen and Veere decided to transfer the responsibility of the colony to the State of Zeeland in 1669. The state, however, Zeeland had no interest in this piece of land and handed over the colony back to the DWIC on April 11, 1670. The company itself gave the colony back to the chamber of Zeeland which henceforth had a monopoly on trade in Essequibo. This should later lead to difficulties within the second DWIC. [247] But it seemed that he was not the only one who was going to the colony. There are mentioned “ free men who have permission to travel to Essequibo to establish plantations there” in a letter dated August 14, 1670. [248] [249] [250]

Due to financial difficulties the Charter of the first DWIC was not renewed. However, because of the high demand for slaves and also because of the fact that there were established colonies, a second Dutch West India Company was founded in 1675. The council members were reduced from nineteen (XIX) to Ten (X). Also the capital was limited to 6 million guilders. [251] After the establishment of the second Dutch West India Company the new Council of the X decided to transfer the administrative activities and the control of trade in Essequibo again to the chamber of Zeeland. [252] It was exactly this trade monopoly, which the acting commander of the colony of Essequibo, Abraham Beekman, tried to break up and allow free trade for everyone with the colony around 1678-79. However, the Chamber of Zeeland was not amused hereof and expressly forbade it in 1681. It was only allowed for members of the chamber of Zeeland from the DWIC to trade with the colony. [253]

In 1686, a renewed attempt is made to gain a foothold in the west of the Essequibo colony on the river Pomeroon. A certain De Jonge (Jacob Pieterzoon de Jonge) was appointed by the chamber of Zeeland as a commander for Pomeroon and sent from the Netherlands to the colony in 1686. [254] In a letter from Commander Abraham Beckman November 4, 1687, he mentioned the number of free planters, which at the date of the letter was 18. They were located in the river Mazaruni. [255] However, the colony was threatened again in the form of war in Europe. In 1688 the Nine Years' War between France and the Republic of the United Netherlands began, which lasted until 1697. [256] Once again the colonies were also directly affected by this war. The colony Pomeroon was sacked only after three years from its establishment by a French privateer on April 30 of the year 1689. Thus ended the independence of the colony Pomeroon and it remained in the administration of the colony Essequibo and its commander. [257] On November 15, 1689 the Zeeland Chamber decided to deduct all property of the company from Pomeroon and to leave only three men as a watch post. Any settlers there were now defenseless and it appears that they gradually also abandoned the river Pomeroon. [258]

Battle of Denain (1712)
War of Spanish Succession (1701-1714)
Source: commons.wikimedia.org
In a muster roll from September 6, 1691 are three plantations of the company in Essequibo (Peolwyck, de Hope, de Fortuyne) mentioned. [259] The company belonged 3-4 sugarcane plantations at the end of the 17th century. There were between 12-15 plantations in private hands which planted sugarcane. All of these plantations were located on the banks of the rivers Mazaruni, Cuyuni and Essequibo. [260] So much for the sugar cane cultivation. In a letter dated Saturday, October 24 1701, Rum (ciltum) and molasses (syrup) are mentioned as an exchange commodity in the colony. The commander also lamented the difficulty of accessing good horses, since the war made the trade for them almost impossible. Those horses were needed for the mills (like the first built in 1664). [261] Which war was mentioned here? In 1701, the War of Spanish Succession began and Holland fought against Spain and once again, the colonies had to pay for this with a poorer supply situation. This war lasted until 1714. Netherlands not only fought against Spain but also against France. [262]

The mention of a rumdistiller, dated 27. July, 1703.
On the company-plantation Nieuw Middelburgh
Source: openlibrary.org
I also found something very interesting. In a muster roll of the DWIC a certain Adriaan de la Ruel of Courtrai is mentioned. He was stationed on the plantation of the company called Nieuw Middelburg Pittsburgh and his profession was rum distiller ("Ciltum Stooker" = "rum heater"). [263] So we can assume the production of rum in this colony at least since 1703. A map of 1706, drawn by Abraham Maas, shows 32-34 plantations in the colony of Essequibo. [264] But the war still raged in Europe. On October 18, 1708 three French privateers (Privateers) with about 300 men invaded the colony of Essequibo. They try to seize or at least to plunder it. After they pillaged several villages of the locals and plantations of the colonists, the commander of the fort Kijkoveral decided to comply with the demand of the buccaneers to a ransom to avert further damage to the colony. On October 25, 1708 colony surrendered to the French captain and commander of the privateer Antoine Ferry. After a payment of 50,000 florins in the form of slaves, goods and cash, the buccaneers left the colony. One third of the ransom had to pay the plantation owners of the 15 or 16 private estates. [265]

Map of the colony of Essequibo, dated 1706
Drawn by Abraham Maas 
Those who believed that the colony had not to endure further trouble until 1714, was laterdisabused. In February of the following year (1709) two other French privateers plundered the Essequibo colony and completed the destruction of their predecessors. They looted most of the still intact plantations, and the four plantations of the Dutch West India Company. Commander van der Heijden reported in a letter from March 9, 1709, that there were only two mills left in working condition. [266] In 1718 the fort Kijkoveral was abandoned as the seat of the commander of the colony and instead Cartabo (Catabo) as a new headquarter was chosen. It was located in direct proximity to the old fort [267] In 1720 there were again five sugar mills, which were ready for use. [266] The colony slowly recovered from these attacks. Essequibo had according to Netscher in 1735 only 25-30 individual plantations and 4-5 plantations owned by the West India Company. In crass comparison, look at the numbers of Suriname from 1712: There were at that time already 200 plantations with some 12,000 slaves. [268] In 1740, the official residence of the commander in Cartabo at Fort Kijkoveral was abandoned and the headquarter was moved to a new post on Flag Iceland. [269] In 1740, the plantations of the Dutch West India Company were relocated due to the exhaustion of the soil layers to the islands Flag Island and Hog Island. Many of the planters followed suit and began to move their plantations to the lower regions of the Essequibo river, which soils were considered more fertile. [270]

Detailed map of Essequibo 1783
Source: gahetna.nl
In 1740 began the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-48) and again this affected the colonies in the West Indies. [271] A year later, in 1741, the planters came to the banks of the Essequibo and the coastal regions of the colony to establish plantations there. [272] Probably the first land grants to English was made by Herman Gerlserkle in 1741 (to Thomas Wilson and James Doig) on the island Wacquename. [270] [273] Shortly after assuming his post as commander of the colony of Essequibo, in 1742, Storm van's Gravensande convinced the Council of Ten to relieve all English immigrants of all taxes for the first ten years. And it was even allowed for them in certain cases to trade with English ships. So far this monopoly was only granted for ships belonging to members of the Dutch West India Company. The English came primarily from the English colonies in Barbados and Antigua, where they have suffered considerable Taxes and the local soil layers were not as productive as those in the Dutch colonies.

As a result of these granted concessions there were alone 7 English Estates on the islands Wakenaam, Leguan and the eatsern shores of the coastal region of the river Essequibo. Storm van's Gravensande decision to open the colony for English planters was a key development and accelerator of the colony Essequibo, and also later for Demerara. However, Pieter Marinus Netscher believes that this way the beginning of the end of the Dutch rule in this region was introduced. The reason for is in my eyes easy to see. Although the English planters access to English merchants for trade was limited. But the exchange of information to the mother country had to have nonetheless taken place. The exodus of planters from the British colonies could not have been happened unnoticed to the English customs. They must have noticed it with greedily curiosity. This interest in the three Dutch colonies should later be obvious. But Storm van's Gravensande could not have foreseen this development. He did that what was in his time the most important thing for the colony: He brought immigrants with money and ready for action in the colonies Essequibo and Demerara. Both were badly needed. [273] [274]

But it seems not all was to the satisfaction of the Zeeland chamber. In a letter dated August 24, 1744, there was the proposal on the taxation of exports of rum and molasses. In addition, the commander has been told to pay more attention to the production of sugar and and to ensure to limit the production of rum or molasses and to prevent the production of the latter ones at the expense of the former. Apparently the new Englishman a different economic perspective than their Dutch colleagues. [275] The situation of limited supply due to the war intensified in the years 1745-46. [276]

 Another colony emerges: Demerara


Map from Storm van's Gravesande (August, 1748)
In 1746, Storm van's Gravensande proposed the region around the river Demerara as a new colony and subordinate to the colony Essequibo. IThe local area was well suited for sugarcane and cotton. As the plantations of indigo and coffee were declining, these two plants gained more and more importance. The first Permit Certificate for a sugar cane plantation in Demerara went to a certain Andries Pieterse from Essequibo. After 6 months, there were already all 18 large sugar cane plantations, and also an undisclosed number of smaller plantations. It is also largely thanks to the English immigrants that sugar and cotton became more and more important to the Dutch colonies in the region. [277] [278]

A map from Storm van's Gravensande drawn in August 1748 showed 110 plantations on the Essequibo and a list of at least 37 names / plantations with the specific amount of acreage of land along the river Demerara. [279] In 1750 Storm van's Gravensande complained about the lack of horses. A lot of sugar cane was unharvested and left to rot on the fields due to the shortage of horses needed for the mills. He also mentions nineteen mills in Essequibo and three in Demerara. [280]

According Netscher the trade in the colony was only limited to members of the Zeeland chamber. And this fact was the reason why Essequebo did not make any great progress. This limitation was the main why only a few ships made their way to the colonies and brought the goods back to the Dutch Republic. This bottleneck was the reason for many letters full of complaints from the planter class addressed to the council of the X of the DWIC. The Council saw the distinct difference of development, especially in comparison to the colony of Berbice, were the free trade to all Dutch merchants was allowed since 1732. The council decided to change this on a meeting on August 11, 1750. The planters should be allowed to sell their goods to other Dutch colonies and it should also be allowed for private traders throughout the WIC to trade the colony. Of course, the protest of the Zeeland chamber was inevitable, which saw its interests in Essequibo in danger and insisted on their right. The dispute remained unresolved for the time being. [281]

Map from 1759 with notes
Source: dpc.uba.uva.nl
In 1750, Storm van's Gravensande reported to the directors the erection of five additional mills and some problem with English traders, who smuggled goods or intentionally made false statements of their cargo in order to pay lesser tax. [282] It is almost hard to believe, but the internal political dispute between the Council and the Zeeland Chamber lasted until the year 1770. Finally, the Stadthalter of the Dutch Republic decided in a arbitral verdict that the Zeeland chamber does not have the sole monopoly of the colony of Essequibo. But the chamber were granted some trade privileges. It was only permitted for merchants of the other chambers to trade with the colony until the 16th ship with goods from the Zeeland chamber reached the colony of Essequibo. This was annual. Only then the trade with the colony was allowed for the other chambers of the DWIC. [283]

According Netscher there were about 60 plantations along the Essequibo and its islands and only 12-14 cotton plantations along the coasts in 1770. The exact number of coffee and sugar cane plantations is not mentioned there. In Demerara, there were at this time 130 plantations, which usually planted sugar cane and coffee. Alone 1/3 of these plantations belonged to British owners. [284]

But the conflict was not settled by the arbitration of 1770. He continued to smolder and was about to turn again into an open conflict when the Council of the X intervened directly in the administration of the colony in 1772. This action outraged the Zeeland Chamber, who looked at it as their right alone to decide on the matters in Essequibo, because only she was competent enough for this. The council had enough and decided to put an end to this dispute. In the beginning of 1773 the Zeeland Chamber was officially informed of a resolution by the Council of X, that the Council was quite competent enough, as he was in charge of the central and general administration of the WIC. It was further argued that the Zeeland chamber had no more right in the matters of the administration of the colonies than any other chamber within the DWIC [285]

The Council also decided to seperate the thriving colony of Demerara from the stagnant body of the mother colony Essequibo in 1773. Later this year the colony Demerara was greater than its mother colony Essequibo. Netschier wrote: "The child had outgrown the mother.” ("het child what de moeder ontwassen!") [286] In 1775, the American Revolutionary War began (1775-1783). [287] This led inevitably to quarrels among the nations in Europe, which were either on the same side with England or they sympathized obviously with the Rebels. The Republic of the United Netherlands was drawn into this conflict. The fourth English-Dutch War (1780-1784) brought again the war to the Dutch colonies in the West Indies. [288]

In February 1781 Sir George Brydges Rodney appeared off the coast of the Dutch colonies. On February 24 commander Schulyenberg surrendered with the colony Demerara. He was succeeded on March 8 by commander Trotz in Essequibo. The last colony Berbice capitulated through governor Koppiers only a few days later to the British troops. [289] [290] [291] [292] [293] [294] [305] But the storm was not over. France fought alongside with the Netherlands on side of the rebels. So it was only a matter of time before the French also appeared in Guiana. The French Captain Armand de Kersaint appeared on 30 January 1782 before the colony Demerara. Until 15 February de Kersaint conquered without much resistance the three Dutch colonies Berbice, Essequibo and Demerara. [295] [296] [297]

Washington Crossing the Delaware 
by Emanuel Leutze (1851)
[The American War of Independece (1775-83)]
After the conquest in 1782, the French set up a city on the east bank of the river DemeraraIt was the city Longchamps, or "La nouvelle ville" ("The New City"), as it was at that time also called on a map of 1783. In the Treaty of Paris in 1783, with which also ends the American Revolutionary War, the Dutch regained the controle of the colonies Berbice, Essequibo and Demerara. In March 1784, the French finally left the colonies and the Dutch regained control. After the withdrawal of the French troops in 1784, the Dutch renamed the city in Stabroek. [298] [299] [300] Finally, Stabroek became the capital of the united colony of Demerara and Essequibo in 1789. At the top of the colony is now a governor. Thus, the separation of 1773 was indeed undone again, but Essequibo was no longer the center of the colony but Demerara. [301]

The battle of Dogger-Bank
Forth Anglo-Dutch War (1780-1784)
Source: commons.wikimedia.org
At the end of 1791, the second charter of the Dutch West India Company was coming to an end. Due to the numerous losses and due to the consequences of war and the reoccupation of the colony in Guiana from 1781 to 1784 it was decided not to renew the charter of the DWIC. Despite massive financial support from the Republic of the Seven United Provinces of Holland in 1784, the DWIC was no longer solvent and thus on December 31, 1791 ended their existence. The colonies became a possession of the Republic on 1 January 1792. Thus the colonies were freed from the shackles and limitations of the Dutch West India Company. [302] However, this should not introduce large gains because the time of the Dutch in this region was about to end.


Admiral George Brydes Rodney
(1718 - 1792)
Source: en.wikipedia.org
In 1793, France declared war on the old Dutch Republic. Eventually the French troopsconquered the Dutch Republic until 1795. On January 19, 1795, the successor state, the Batavian Republic, was proclaimed. [303] This nation was now in an alliance with France. England itself was at war with France and its allies (Anglo-French-War 1793-1802). The new Batavian Republic was automatically declared an enemy of England. [307] This had an immediate effect on the Dutch colonies. On April 20, 1796, an English fleet reached the coast of Demerara. Two days later, on April 22, the colony of Demerara and Essequibo surrendered and was taken by the English [305] [306] On May 2, also the colony of Berbice surrendered to the British troops. From 1796 to 1802, the colonies remained in the possession of England. [303]

In peace to Amiens in 1802 between England and Napoleonic France, Spain and the Batavian Republic, the English handed back the colonies Essequibo, Demerara and Berbice to the Dutch. [308] [309] The peace was short-lived, as the terms of peace on the part of France have not been completely fullfilled and these were already more than unfavorable for England. And so England declared war to France on May 18, 1803. [310] The British Commodore Samuel Hood & Lieut.-General William Greenfield appeared off the coast of the Guiana and the colony Demerara and Essequibo surrendered on 19 September. On September 26, the colony of Berbice followedsuit. This time, the colonies remained in the possession of England. [312] [313] [314] With the British-Dutch treaty in 1814, the three colonies have been formally ceded to England. Thus ended the Dutch history in this region. [314] [315] [316]



The private colony of Berbice 

The history of the colony of Berbice begins in 1627. In the said year the Dutch government gave a concession to the house Van Pere to develop a colony in the river Berbice. This agreement was signed by Abraham Van Pere on July 12. He was a merchant from the town of Vlissingen and also a director of the Zeeland chamber. He was allowed to take 60 colonists with him. [317] [318] [319] After some delays Abraham Van Pere left Europe on September 24 in the direction of Berbice. [319] According to Netscher it was a private company. So there was no real correspondence as in the other two colonies and, accordingly, one finds relatively little about these early days. The terms of the contract were changed and adapted over the course of time. The first change was already on 8 March 1628 then again in 1632. On June 18, Abraham Van Pere Junior and Peter van Rhee were included in the contract. This last change was again amended on 20 May 1660 and lasted until 1678. [320] But more on that later. After expiration of the first Charter and with the beginning of the second DWIC some difficulties appeared. [251]

The second DWIC claimed with its founding next to the colony Essequibi also the colony Berbice. The house Van Pere however insisted on the aforementioned existing treaties that have changed the last time around 1660. But the Council of the second DWIC expressed that all contracts made with the first DWIC were annulled when the company was dissolved. The dispute was only settled in 1678. A new resolution occurred on 14 September and confirmed the possession the possession of the colony to the house of Van Pere. [321] It was once again a private colony and not a subordinate to the Council of X. [321]

Map of Berbice ca. 1720 [188]
Source: en.wikipedia.org
With the beginning of the Nine-Year's-War (1688-97) between France and the Republic of the United Netherlands, the first serious time for the colony began. [256] After an unsuccessful attack on Surinam some French privateers under the squadron of the French Admiral du Casse raided the colony Berbice in 1689. After they have plundered and burned down some plantations the commander of the colony was forced to pay a ransom of 20,000 guilders to avoid further damage to the colony. However, the payment could be pushed down to 6,000 guilders and some barrels of sugar. This was made possible due to an exchange of prisoners. The commander of the colony of Surinam van Scharphuysen managed to capture some of the privateers in the unsuccessful attack. [322]

Jacques Cassard (1679 - 1740)
Source: fr.wikipedia.org
The colony was again granted some peace. This, however, was interrupted by the War of Spanish Succession (1701-1714). [262] This time it was no normal looting. A French fleet under Admiral Cassard was sent to attack the colonies of Holland in 1712. Admiral Cassard managed to conquer the colony Surinam and extort the enormous sum of 622.800 guilders. A small unit of three ships and 600 men under the command of Baron de Mouans was sent to the neighboring colony of Berbice. On 8 November 1712, they reached the river Berbice. After a brief and unsuccessful negotiations, the French bombarded the fort Nassau from the evening of 11 November to 14 November. On 15 and 16 November was finally re-negotiated a surrender of the colony. An Agreement was reached for a payment of 300.000 guilders, of which 118.024 guilders were to be paid in the form of slaves and goods and 181 976 guilders in the form of a promissory note, signed by the commander de Watermannde. On December 8, the French left the looted colony. [323] [324] [325] [326] [327]

The Master van Pere, Johan and Cornelius van Pere, however refused to pay the promissory note of the French. The document came into the possession of a French company in Marseille on 13 September 1713. This company had no interest in the colony and tried to sell them to Dutch merchants. The merchants Nicolas and Hendrik van Hoorn, Arnold Dix and Pieter Schuurmann were willing to purchase the colony for the sum of 108,000 guilders. However, the Dutch West India Company had a monopoly on the slave-trade from Africa. After the merchants had arranged an agreement with the Dutch West India Company for a supply of slaves, the French had carried off the best slaves as a ransom replacement, the colony was formally handed over to the new owners on November 28, 1714.

However, the Dutch West India Company did not come to its promise, partly because they had to supply too many colonies, and so the slave trade did not materialize. This bottleneck brought the colony to the brink of ruin. The new owners decided to obtain fresh capital in 1720 and eventually founded a society. This had 1600 shares, each carrying 2,000 guilders. After some financial difficulties seven directors were given the supervision of the society, with headquarters in Amsterdam, and met for the first time on October 4, 1720. [328]

Map of Berbice 1764
Source: www.gahetna.nl
After several unsuccessful expeditions in search of gold and silver into the deeper inland the attention of the directors focused on the development of the colony itself, and within a short time eight new plantations were established in 1723. However, the Dutch West India Company was unreliable as regards the supply of slaves from Africa and so there were only a few slaves on these plantations. [329]

In 1732 the firm acquired a large measure of independence from the DWIC. Instead of a certain sum per ship they had only to pay a annual fee to the Dutch West India Company. This ultimately still had a monopoly on the slave trade in the Dutch colonies, of which the colony Berbice was dependent. In addition, they opened the colony for any Dutch. Therefore Berbice did not possess the inhibiting bottleneck of Essequibo for a long time because the chamber Zeeland was too focused on their own interests and thus were the reason why Essequibo was not a thriving colony. Only the seafaring was further restricted. The ships were only permitted to travel between the Dutch Republic and the colony of Berbice. It was not allowed to travel to any other colonies of the WIC or other nations. [330]

In 1733, the society had 12 own plantations: De Dageraad, de Goede Hoop, de Berg (später Johanna), West-Souburg, Vlissingen, Cornelia Jacoba, de Peereboom, de Markjeij, Hardenbroek, East-Sourburg und Savonette. Nine of them were sugar cane plantations. On the other estates was coffee, cocoa and cotton cultivated. [331] On May 18, 1735 the Directors of the society decided to pay out a dividend of 4% to the shareholders. According to Netscher, this proved to be a major error. In the following years the society was unable to repair the Fort Nassau decently because they had not the money to do so. This has been constantly postponed until the fort was abandoned immediately in the slave revolt in 1763 because it was indefensible and in a pitiful state. [333] According to Netscher there are on a map of the pioneer January Daniel Knapp 93 private plantations on the River Berbice and the Wironje Creek and up to 20 on Canje Creek dated around 1740. There were no plantations in the coastal region of the river . [334]

Map of Berbice ca. 1780 (1771) [187]
Source: en.wikipedia.org
On 5 July 1762 a small mutiny occurred on the plantations Goedland and Goed Fortuin. 36 slaves plundered the plantations and fled into the nearby woods. It cost the colonists a few weeks to curb the rebellion and was just a small foretaste of the following events that would soon befall the colony. [335] On February 23, 1763 the uprising of the slaves began on the plantation Magdalenenburg.This uprising became a veritable conflagration. On February 25, the rebels attacked the plantation Providence. A day earlier, the governor Van Hooge learned that hostile Accoway Indians attacked a post near the plantation Van Hoogenheim. This event sparked the slaves and encouraged them to exploit the weakness of the Dutchman for an uprising. The news of the uprising spread like wildfire to the Canje Creek. There, the slaves rebelled almost at the same time against their masters. On February 28, the governor learned of this tragedy. Also, that the slaves of the private plantations Lilienburg, Juliana, Hollandia und Zeelandia, Elisabeth and Alexandra murdered their masters and set the buildings on fire except on the plantations Hollandia and Zeelandia. 

The brains behind this uprising were the slaves Coffy, Accara and two further unnamed ringleader. These slaves originally belonged to the plantation Lilienburg. On 4 March occurred some dramatic scenes. Many settlers were slaughtered in a bestial manner, including the major-surgical of the colony Dr. Jan Jacob Baas, which was accused by the slaves to have poisoned some slaves with poor medicine. On 6 March, the governor sent a few confidantes with a request for help to the governor of the colony of Surinam Mr. Crommelin. While the survivors endured in the military post St. Andries it was due to differences among the rebels which lead to internal fights between the rebel slaves. Coffy then committed suicide. 
Finally the rebels could be defeated by reinforcements from Suriname and St. Eustatius. On March 26 of the year 1764, the last leader of the rebellion was brought in chains before Van Hoogenheim. But Accara, one of the ring-leaders of the uprising, was still free and was only captured in April and presented to the Governor in chains on April 15. On April 27, 34 slaves were sentenced to death. The rest of the prisoners came back to the fields. The sentence was carried out on the following day. 17 of them were hanged, 8 were brokenm on the wheel and the last 9 were burned, including 7 in a particularly brutal manner by slow fire. The Dutch had proved at this moment to be as cruel as the slaves who rose only against their inhumane conditions and according to Netscher, the salves were ill treated by their Dutch masters. The Dutch slave masters were very cruel. [336] [337]

Map of Berbice 1802
Source: www.wdl.org
To prevent further bloodshed, the governor punished all plantation owners, who abused their slaves again. However, all members of the court themselves were plantation owners and therefore this also concerned themselves. This was the reason why the penalties were only mild. On May 26, 1765, his successor Johannes Heijliger arrived in Berbice and Van Hoogenheim left the colony. In 1766, a severe earthquake struck the Dutch colonies of the coast home. [339] The colony made no great progress and was only bobbing up and down between 1764 and 1778. The plantation owners refused to pay taxes for the benefit of the colony and to repair the damage caused by the slave uprising. The various governors in each period were either undecided (such as Heijliger) to idle or died after a relatively short time. The lack of money was also reflected in the state of defense and this was not repaired of the damage caused by the slave uprising in 1763. The colony stagnated. This went so far that between the years 1768 to 1772 the plantations of Berbice were unsaleable (in the sense of no one wanted to buy them). [340]

Armand de Kersaint (1742 - 1793)
Conqueror of Demerara,
Essequibo and Berbice in 1782
Source: en.wikipedia.org
Only with the recent appointment of Pieter Hendrik Koppiers as a governor it seemed that apromising man had been won for the colony. He was sworn in on 19 June 1778 in Holland and arrived in the colony in October. His first job was to record the status quo of defense of the colony. This he then reported to the directors in Holland, which appointed immediately on his recommendation the capable Jan Carel Willem Herlin. This man should bring the defense of the colony within a few years at a decent level. After the issue of salary and the funding was clarified Jan Carel Willem Herlin undertook trip to Berbice in summer 1779. However, the trip turned out to be a little tedious, so he reached the colony 28 March of the year 1780. He soon began his work. The Fort St. Andries and the post Niewslot should be fortified in such a way that it would be not possible for a frigate or privateer ship to reach the colony. However, these efforts, as we shall see later came far too late. [341]

The fourth English-Dutch War (1780-1784) broke out and threatened the colonies. [288] As already written above Sir George Brydges Rodney appeared off the coast of Dutch Guianas in February 1781. The other two colonies quickly surrendered to the English troops and the colony of Berbice followed suit in March. [289] [290] [291] [292] [293] [294] The colony was only freed from the English by French troops. The French Captain Armand de Kersaint appeared before the colony Demerara on 30 January 1782. Until 15 February de Kersaint conquered the three Dutch colonies Berbice, Essequibo and Demerara back without much resistance. [295] [296] [297] After the war the colonies were returned back to Holland in 1784. [299] [300]

Sir Ralph Abercromby (1734 - 1801)
Source: en.wikipedia.org
With the expiry of the second Charter the situation changed radically end 1791. While the colonies of DWIC came into the possession of the Republic of the United Netherlands in 1792, the society still owned the colony of Berbice. But the claims of the society were declared null and void (as well as the private business venture in Suriname) on 9 October 1795. A committee consisting of 21 members took immediate control of the colonies. However, [342] This control did not last long. France conquered the United Netherlands during the French Revolutionary War and the Batavian Republic was declared. [303] This prompted, as written before, the declaration of war on the Dutch Republic by England. Again the English appeared before Berbice and on May 3, 1796, the Dutch governor Van Batenburg surrendered and the colony fell into the hands of England. [343]

In the peace of Amiens Berbice was given back to the Dutch. But war broke out anew on May 18, 1803. [308] [309] [310] The English General Greenfield conquered the colonies again. England conquered by General Greenfield again the three colonies. (Commodore Samuel Hood & Lieut.-General William Greenfield). On September 19, the colony of Demerara & Essequibo surrendered. The capitulation of Berbice took place on September 26. [312] [313] [314] This time, however, the colonies remained in the possession of England. Through the British-Dutch treaty in 1814 Berbice, Demerara and Essequibo were formally ceded to England. [314] [315] [316] Thus ended the history of the Dutch rule on the River Berbice.


The colony of British Guiana


The boundary lines of British Guiana
in 1898
Source: en.wikipedia.org
Even before the unification of the three colonies, the city Stabroek was renamed to Georgetown in honor of King George the Fifth on 5 May 1812. [347] [348] In 1823 a major slave uprising threatened the colony. Rumors about the emancipation enticed the slaves to believe that their liberation was imminent. This rumor spread like wildfire and the subsequent disappointment that followed aroused the anger of the slaves. On August 17 of 1823 they rose up against their English masters. On August 19, martial law was proclaimed in the colony. On August 21 there was a skirmish between British troops and nearly 2,000 slaves. The following day, the governor offered all slaves a pardon if they surrendered immediately. However, this pardon was granted for the instigators of the uprising. In the end of August, the ring-leaders were put to death and hanged. [344] The martial law, however, was not lifted until January 19, 1824. [345] 


The three former Dutch colonies were finally united in 1831. On July 21, 1831, the first Governor of British Guiana, Sir Benjamin d'Urban, was sworn in. [346] While the British slave trade was already abolished in 1807, the slavery existed until 1838. It was in 1833 when the Act of Emancipation passed the British parliament, which provided the abolition of slavery on August 1, 1834. However, the planters of the West Indies had used influence and so after this date the so-called apprenticeship' began. What was this? In short: The owner was now called the master and the slave was now an apprentice and the latter still had to work for free for the former. It did not change much serious and many Slaves saw this 'apprenticeship' as that what it de facto was: An extension of their period of suffering in slavery. This apprenticeship was to last about six years and affected all slaves over the age of 6 years. So it also included child labour. [349] [350] These decisions are, from today's perspective, considered very immorally and very dubious. 


The coat of arms of Guyana [189]
Source:  http://commons.wikimedia.org
The British government saw their mistake and reduced the duration of the apprenticeship to four years. Slavery was finally abolished in the British colonies on August 31, 1838. [351] In this year, the first Indian labourers arrived in British Guiana. This was due to the planters and their want for cheap workers. There was a reason for this: The whole system was only profitable enough with the use of cheap labor. In addition, the former slaves had not forgotten their treatment and so they left the plantations. This cheap replacement workers now came from Asia and Europe. However, the Chinese and European immigrants did not seem to be suited for the harsh conditions on the plantations. Also, Portuguese from Madeira came to British Guiana as a disease among the vine-hills in their home-country destroyed their livelihoods. [351] [356] The main stream of the mass of workers were undeniably the workers from India (called by the English as "Coolies"). This Inidan Indentured Labour Immigration lasted until the year 1917 and brought a total of 238 909 Indian workers to British Guiana. [352] [353] 

The death rate of the Indian workers, however, was so high that the Indian government suspend the emigration of the workers for two time periods. The first suspension was from 1839 to 1844 and the second was between 1848 and 1851 (for Trinidad and British Guiana). Jamaica was even cut off until 1860. Apparently, the plantation owners treated their workers not much better than their slaves before . [354] [355] In between, there were also immigrants from China. In 1853, two ships reached with the Chinese workers colony. Between 1859 and 1866 regular Chinese workers arrived at the colony British Guiana. However, this flow came to a halt in 1866 as the Chinese government insisted that the workers should be brought back to the motherland at the expense of the colony. However, the aim of the emigration was not the return of the workers and so few Chinese came only in 1874 and 1878 to the colony before this source dried up for good. [357] 
The crisis in the sugar market 1884-85 hit the colony especially hard, since they mainly produced sugar and its by-products. From this point on rice began to replace sugar more and more. The situation of the workers, however, did not change and remained at a low level. As the colony was almost exclusively dependent on the sugar industry, it was of course particularly vulnerable to incidents in this business. Riots and strikes were not the exception but rather the rule in British Guiana. The first major was held at the plantation Leonora in 1869 and swept over to the plantations Malgre Tout La Jalousie. This “uprising” was relatively “harmless”, since no one was killed. The reason were the low wages the workers on the plantations received for their work. [412] [413]

Forbes Burnham & Jeddi Chagan 1953
Source: www.guyanagraphic.com
The next major incident occurred on the plantation Devonshire Castle in Essequibo in September 1872. Again, the reason was too low wages. In an attempt to disperse the gathered people the police advanced to the crowd. There was a scuffle between the workers and the police. Then suddenly a shot from a weapon of a police officer sparked order. Thereafter, some further police officers fired on the crowd with the result of 5 dead and 8 wounded. Rthis brought an swift end to the uprising. The next incident took place on the Uitvlugt property in October of 1873. No one was harmed, but this was the mere result of a massive police presence and the command for loading the weapons. Again, low wages were the reason. In the uprising on the plantation Non Pareil in 1896, the stumbling block was the lowk pay, which culminated in a shootout with 5 dead people and 59 wounded. [412] [414]

British Troops marching in British Guiana 1954
Source: guyaneseonline.wordpress.com
The next incident was in 1903 at the plantation Friends (Berbice), which killed 6 people and 7 wounded, and in 1905 at the plantation Ruimveldt where 7 people died and 17 were seriously wounded. [361] [362] [38] Only through the use of armed British forces the order could be restored. In September of 1912, another worker was shot down on the plantation Leonora. Again, the reason was the dissatisfaction with the low wages for the workers. In 1913, another incident occurred. This time it concerned the plantation Rose Hall in Berbice. This time 14 people died by gun shots. It is said that this incident brought the Government of India to the decision to stop immigration from India to the West Indies because the victims were mainly Indian immigrants. In 1917, the Indian government finally stopped the emigration of indentured workers. [412] [39] [58]

The next major incident occurred in 1924. What began as a peaceful strike in Georgetown resulted in a violent uprising. The military and the police stopped people coming from the plantations lying in south of the country on their way to Georgetown on the plantation Ruimveldt. After reading the Riot Act the command for shooting was given to disperse the people as the crowd refused to dissolve. 13 people were killed and 18 wounded. [412] [59] The Great Depression in the 1930s years hit British Guiana very hard and many people lost their jobs due to the low prices of export products of the colony. During this time, the working class was aware of the fact that they had no political representation. [363] What followed was another incident in 1939 at the plantation Leonora. Again 4 strikers were killed by police bullets and four others were wounded. [412] [419] Till the end of the second world war there was no further unrest in the colony. But trouble was brewing. This time it concerned the plantation Enmore. Here in April 1948 during a strike five more workers died trough bullets. Nine were wounded. The monument "Enmore Martyrs" was built in their honour. [105] [360] [420] [412] It is said, that this very event lead to the establishment of the PPP in 1950 with their leader Jeddi Chagan.

The last major violent incident before the independence of the country occurred in February 1957 the plantation Skeldon in Berbice. Here at a strike 17 workers were injured by a shot from a "Greener" gun (a shotgun) after tear gas had been used before. But there were also political crises in British Guiana, in which even one America was involved. [412] [421]

The flag of Guyana
Source: en.wikipedia.org
In 1928, the colony was given a new constitution and it became a crown colony. [358] [359] Another constitutional amendment in 1953 resulted in a new political system consisting of two chambers, the lower House of Assembly and the upper State Council. With the next election on 27 April 1953 a severe political crisis was triggered in the country as the PPP (People's Progressive Party) under Jeddi Chagan won 18 of the 24 seats in the lower chamber and Chagan Jeddi became Prime Minister. This development was meet with concern and suspicion in England, since the MI5 classified this political movement and Jeddi Chagan as "communist". Winston Chruchill was forced to act and sent British troops and a warship, the HMS Superb, to British Guiana. The government was deposed on 9 October and the British Colonial Office took control over the colony. The Jagans were put under house arrest. Only some time later the Cuban Revolution (1953-59) occurred at the doorstep of America, which confirmed and also increased the wakefulness in England and America against communism. H However, this event could not stop the independence of Guyana. This crisis has been largely forgotten in Europe. In memory, however, remained stuck the nuclear threat in Cuba by Russian rocket in October 1962 and the embargo against the island nation which is still in power to this day. [371] 

On May 26, 1966, the former British colony of British Guiana becomes independent and is since that day called Guyana.Guyana is a melting pot, consisting mostly of Indian and African influences. This is owed due to the immigration waves of the former upper class, the planters. The PPP (People's Progressive Party) and the PNC (People's National Congress) dominate the political landscape and the two mainstreams of the population (Afro-and Indo-Guyanese) can be found in them. The history of British Guiana ends here.


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Chapter 2 
-
The plantations in British Guiana 

Map of Berbice ca. 1780 (1771) [187]

Allegedly every sugar plantation had its own distillery in the 18th and 19th century. Whether this is true or not is next to impossible to check.There were at least 189 sugar plantations and only 19 cotton plantations and 71 coffee plantations listened in the two regions Demerara and Essequebo (or Essequibo) in a report on the slave population and their development in the colony of British Guiana dated back to 1832. However, some plantations had more than one cultivation. So there were "only" 153 plantations which exclusively harvested sugar cane. [16] Some of these sugar plantations were Enmore (coffee & sugar), La Bonne Intention (sugar), Ogle (sugar), Great Diamond and Little Diamond (coffee & sugar), Versailles (sugar and coffee), Schoon Ord & Meerzorg (coffee & sugar ) and Grooten Klyn Uitvlugt (sugar and coffee). The sugar cane plantations from Berbice are not listed here (Albion, Blairmont, Skeldon and Port Mourant). 

Essequebo, Demerara & Berbice [191] 
Source : http://commons.wikimedia.org
A book published by Robert Montgomery Martin from 1840 states the number of 154 regarding sugar plantations in the regions Berbice and Essequibo for 1831. From these 154 plantations were only 31 situated in the region Berbice. [22] A list of names is not mentioned. If you bear in mind that slaves were working under harsh conditions on those plantations, then most of the names sound more than cynical. There were "Vive La Force" (sugar), Garden of Eden (sugar), New Hope (sugar) and Good Intention (sugar). I know that you can also see this another way, namely from the perspective of the owners. But if you look back from the future into the past then most of these names sound a little condescending to contemptuous, if you have the fate of the slaves in mind. Only the well-known and still surviving sugar cane plantations are might known to the connoisseur. Smaller plantations were either given up or absorbed by these bigger survivors over the centuries.

The rum from British Guiana

Dark rums coming from Guyana
Rum has a long tradition in British Guiana. The rum which I call Demerara Dark can be traced back to the mid 19th century. [46] Its origins could go back to the 17th century. In the 19th century most all sugar plantations used for colouring rums what was easily available. Notably, they took caramel, which was prepared from muscovado sugar (unrefined brown sugar). Some plantations even preferred to produce rum instead of sugar. Of course there was also uncoloured rum sold as well. But according to the source, the trend began to reverse. In order go get more sugar they used vacuum pans combined with heating the molasses. Until the use of this technology, the molasses was converted to a large extent in either rum or exported to England. [47] This method of extracting sugar was patented in 1813 by Charles Howard and began its way into into the West Indies. The first vacuum pan was used in 1832 by John Gladstone on his property Vreede-en-Hoop in Demerara. [431] [423] [433] The sugar extracted by this method was much purer and cleaner than the brown and partly still moist muscovade sugar obtained via the common process. However, not everything was positive in this development. To this end, I will quote a German source from 1890 once:

"Der Zucker wird in flache Holzkasten entleert, von allem Schmutz und Knötchen sorgsam befreit, gemischt und entweder in Säcke oder in mit Papier ausgelegte Tonnen verpackt. Auserlesene schöne Partien kommen in kleinen Säckchen zum Versandt. – Der I. Ablauf wird mit Wasser verdünnt und so viel Kalk zugesetzt, bis das Gemisch alkalisch reagirt; darauf wird im besonderen Vacuum das Gemisch leicht eingekocht und, wenn fertig, in Krystallisationskasten oder Schalen gelassen. Nach etwa 14 Tagen ist die Krystallisation beendet und wird die Masse geschleudert. Der enthaltene Zucker II ist hell und feinkörnig; von gutem Geschmack und enthält 86 bis 88 Proc. Rohrzucker, er gelangt wie das I. Produkt ohne weitere Reinigung in den Handel als Consumzucker. Ist der für Nachprodukte ein lohnender, so wird der II. Ablauf nochmals eingekocht, wenn notwendig mit erneutem Kalkzusatz. Nach 4-6 monatigem Stehen erhält man daraus einen ganz ähnlichen Zucker wie das II. Produkt ist. Der entstandene III. Ablauf wird zu Rum verarbeitet; bemerkt sei hier noch, dass der Rum von dieser Arbeitsweise nicht so gut ist als der von Muscovadoplantagen erhaltene. -- Anstatt den I. Ablauf mit Kalk einzukochen, wurden gute Erfolge mit Soda angewandt." [434] 
 
A young rum from Guyana.
The molasses obtained from the closed vaccum pans thus had a poorer quality than those from the normal production process in open containers (open pan - common process). The same information can be found in old English literature. Why is this so? Because the vacuum pan molasses has less sugar in it than the common process molasses. This missing sugar and some other flavours can not influence the fermentation process anymore. So the quality of rum changed already in the 19th century with the increased efficiency of the sugar production. But molasses was always just a by-product of the sugar industry. The molasses was either being distilled to rum or sold as fodder for animals. To my knowledge, Jamaica was the only nation / island which hold on the old common process and also gave the production of rum a higher priority than the production of rum up until the 20st centuy. With the use of industrialized molasses from sugar big factories in some distilleries, the quality of this raw material has probably not increased further. It is rather reasonable to assume the opposite.

Rum from Guyana was often ranked behind the rum from Jamaica, when it comes to profit and the price of the rum in the 19th century. The reasons were not only the above mentioned decrease of the molasses in the 19th century. There were other reasons also accountable for this kind of change. Actually, there were two additional main reasons. They were mentioned in the report on the preparation and the contributors to the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867. First, the soil from which the sugar has been obtained, were salty on many plantations. You could even tasted this in the sugar cane juice. Second, the water temperature. On many plantations it was not possible to get the water under a temperature of 84 ° F (about 28.9 ° C) required for the distillation process (needed to condense the alcohol). This was no problem in Jamaica. The spring water from the mountains was cool enough. The exported rum from British Guiana had an average alcohol content of 35% OP. So about 77% abv per barrel on average. [47]

Another young rum from Guyana.
But not only the raw material for fermentation changed, but also the fermentation itself underwent a change in British Guiana. The Handbook of British Guiana from 1913 mentioned a fermentation time of 36-48 hours. This duration decreased even further to mere 28 hours in 1949. [435] [436] A footnote from Sashas Article indicates that DDL only has a fermentation time of 24 – 26 hours, regardless of what style is being distilled. The shorter the fermentation period, the poorer the taste. However, if it is the goal of the distilleryto produce a lot of rum with continuous stills then this method seems to be rational and logical. Why produce heavy congeners in the fermentation when they are not being allowed to end up in the final rum? It doesn't make much sense. However, this means in reverse also, the purer the rum, the tasteless and exchangeable he is compared to other products. In this context I would like to quote a text from an athor who wrote about this problem in 1967:  

„The flavour of the rum may differ from Martinique to Guyana, Puerto Rico to Trinidad (Caroni's home island), but the prices are much the same. Indeed, now that the continuous still is being used the rum flavours are matching each other more and more closely. The Cubans have in the past filtered rum through charcoal to rid it of the pungent 'con generics' that are so characteristic of the old and coarser or 'heavier' versions. Now the patent still can purify the spirit to its desirable modern characterlessness, leaving only the faintest contrasts between one Caribbean product and another.“ [437]

Four rums made with Port Mourant Vat Still
Specialization, mass customization or the simple old mass production? That is the key question for the distilleries. Many tread the final path, which is more than unfortunate but also logical in my eyes, because it is due to the global pressure of the international competition, which we owe to capitalism and globalization (cheap, fast & much). Others, however, pursue the mass customization strategy. What's this? It produces basic components in a kind of mass production, combines them and tries to satisfy different kinds of customers at the same time with their products and each with it's own marketing. So it is a kind of modular (assembly) system. Nearly all of us had something like this in the glass before. I'm talking about blends. Spiced rums are also a part of it. The raw material (rum) was cheaply made in great number and adapted to the palate of the different target audience. Both, blends and spiced rums, are (hopefully) made from rum and are containing different kinds of this modular (assembly) system. These modular parts are rums made with continuous or discontinuous stills. The latter ones are more expensive then the first ones and contain more heavy flavours. Rums with less flavour to almost neutral alcohol are being produced in continuous stills. The resulting products or blends are combined by these basic rums. Only in the early stages of a small distillery you may find the specialization strategy. The same goes, whether young or old-established distillery: big distilleries can't and don't want to finance themselves with such a strategy. The target group is too small and special. The income gained is too small to sustain the distillery.


More rums made with the Port Mo(u)rant Vat Still
Back to British Guiana in the 19th century.One source lists for the London International Exhibition in 1862 following plantations which have contributed rum: Houston (4 YO, Demerara), Montrose (Pot Still, Demerara), Better Hope (Demerara), Greenfield (Demerara, Patent Steam Still), Smythfield (Steam Still, Berbice) and Providence (Berbice). [178] 
A list of participants from the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867 listed the following sources: Schoon Ord, La Grange, Blairmont, Cumings Lodge, Goldstone Hall, Bee Hive, Taymouth Minor, Rose Hall, Nismes, Montrose, Mon Repos, Hope, Hope and Experiment, Adelphi, Anna Catharina and Great Diamond. [47] Including many coloured rum samples. 

This time there were much more plantations at the next Paris Universal Exhibition in 1878: Anna Catharina, Aurora, Blairmont, Chateau Margot, Cornelia Ida, Cane Grove, Cove and John, De Willem, Great Diamond, Greenfield, Houston, Herstelling, Helena, Hope, La Grange, La Resouvenir, La Union, La Bonne Intention, Leonora, Lusignan, Melville, Mon Repos, Metenmeerzorg, Ogle, Providence (D.C. / Demerara Coast; actual west bank Demerara river), Peter's Hall, Philadelphia, Ruimveldt, Rose Hall, Smythfield, Stewartville, Success (E.C. / East Coast; Demerara), Tuschen de Vrienden, Uitvlugt, Vreed en Hoop, Wales, Windsor Forest, Zeeburg, Zeelugt. [194] 
The names changed again on the Calcutta International Exhibition of 1883/84. At least the following plantations were mentioned: Chateau Margot, La Bonne Intention, Cane Grove, Leonora, Farm, Belle Plaine, Enterprise, Taymouth Manor, Cornelia Ida, Reliance Tuschen de Vrienden. [226] 

A source from 1893 mentioned again some plantations, which were represented at the Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago with rum samples: Peter's Hall, Success, Anna Regina, Cane Grove (Cave Grove gab es nicht), Hope, Houston, La Bonne Mere, La Bonne Intention, La Jalousie, Maryville, Melville, Nismes, Ogle, Port Mourant, Rose Hall, Schoon-Ord, Skeldon, Tuschen-de-Vrienden, Uitvlugt, Versailles and Wales. Wales and Nismes offered uncoloured rums only. All the other plantations had both, coloured and uncoloured rums. [179] 

Another source stated that Port Mourant produced coloured rum in 1927. [57] Bottlings from Cadenhead, Berry Bros & Rudd and Bristol Spirits Limited from 1974 and 1975 were such coloured rums from the double wooden pot still. However, they were not distilled at Port Mourant itself, but in the Uitvlugt Distillery and are paying tribute to this old style. Many of the names listed here disappeared forever from the memory of most people. Many of these plantations also had a sugar factory, which is indirectly confirmed in the catalogs of the Exhibitions provided by the sugar samples.


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Chapter 3
-
Production and export of rum in British Guiana 

Rum-Blends created with rums from Guyana
Where has all the rum gone? While the rum from Jamaica were shipped mainly to the UK, Germany and the United States, the rum from British Guiana went mostly to the UK, Canada and other British possessions of the time. This is stated by a source from 1938. [90] So relatively shortly before the invasion of the Wehrmacht in Poland and the beginning of the apocalypse of the modern times. Germany has traditionally been interested only in rum from Jamaica. Demeraras were relatively unknown in this country. 

Rum and sugar are inseparable. Especially the sugar had a very turbulent and chaotic history. Lets begin with the 19th century. The expected collapse of the sugar market with the end of slavery in 1838 did not occur in British Guiana. But the Sugar Duties Act in 1846, which equated all imported sugars with a tariff, came down very hard on the economy of the colony. The full changeover was not finished before 1854. The last refuge for colonial sugar in the British Empire was gone. The British colonies had now to prevail against countries such as Cuba and Brazil, which still used cheap slaves for the hard work on the plantations. [93] [94] 

The price stabilized again until around 1880 for a few years until the first real major crisis struck the sugar market in the mid-1880s. This crisis was caused mainly by massive subsidized beet sugar in Europe. Some countries, including France, Germany, Holland, Belgium, Russia and Austria, outbid each other with subsidies. About 1884 cheap beet sugar flooded the UK market and also began to enter the American market. More trouble for sugar from British Guiana came from some British sugar producers, which coloured their sugar with yellow dye to make it visually equal with the Demerara sugar which was very prevalent at that time in the English grocery stores. [95] [96] [97] Another drawback was the fact that European sugar producers used charcoal to extract all impure materials from the sugar to produce white sugar crystals. These sugar crystals had a significant optical advantage over the ugly grayish sugar from the colonies. [99]  

Finally, when the United States 1893 introduced an import duty on sugar the economy of the colony went downhill for whole 10 years. Many plantations were abandoned or went bankrupt. To get a feeling about the decrease of the sugar industry I will provide a table with the amount of acres being in canes and the number of active sugar estates in British Guiana during 1882 - 1896.[419] It is attributed to a source from 1896.

Year
Fiscal year
Number of sugar estates
Acres in canes
1882
(1881- 82)
106
79.262
1883
(1882-83)
104
79.037
1884
(1883-84)
105
79.502
1885
(1884-85)
105
75.344
1886
(1885-86)
105
76.200
1887
(1886-87)
97
76.560
1888
(1887-88)
96
76.625
1889
(1888-89)
96
78.271
1890
(1889-90)
95
79.243
1891
(1890-91)
96
78.307
1892
(1891-92)
79
76.100
1893
(1892-93)
74
69.814
1894
(1893-94)
70
68.321
1895
(1894-95)
65
67.921
1896
(1895-96)
64
65.908


You can see the change. Even with declining numbers of sugar estates the acreage remained stable or it even increased until 1890 before both inevitably decreased by the rise of beet sugar in Europe. Finally, in the fiscal year 1898-99 there were only 64 sugar estates left, of which 55 had a distillery. I do know them all by the name. The soaring of beet sugar did not change until the Brussels Sugar Act in 1902. This Act cut the subsidies in Europe on beet sugar. You can see the development of this period in the number of distilleries. While the number of distilleries in the fiscal year 1880-81 was 109 in British Guiana, there were only 53 distilleries left by 1901-02. Last one is stated by a source from 1903. This was one year after the Brussels Sugar Act. This is a reduction of 56 sugar estates which produced rum. [98] [89] This figure speaks for itself 

Prices remained relatively stable now until 1910. The great drought from August 1911 to April 1912 had a significant effect on the crops and also influenced the following year in 1913. [100] With the beginning of the first world war began a short time of prosperity on the sugar market. The war devastated the European sugar beet fields and sparked the need for Caribbean sugar and rum. But this golden age did not last long. After the war the access to the German market has been hampered by restrictions and the U.S. market was de facto closed in 1919 for rum from British Guiana with the beginning of the American prohibition. [101] [102]

Warehouse of Demerara Distillers Limited
Source: www.velier.it
The Great Depression of the '30s of the last century also left its mark on the sugar market. The demand was far lower than the supply. From 1930 to 1933 the exports of rum were decreased to a very low level (Table 9, 10 & 11). In 1933 the American Prohibition finally ended and the numbers increased slightly. From 1935, however, serious riots shook the British colonies. The highlight of this unrest culminated in British Guiana in 1939 on the plantation Leonora. What at first began with a strike for better payment eventually ended in a shootout with several deaths. These riots ended only with the beginning of the World War II. [103] [104] 

The remaining distilleries in British Guiana were only relieved again from the fluctuations on the sugar market with a world war. This can be beautifully seen on the export figures and the market value (see Table 12). In 1947 there were only 9 surviving distilleries left (see Table 1). All others had to either give up or amalgamated with larger rum producing plantations which survived the storm on the sugar market without harm. The consolidation of the distilleries remained in full gear and ended only after the independence of Guyana with the nationalization of all distilleries and sugar factories. In the years of Guyana's independence only 5 of the 9 distilleries were left. In his book Rum Dave Broom mentioned only three remaining distilleries in 1971. It has only one of these three distilleries managed to survive to this day. 

After the nationalization (1976) the Guyana Liquor Company (the holding company of DDL) made several serious changes. The first one was the modernization of the wharf in the Water & Schur Maker Streets in 1977 (to make it accessible for bulk-tankers). The next step was the building of the new bulk terminal for handling and loading of bulk tankers. Since that year rum from Guyana is almost exclusively transported in stainless steel tanks and no longer in barrels. Only if a customer explicitly wanted his rum in casks it was sold in barrels. At the beginning of the year 1978, the capacity of the warehouse was 250,000 gallons. [419]

How does the rum then comes into the barrel these days? It's simple. After the rum reached Europe it is there being barreld by the buyers or the warehouse owners. These originate either from their own stock, are purchased from distilleries or are imported. Sometimes there the casks are apparently used too often. The results are very pale fillings, as some bottlings from “Versailles” 1990 and the 1998 batch coming from the Uitvlugt distillery.

Importer for rums to the UK (Liverpool)
(This is a screenshot) 
Source: www.cylex-uk.co.uk
How does it come that nobody is checking the content of the barrels whether they are active or not ? Is there no quality management after all? Well, if you take a look at a picture of a distillery warehouse full of barrels then you might see why. In order to use the whole space height the barrels are placed one pallets and stacked. You could not even reach most of those barrels even if you want to check the content of them. A complete removal of those barrels to a more accessible area would be necessary to do a complete check. No distillery would do such a thing, regardless of the distillate (rum or whisky) being produced there. The great range of different stages of maturation is the problem of the blender. He has to create a stable blend out of different vintages with different stages of maturation or of flavours, even in the same batch. Some of the official bottlers are using burnt caramel in order to give the outcome the same optical appearences and maybe even to disguise the lack of maturation. Everything else would be too costly and no distillery manager would ever handle this “problem” by checking the contents of the barrels. The only ones who control the quality of their barrels and optionally are using a second ex-bourbon casks ("2nd Bourbon barrel") for an additional maturation are the independent bottler. The role of a single barrel is much greater here than in a distillery, who handles more than a few thousand new barrels every year. A single barrel or a few barrels who are sucked dry are making no difference in the great scheme of production.

The last vintage with delivery in barrels from Guyana to Europe was probably in 1977. But there were also practical reasons for this change. The authors Hugh Barty-King & Anton are mentioning these in her book Rum Rum Yesterday and Today. For 5,000 barrels were required for a shipment of 250,000 gallons of rum before the establishment of the new bulk terminal in 1978. There were 700 workers and 3 months needed to prepare the barrels for the journey and handling of the transfer. All this was reduced to one month and less than 100 workers after 1978. Rum has become a bulk commodity. The rum reached Liverpool (among a few other ports in Europe) and was transported from there to the respective buyers in the UK. [419] [420] [421]

If you have still the romantic vision of ships full of barrels with rum coming from Guyana to Europe, then please remove this image from your imagination. Those days are long gone. I got a confirmation of this practice from Doug McIvor, Spirits Manager of Berry Bros & Rudd on the Finest Spirits in Munich in 2014. Only a few island nations are still selling their rum in barrels. Guyana is no longer among them. One such company, that is based in Liverpool and deals with bulk rum, is "The Main Rum Company Limited". It is also involved in the trading of aged and unaged rums from the Caribbean, also from Guyana. [422] 

 
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Chapter 4 
-
The tradition of colouring 
Colouring does matter)

Coloured rums from the Enmore Distillery
 (Guyana, 20th century)
In 2011 when I entered the rum scene I have heard the rumor that there are rums from Guyana, whose barrels were treated with molasses and thus gave the connoisseur a real special experience in taste. However, I did not find a single evidence of it in 2013 while I was doing my research for the acrticle “The Demerara Distilleries 1.0” until I changed my search and thought patterns thoroughly. I came across an ancient manual made for planters in British Guiana in the 19th century. Inside of it were proposals and ideas how to run a sugar estate and a rum distillery. But this was not the only content. There was also the mentioning of how to colour rums. The procedure for the preparation of this colorant was explained. It was, of course, a kind of caramel. Here is an excerpt from the Manual of Plantership by Alexander Mac Rae from 1856:

“The proper manufacture of good colouring matter for rum is very important. For this purpose the best sugar should be selected and placed in sufficient quantity in a pan on an independent fire. The sugar must be constantly stirred with a wooden paddle during the action of the fire on the pan, in order to prevent its getting a singed taste or flavour ; and when it it comes to a consistency, making it difficult to keep it in motion with the paddle, the fire must be withdrawn, and high wines gradually added to it under the agitation of the paddle, until it comes to a consistency of thick cream, so that the whole will be perfectly dissolved. After this, it should be put into a cask placed on end, with two cocks, one about six inches from the bottom of the cask, the other about two inches from the bottom, and allow to remain undisturbed, in order to its depositing the sediment, until it runs off from the upper cock entirely free of sediment. It may the be used for colouring the rum, and about three pints of good colouring matter well concentrated ought to be sufficient for 100 gallons of spirit ; but different markets require different shades of colour, and to regulate the shade of colour the rum must be left to the judgment of the person entrusted therewith. Great care must always be taken that the colouring matter does not impart any cloudiness to the rum, because when rum is cloudy the value of it is greatly deteriorated. I would always recommend colouring matter to be made in large quantities, because the longer it is kept the purer it becomes.” [438] 

Coloured rumfrom the Uitvlugt Distillery
 (Guyana, 20th century)
The colouring matter was being produced with the material at hand: Muscovado sugar. It sounds very similar to the production of ordinary burnt caramel. The sugar was to be boiled in an open pan and was constantly being moved with a wooden paddle to avoid a singed taste. It is almost the same with creating a good sauce by using onions through baking them first. In order to prevent a burnt taste you have to catch the point before the onions are singed and the taste of the result is greatly changed. You don't want this to happen to the coluring matter. When the desired consistency has been reached the pan was removed from the fire and was being diluted down to a creamy consistency by using 'high wines'. They used rum to dilute the burnt caramel down to a desired degree. By ordinary burnt caramel this is done by using water.

This material was then stored in wooden barrels, which possessed two outlets. One was located 1 inch above from the bottom and the next one was 4 inches away from the first outlet. Why this? Its quite simply. The mixture was allowed to let heavy particulate matters settle down on the ground. These were unwanted in the final rum. The longer it is kept in a calm state the purer it becomes over the time as more particulate matters are settling down. To this end, I got the information that Luca Gargano (Velier SpA) reported how this colorant was stored in barrels in the past and thereby was used for the creation of different kinds of “marks” in British Guiana. This information comes probably from D.D.L.. This description was the perfect match of this procedure and verifies his statement. If one wanted to remove the sediment, so he opened the lower outlet. If one wanted to a portion of colouring matter, so he opened the upper outlet and added the burnt caramel to the rum.

Reference about the colouring matter 
Back label of Pussers Blue Label
There were no barrels which were lined or treated with molasses. They have never existed.But the myth arose from a certain effect, which struck some bottlers in the U.K., as they bottled some colored rums in the past. A German whisky bottler mentioned to my blog- colleague Flo almost in passing, as if it was not of interest, that the last bottles of a barrel from the 70's from Guyana which he bought in the past were the most aromatic ones of the whole cask. So, that means there was a thick layer of an aromatic material on the bottom of the cask. This must have been the reason to assume, that the barrels from Guyana were treated with molasses. Bottlers like Bristol Spirits Limited and Berry Bros & Rudd must have noticed this. Doug McIvor also told me the version of treated cask in the beginning of 2014. However, I already knew the manual and it's contents and could not make any sense of it, but I remained silent.

The "aha"-effect came in a tasting session this year, as I diluted down a few samples of Demerara rums bottled by Velier. I wanted to see how the profile changed by adding a little bit of water to those rums. I let homogenize the rum with the water for over two days before I started the session. What I then saw this evening was like a little revelation. It had a thin layer of fine sediment at the bottom of the little bottle floating around like a cloud in the rum. I knew that these were colored rums and knew immediately what had happened. The degree of saturation of the rum had changed by the lower alcohol content, thus some of the solved colourant was being dissolved by this change. It was no longer able to bind with the mixture in the same proportion as it could before. A rum with more water then alcohol can not contain that much of the colouring matter as a rum with a higher strength. So the dissolved colouring matter was being released and settled down visible on the ground. This is exactly what happens in each barrel. Via the angels share the alcohol level changes and thereby changes the saturation level of the rum inside. The released colouring matter sinks to the bottom of the cask and accumulated there over the time. This was the origin of the myth of treated barrels with molasses. To this end, I threw a glance back into the planter's manual. Here was exactly this effect described. If too much colouring matter was added then the rum became “cloudy”, which was practically the colouring matter because it was unable to bind further with the rum. So, too much of the stuff kills the rum. The manual mentions that if you would add to much, then the value of the rum decreased significantly. This cloud disappears when you are moving the rum or shaking the vial. Give it enough time and it will reappear.

Diluted sample with
sediment particles (1)
Diluted sample with
sediment particles (2)
So, the colorant in the past was a burnt caramel diluted down with a high proof rum. Molasses was not used. I can not say what DDL is using nowadays because I was not in the distillery yet and I doubt that a manufacturer will tell his secrets to a stranger like me. However, the rum for export reaches its destination in tanks. The colouring matter is added to the tanks before pumping it into storage of the bulk Terminal. 

Why diong this? What was the origin of this tradition that has existed at least in the 19th century, or perhaps even in the 18th century? A clue (1989) led me to the Royal (British) Navy. The Navy allegedly demanded a colored rum to clearly visually distinguish him from water. [439] I can not say if this was the real reason for this tradition. Another source claims that these rums should be colored to disguise a poor quality of the water, which could vote for the indication of some authors and websites that rum was also used to disinfect the water on board the ships. Here is an excerpt of the source from 1984: 

"The rum was a dark blend of five rums from Demerara and Trinidad which had been blended and bottled on the island of Tortola in the Crown Colony of the British Virgin Islands. The colour was also in keeping with tradition, since this naturally golden rum was always darkened to camouflage any cloudiness in the water when it was mixed with the rum to produce the grog." [440] 

However, the fact remains that rum in the “Navy Style” are all dark and colored. At least the final blend was coloured. Had they been so dark with out a colouration, then the rums would all have been “wooden bombs”, almost inedible (woody, bitter) and not pleasant on the palate. Nothing you want to give to your men to keep them in a good mood. But not all rums in the final blend would have needed to be coloured. The "Navy-Tot" is no longer in the Royal Navy. It was abolished 1970. The rum of the “Navy Style”, however, has survived to this day. Anyone interested in the subject of burnt caramel and colouring matter in whiskys, should take a look at this very good article. Last but not least I want to quotee from a source from 1949, printed by HM Stationery Office, regarding on the state of the sugar industry in British Guiana:

“Next the colouring matter, burnt sugar, is added in varying quantities to suit the particular markets to which the different consignments are to be sent. It is a curious fact that Canada and North Britain like their rums dark-coloured, true "Nelson's blood," while a more anaemic hue is in demand in the Midlands and almost pure white is preferred in the South of England. When finally mixed to the right colour and matured, the rum is poured into casks and stored in bond under strict control of Customs officials. We inspected the books and organization of a number of these distilleries and rum stores and were impressed by the efficient way in which they were run.” [463]


British Guiana and the Royal Navy

 
Tot Issue Royal Navy (1)
Source: www.pussersrum.com
Rum from British Guiana have also long been used in the blend of the Royal Navy. In the beginning of the 20th century the belnd was mainly made up of rums coming from British Guiana and Trinidad. Unfortunatley I don't know the year or date in which rums from this colony have been used for the Navy blend. I would like to quote a interview from July 7 (Tuesday) 1908.

"Mr. Frederick Henry Dumas Man called.

12992. (Dr. Bradford) What is your firm? -- E. D. and F. Man, Colonial Brokers.

12993. That is a firm of old-standing, is it not? – It dates back to 1783.

12994. How long have you yourself been in the business? -- Twenty-Nine years.

12995. What is the nature of your business? -- We deal in Colonial produce – sugar, rum, cocoas, etc. We have got from three-quarters to seven-eighths of the rum trade, and a small fraction of the sugar trade.

12996. Is your trade exclusively in Jamaican rum? – Not at all—any rum. 
… 
13009. You are employed by the Admiralty, are you not? -- Yes, we buy their rum.

13010. Do you buy all the rum for the Navy? -- Yes, all.
... 
13036. Do you think that would generally be the view of people who are engaged in the trade of rum generally and not confined to Jamaican rum? -- I am sure that would that would be their view. We once supplied the Admiralty with Jamaica rum (they usually take Demerara and Trinidad) and the sailors did not like it so well. 

13037. But you sell more Jamaica rum than anything else, do you not ?—No, I do not think so. It varies according to the crop.
13038. You do not know which predominates ?—What we call the proof rum, that is rum other than Jamaica.

13039. The bulk of the Navy rum, what is that? --That would be proof rum – not Jamaican. 

13040. Proof rum, I take it, is an expression of your own over there? -- A trade expression. It means to say that the rum is sold per proof gallon. 

13041. (Dr. Bradfort) But that rum is largely patent still rum? -- Chiefly patent still rum." [441]

Tot Isse Royal Navy (2)
Source: royalnavymemories.co.uk
Who was Mr. Frederick Henry Dumas Man? He was the great-grandson of James Man. James Man, a barrel maker, founded the company ED & F. Man in 1783. This company received its name from Edward Desborough Man and Frederick Henry Dumas Man in 1860. [442] This company was responsible for the purchase of all rum, which were used for Navy Blend until 1970. The company still exists today. This source from 1908 tells us also that the major component of the Navy blend was Patent Still rum. A source of 1924, a debate in the British Parliament, mentions those two countries as origins for the Navy blend as well.  

„Mr. AMMON: The number of ratings over 20 years of age who are in receipt of rum ration in kind is approximately 43,000 ; the number, also, over 20 years of age, who are in receipt of money allowance in lieu is approximately 27,000. The cost price to the Admirality of rum ration is about 3/4 d. per man, and the rum is obtained principially from Demerara and Trinidad."[443] 

However, the blend had changed in the meantime. For how long I do not know. I would like to quote a debate in the British Parliament in 1956:

“Commander Agnew: I agree, but I did not experience those conditions. While I was looking through the Votes in connection with the necessary arrangements to be made in respect of victualling yards abroad, it struck me that there was one item connected with salaries and wages of the police which has undergone a very marked increase this year as compared with the Estimates for the previous year.
They relate to overtime, which has shown very great increase from £700 to £5,500. It is possible that the wages and salaries of the police have been increased all round and that this has caused inflation of the figures, or there may be shortage of men on police duty at the victualling yards and in consequence they may have had to do overtime to keep the full roster of protection. I should be grateful for information on that point.
What is the present source of supply of the rum issued to the Royal Navy? It used to be very good dry rum from British Guiana, but I understand that almost all the vintage stocks were purloined by the Army in World War I and that the Admiralty has never quite caught up with the quality.
Tot Isse Royal Navy (3)
Source: en.wikipedia.org
Mr. K. Robinson: Did the hon. and gallant Member experience the particularly nasty Australian rum that we had during the war?

Commander Agnew: I do not think I met it. It was only by connivance and a slight irregularity that I was able to get a quantity of rum, but never sufficiently frequently to become a connoisseur. Does the Admiralty still use British Guiana rum and keep it in store, maturing it in victualling yards for a reasonable number of years before issuing it to the Fleet?

Mr. R. Bell: My hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Commander Agnew) has referred to grog. I was interested in the comments he made about the vintage grog. I have heard that the Army nobbled the stock, but I have also heard it suggested that the Army laid it down as port. The trouble with the Navy was that, having got some fine dry rum it used to wet it and issue it to the men as grog. 
…
Mr. Ward: The answer to the question about the seamen's new uniform is that, if there are no unforeseen production difficulties we should be able to start issuing it to the Fleet in about six months' time. It will cost about £28,000 a year more than does the existing uniform. 
The hon. Member for St. Pancras North (Mr. K. Robinson) asked about the reduction in the amount of money provided for victualling. I can say that there is no decrease whatever in the standard of the food but there is, of course, a smaller number of men in the Navy, which accounts for the reduction in that figure. 
Several hon. Members have talked about grog and grog money. I must confess that I used to like rum until about fifteen years ago, when I made the mistake of walking round a rum factory in Jamaica. The smell was so abominable that I have never been able to drink rum since. Nevertheless, I understand that it is very popular in the Navy. Supplies come, not from British Guiana or, my hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Commander Agnew) will be glad to hear, from Australia, but from Jamaica or Barbados.” [444]

Coloured rum from the Caroni distillery
 (Trinidad, 20th century)
Mr. Ward thus reported that at the time of the debate (1956) rums from Jamaica or Barbados were used. He also makes the British Army responsible for ensuring that the rum stocks from British Guiana were decimated during the First World War and the Admirality has problems to catch up with the quality since then. Mr. R. Bell, however, accused the Royal Navy indirectly to “waste” good rum for the daily ration. An interesting point of view. I am not certain if rums from British Guiana were later added again to the Navy blend. Pussers Limited, which has acquired the original formula to produce the Navy Blend should have an answer. By consulting their website you will find indeed the statement, that rums from Guyana and Trinidad are used. As above (The Tradition of Colouring) already quoted, the blend of the Navy consisted of five different rums coming from these two nations. These rums could have been the styles P.M., E.H.P., a light and a heavy version from Caroni, and an unknown fifth rum. Of course this is only a guess on my part.We can only speculate on a substitute for Caroni since this distillery was being closed down in 2003. The Interim version, which is mentioned in the British Parliament in 1956, could have caused the frequent confusion that rum from Jamaica were mainly used for the Navy blend, as it is even stated on the English website on Wikipedia. I do not know for how long the navy used one of the other two nations. Another source mentions even rum from Demerara (British Guiana), Trinidad and Barbados. [445] However, one must not be a genius to guess where these rums may have originated. I suspect the closed distilleries Caroni (Trinidad), Uitvlugt (before the closure of Albion and Albion after the closure Port Mourant) and Enmore. In the two latter ones were the wooden stills, which are mentioned by Pussers and are used to ensure a distinctive flavour of the blend. Caroni also had such a wooden Coffey Still (more on this in a separate article about Trinidad) made from Guyanese Green Heart.

 
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Chapter 5
-
The Stills and distilleries in British Guiana 

Demerara Sugar Factory (1916), British Guiana
Source: www.guyanatimesinternational.com
In the early days there were three types of stills in Guyana. There was the traditional pot
still, the Vat Still and several continuous stills. Here is an excerpt from a source from 1908: 

„In British Guiana the destilleries are of three kinds:
1. Those using pot, or vat stills which are practically only modified pot stills.
2. Those using both pot stills or vat stills and Coffey or other continuous rectifying stills. 
3. Those using only Coffey or other continuous rectifying stills.“ [82] 

The traditional pot still (completely made of copper) is nearly as good as gone. D.D.L. owns one copper pot stills, two Vat Still and a many continuous stills. The Versailles Single Wooden Pot Still and Port Mourant Double Wooden Pot Stills are Vat Stills, but are repeatedly referred to as pot stills. Basically, the Vat is still nothing more than a modified pot still with a barrel design (Vat = barrel) made of wood. Only the head and neck are made of copper. A source from 1908 describes the structure as follows: 

Versailles Single Vat Still
Source: thefloatingrumshack.com
„Vat stills consist of cylindrical wooden vessels built of staves strongly hooped with wrought iron. They have high copper domes covering openings in the heads of the vessels which communicate with a retort or retorts of the Jamaican pattern, but, as a rule, the retort acts as the lowest vessel of a rectifying column. As in Winter's still a spiral pipe or a series of small perpendicular pipes descend down the interior of the column through which cold water is whenever distillation is in progress, and by which the spirits vapour undergoes a process of rectification as it ascends the column before passing into the condenser. The vat stills are heated by injection of steam.” [83] 

The "heads" (domes) of the Vat Still thus consist of copper and the still is fueled by injected steam inside. In the case of the Versailles Still is downstream retort attached to the still, which functions as rectification column to increase the alcohol content. A double distillation is also possible in succession to obtain a sufficiently high alcohol content. In case of the Port Mourant Still both Vat Stills are arranged in series in order to produce the desired high alcohol content. 

 Today, these two stills are the last of their kind. But a long time ago there were many pot and vat stills in British Guiana. The source from 1908 says something about 42 active distilleries in July, 1906. 32 of which had a pot or vat Still. Only three distilleries had either a pot or vat Still together with a continuous still. Merely 7 distilleries had only continuous stills. [82] As above already written: In 1880-81 there were 109 distilleries in British Guiana. However, their number decreased already to 53 in the fiscal year of 1900-01. [90]

Port Mourant Double Vat Still in the front
Versailles Single Vat Still in the middle left
Both rectification columns are in the back right
Copper Pot Still in the back left
Two Column Still in the far back left (on the top)
Source: thefloatingrumshack.com
This changed dramatically in 1914. In this year there were only 36 distilleries left. Of these,27 used the pot or vat still and 9 the continuous Still. [84] The continuous stills were built locally and consisted of native timber (greenheart). This stated a source dated back to 1919. So a lot of continuous stills in those days were made of wood. The source mentions ten large "continuous rectifying stills" for the year 1919. [85] The change to continuous stills made of steel was obviously later. The last remaining one is the Enmore wodden continuous still. Today it is in the possession of DDL and part of their heritage concept.

 A small irony of history: The Great Diamond plantation once owned a coffey still and a vat still back in 1908. [86] So it was one of the three distilleries which used both types. Most of the continuos stills in those time were made of wood. So Diamond, who was the Great Diamond plantation once, had most likely a wooden continuous still, but eventually scrapped this one and used a metal continuous still instead. Thus there is a relatively high probability that Diamond once owned a wooden continuous still. What an irony of history that they now have once again a still of this type, after they scrapped the former one on a unknown date. The same applies to the vat still. There is no doubt about their existence in my eyes. The vat still was probably scrapped first. According to the source the coffey still provided a similar quality compared with the vat still. Later, she probably was also replaced with a column still made of metal with higher production output. Did someone perhaps learned anything from the mistakes of the earlier days? 
Mon Repos Sugar Factory (Bitish Guiana)
Source: www.guyanatimesinternational.com
Back to the distilleries and the stills. For the year 1921 there were only 30 active distilleries left. 21 distilleries used exclusively a pot or vat still. Three, however, both types of stills and only 6 relied on continuous stills. [87] We now make a jump into the year 1938. In this very year the distillery of the Houston estate (former Zorg en Hoop) was closing it's doors forever. [88] There were only 9 distilleries left in British Guiana after the year 1938. If you now make a logical connection with the production figures of table 1 in the Appendix of 1950, then you come to the conclusion that the Port Mourant still and the Versailles Still are the two pot stills listed in that year. So since 1938 both stills are the last representatives of their kind. The number of distilleries continuous to dwindle, but their names have made it to this day and are mostly well known.
In 1949 only 9 of the 16 sugar factories had a distillery attached to get rid of the leftover molasses, which is “only” a byproduct of the sugar industry. These included Albion, Blairmont, Enmore, Skeldon and Port Mourant. [19] According to another list, which apparently is also dated back to 1949, there were only 15 instead of 16 sugar factories. [23] The "BIG 9" are mentioned more or less completely including with the owner.
 


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 

Chapter 6 
-
„Bookers Guiana“ 

The flag of British Guiana [190]
Source: http://commons.wikimedia.org
If you want to tell the whole story, then you must also say a few words about the Booker group wich greatly dominated the sugar market in British Guiana in the 20th Century. The story begins in 1815 as Josias Booker (senior, 1793-1865) reached Demerara. In 1834 the company Booker Brothers & Co. was founded by Josias Booker senior in British Guiana. [106] [107] Gradually, the company bought several plantations over the years. Smaller plantations which went bankrupt during the fluctuations on the sugar market have been consolidated with larger plantations and their names disappeared partially. On 30. April 1849 Josias Booker bought the plantation Profit for G$ 10,220. [112] Josias Booker junior contributed a colored rum to the London International Exhibition in 1862 (Appendix A position 67), which came from the plantation Greenfield. This rum was 47% above British OP and was distilled on a patent steam still of T.F. M'Fablane. So the Bookers entered the rum business very early. [178] 

Advertising of the Bookers Rum Company
Source: archive.org
© Thomas Skinner & Co. (Publisher) Ltd (London)
© Thomas Skinner of Canada Limited (Montreal)
In addition to the company Booker Brothers & Company, there were also other companies that had an interest in British Guiana. One of them goes back to John McConnell (1829 – 1890) which came to British Guiana in 1846. [49] [109] He worked closely with Bookers from the start and bought a sixth share of the company in 1854. Finally, John McConnell founded his own company. It was the John McConnell & Company in 1874 in London with him as the sole owner. [52] He used the company not only to support the Bookers with goods and financial resources, but also for his own business and trading. [109]

In 1881 Josiah Booker (Junior) died and John H. Booker, a younger brother, was the last family member who was involved in the business of the firm of Booker Brothers & Company. Finally, John H. Booker sold his shares in 1885 to John McConnell, who remained alone in the possession of the three companies Booker Brothers & Company, George Booker & Company and John McConnell & Company. [56] [369] In turn John got support from his own family in the form of his two sons. Arthur John McConnell came to the company in 1889 and Frederick Vavasour McConnell in 1890. It was these two men, which consolidated the three companies under a new name in 1900: Booker Bros., McConnell & Company Limited [108] n 1867 he was verifiable a landowner. He owned the plantation Tuschen de Vrienden. This plantation contributed a sample of sugar to the Paris Universal Exhibition in the same year. [110]

The Bookers Bros., McConnell & Co., Limited owned in 1917 the following plantations: Cane Grove, La Bonne Intention, Mon Repos, Port Mourant, Rose Hall, Skeldon, Tuschen-de-Vrienden, Uitvlugt and Vryheids Lust. [111] Their number continuous to grow. In 1934 the following plantations were also in the possession of the Booker Group: Spinglands, Friends, Mara, Lusignan, Success, La Ressouvenir, Wales, Versailles, Hoaston und Schoon Ord. [113] Later, another merger was in order. 1939 the Bookers Bros., McConnell & Co., Limited merged with Messrs Curtis, Campbell & Co. (Curtis, Campbell & Co, Ltd). This brought the plantations Albion, Enmore and Ogle in the possession of the Booker Group. [115] [116] A descendant of the founder of Curtis Campbell & Co, later became the chairman of the Booker Group. His name was John "Jock" Middleton Campbell. 

John Campbell, the chairman of the Booker Group from 1952 to 1967, witnessed the independence of the colony and formation of the nation of Guyana. He has worked with Forbes Burnham and his predecessor Cheddi Jagan, when he was still Prime Minister of the colony British Guiana. The political winds changed as Forbes Burnham became official Prime Minister of Guyana on May 26 1966. The newly elected government of the former colony pursued a communist ideology that proved to be disastrous for the economy later.

Advertisingof the Bookers Rum Company
Source: archive.org
© Thomas Skinner & Co. (Publisher) Ltd (London)
© Thomas Skinner of Canada Limited (Montreal)
It is not surprising that after the events of the political crisis in 1953the directors of the Booker Group opted for a diverse range of activities. The company began to increase their activities in England in the field of industrial and food sales. But first the Booker Group took over the company S. Davson & Company Limited in 1955. This brought the Blairmont estate plus the plantations Providence and Bath, which were a part of Blairmont by now, in the possession of the Booker Group. [114] [117] In 1956, Bookers took over the company George Fletcher & Company (an industrial firm) and in 1957 it was followed by Alfred Button & Sons (a small supermarket chain). In 1962 the Nigerian Sugar Company is founded and Bookers was involved. The name of the company shortened in 1968 to Booker McConnell Limited. Finally, in 1976, it came to the indicated policy decisions from 1953. The sugar and bauxite industry, as well as all other major companies were nationalized under "1975 Vesting of Property (Acquisition or Purchase) Act". The year 1976 is the final year in which the sugar factories were in private hands. [372]

The Booker Group had to ultimately surrender its plantations, distilleriers and sugar factories in Guyana to the Guyanese government and received a compensation of nearly 500 million Guyanese dollars as compensation. [118] The power of the Booker Group in Guyana ended abruptly. The company still exists to this day. Because of this power and influence which the Booker Group once had in British Guiana, the Guyanese jested that British Guiana should be called “Bookers Guiana”. [119]

But the story is not over yet. The following years were an economic disaster for Guyana. The country had a rapid inflation resulting in a decline in wages and a growing inefficiency of produtcion. The value of a monthly salary of G$200 in 1977 amounted actual the real value of G$ 120,77 and fell in 1980 to G$ 102,07. The sugar industry was in no better shape then the rest. In 1976, the last year in which the industry was in private hand, 332.457 tons of sugar were produced. This production output fell to 241,861 tons in 1984 and there were even only 167,660 tons in 1988 produced and the amount descend in 1990 even further into the basement. The government Desmond Hoyt finally realized that they were no longer in fully control of the situation and invited a subcontractor of Bookers called "Booker Tate" to came to Guyana in order to assist them in the management of enterprises in 1990. [373]

The new Skeldon factory in 2008 (under construction)
Source: pmtcalumni.org
This firm was formed in 1988 by the companies Booker PLC and Tate & Lyle as a joint venture. Tate & Lyle has long been active in the sugar business in Trinidad and thus the two companies united their experience in this area under one roof. Although Booker Tate was under the supervision of the government and acted virtually no longer on their own, but Bookers was back in Guyana. In 1990, they signed a "Full Operational Management Agreement". Booker Tate advertises this activities on their own website. They are claiming that the output of sugar could be increased to 280,000 tons in 1996. In 2002 they almost reached the old record from 1976 with 331.067 tons of sugar. In 2004, the TSB Sugar Holdings (Proprietary) Limited (TSB), a sugar manufacturer from South America, bought Booker Tate. They signed a contract for the construction of a new sugar factory at Skeldon in 2005. [374] [375] However, it was not everything going smooth. A SWOT analysis of Guysuco showed that exactly this new Skeldon factory, in addition to Wales, was the weakest. The problems supposedly started during the 2nd crop in 2008 before the new Factory was commenced to operate. [376] In 2009, Booker Tate ended commitment in Guyana with the completion of the new factory. 


The current development leaves no doubt about the direction of the sugar production in Guyana. Here are a few official figures from the state owned Guyana Sugar Corporation (Guysuco).

10 Years Review of GuySuCo 2000-2009

Year
Sugar
(Tons)
Molasses
(Tons)
2000
273.318
108.703
2001
284.474
118.103
2002
331.052
137.794
2003
302.378
127.201
2004
325.317
138.140
2005
246.071
115.732
2006
259.549
107.501
2007
266.482
115.048
2008
226.267
99.280
2009
233.736
109.598

In order to gain a complete picture of the development we have to look at the last years. Unfortunately, the overall situation and the development of sugar production in Guyana is once again a negative one. 

2010 – 221.000 tons of sugar [448]
2011 – 237.000 tons of sugar [448]
2012 – 218.070 tons of sugar [449]
2013 – 186.500 tons of sugar [450]

The only thing you can observe in this development in the short term is that Demerara Distillers Limited is (almost) independent of the sugar market. If one day Guysuco ceases to exist than this will have not an immediate and lethal effect for the rum business in Guyana. But in the long run the production costs are about to rise, due to the fact that the distillery would have to import the necessary molasses for the rum production. This is nothing new in the Caribbean. Trinidad Distillers Limited (Angostura) on Trinidad & Tobago is in this situation right now and it is still alive, while the state-owned sugar company Caroni along with its distillery were closed down for more than over ten years ago. Agnostura has to import the necessary molasses for the rum production. It will definitely influence the rum industry in Guyana, however, the extent is yet uncertain and can only be guessed at this time. It is really ironic: Although the production of both products in Guyana are now separated (rum and sugar), however, their still bonded together by fate. In other industries, this binding link between the alcohol industry and the agricultural producers is less dramatic. Grain, needed for whisky, will always be produced, because it is also a source for food. However, rum is literally bonded to sugar cane, while sugar can also be gained from other sources such as the sugar beet and it is not solely bound to sugar cane. To call the distilled spirit 'Rum' it has to be gained from fermented molasses or fresh cane juice. Spirits from sugar beet are not called rum, but they can be more easily being produced in Europe in order to gain sugar. The production may have been separated, but the 'vital bond' between rum and sugar is still in existence.

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 7
-
United Rum Merchants 
(Booker's Rum Cartel) 

Source: www.rum.cz
What happened after the nationalization in Guyana on the European rum market and what kind of influence had Bookers? You have to go a little back in time to understand the whole development and also the entire dimension. The company United Rum Merchants was formed through a merger of three companies: Alfred Lamb & Son Limited, White Keeling (rum) Limited and portal, Dingwall & Norris Limited. [427] [429] Who where those companies? The Alfred Lamb & Son Limited was founded in 1849 by Alfred Lamb. He died in 1895 and left the company to his son Charles H. Lamb, which previously entered the business. By the death of the founder were also Alfred B. Lamb and W.J. Godwin within the company. In 1908, Alfred B. Lamb retired from the company and in 1919 a certain Charles T. Brend became partner of the firm. The most famous brand of the company was "Lamb's Navy Rum". [333] [338] The company Portal, Dingwall & Norris Limited owned the trademark rights to "Lemon Hart" rum. This brand was started by the the company Lemon Hart & Sons Limited. This very company was founded by Mr. Lemon Hart in 1804. In the course of the century, the brand came into the possession of Portal, Dingwall & Norris Limited and finally a part of the portfolio of URM. [453] [454] [455] The company White Keeling (rum) Limited was formed by the merger of the two companies Henry White & Co. (founded in 1842) and E.H. Keeling & Son (founded in 1822). The most famous brand of the company was the "Red Heart" rum from Jamaica, which can be traced back to Henry White, the founder of Henry White & Company. [456] [457] 

Source: www.rum.cz
So URM had these three companies as subcontractors in their possession. Precisely this company (URM) was being incorporated into the Booker group and acted from London in 1947. In 1951, the new Booker subsidiary “Bookers Rum Company Limited” came under the roof of United Rum Merchants. This company was responsible for the rum business since 1951 and did also control the marketing activities and advertisements regarding rums from British Guiana. The bulk rum and some other products were managed by another and new sub-contractor, which was also added in 1951. It was the “Booker Produce Limited”. These companies regulated and controlled the business around rum. [427] [429] Booker had an exclusive access to rums made in British Guiana through its possessions in this country. They could have also easily influenced the prices for competitors. By the time of the independence of Guyana (1966) only one competitor was still active: Diamond Liquors. Of course Lambs and Lemon Hart did not only bottle rums coming from this nation, but also rums from Jamaica and other islands. After Bookers forced departure from the sugar business in Guyana and the associated loss of production and distilleries, probably the decision was made to abandoned the business as a whole in the long run. In 1984, the subsidiary United Rum Merchants, which was incorporated it into the Booker company in 1947, was sold to Allied-Lyons. Among them were the brands "Lemon Hart", "Red Heart", "Black Heart" and "Lamb's Navy Rum". The company's name changed in 1994 from Allied-Lyons to Allied Domecq Spirits & Wine Limited. This company was bought in 2005 by the French corporation Pernaud Ricard, which did split up the possessions of Allied Domecq Spirits & Wine Limited. The trademark rights regarding "Lamb's Navy Rum" were sold to Corby Distilleries. "Black Heart" is still in the hands of the Allied Domecq Spirits & Wine Limited. The rights to "Lemon Hart" were sold by Pernod Ricard to the Mosaiq Incorporated in 2010. [458] [459] 

Source: www.rum.cz
The biggest rival and opponent of United Rum Merchants on the 'Dark Rum' market was Seagram's, with its well known brands 'OVD' (Old Vatted Demerara) and "Wood's Old Navy Rum". Both were also made with rum from Guyana (British Guiana). Seagram's also sold its traditional brands. Today, these are in the possession of William Grant & Sons Limited. [460]

With all these developments you can now perhaps understand which global player and rum giant Bookers really once was. It was the first mega corporation in the rum business and was quickly followed by other companies such as Diageo and Pernaud Ricard. Companies like these were not a completely new kind of corporation but a logical development of market concentration, renewed decay and reorganization on the market. They are also a result of state intervention in the markets. Why? Because nations and states are making the rules for the markets. Today there is only one single distillery left in Guyana, whose parent company is in the hands of the state. Although the monopoly for the production of rum in Guyana became de facto reality, but it was not Bookers who did win the race. But the state of Guyana also may not be considered as winner because of the resulting inflation and the increase of inefficiency due to the nationalization of the former private companies.


The change of the rum-market 
(A opinion)

'OVD'  = 'Old Vatted Demerara'
The brand of the competitor Seagram's
Source: www.thewhiskyexchange.com
One possible reason for the sale of United rum Merchant in 1984 could be the increased importance of white rum, like the one which Bacardi reassambled prior to the Cuban Revolution. The 'Dark Rum' market, however, lost more ground over the decades. With the stop of the Navy Tot in the Royal Navy the change came into full swing in 1970. There were and are still the old customer base, which was used to the dark rum type because of their duty in the Royal Navy due to the Navy Tot. Dark rum was well known to the native in Scotland. I would like to quote a source from 1989 which was saying something about the state of the dark rum market: 

“In the UK two brands vie for first place in the standard dark rum market: Seagram's Captain Morgan, and United Rum Merchants' (URM) Lamb's Navy. Allied-Lyons purchased URM from Booker McConnell in 1984. Seagram and URM also compete in Scotland where OVD (Old Vatted Demerara), Seagram's Scottish brand leader, is in a close race with Black Heart from URM. In both markets the Seagram brands lead, but only just. So how are Seagram and URM tackling the problem of a declining market? Seagram's UK marketing manager for spirits, John Cornish, describes the problem: 'If you look at the dark rum market place, it's being drunk by predominantly older and is concentrated into a relatively small proportion of heavy users. That's fine at the moment, but you are looking at the next ten years. That market is going to disappear and you haven't got the same level of heavy usage in the age group 25 to 45.' These long term problems have led both companies to pitch for younger drinkers in the past. Their quandary is how to attract the young without alienating the old. However, dark rum's youth appeal has thus far failed to emerge, so Captain Morgan is still directing its ads at the older macho man. This year's budget is estimated at about £1.6m. URM's Lamb's Navy is also being handled gently. There have been some label changes and a new hexagonal bottle, but there are no drastic alterations planned for the brand's image.“ [462] 

"I Play ball...!" 
Advertisment with play on words.
Source: www.capitalbay.com
So the customers died one after another and the customer base decreased. The youth, however, became persuaded with light and white rum. This I can confirm from my own youth. 'Bacardi' and 'Havana Club' are known throughout Europe and embody this kind of 'new rum', which became more popular after the end of the World War I, especially in the United States. Other authors did write whole books about this topic alone and tried to explain the 'wind of change'. This is one of the reasons why I will not venture deeper into this topic. It would simply be to big to fill in into this humble work. But what really changed?

Patent Still Rum, Rum thus obtained from continuous stills, were nothing new and had been around since their invention in the 19th century. As I have already quoted above, the Navy Blend at the time around 1900 was already mainly consisted chiefly of patent still rum. [441] Also, in Cuba this kind of light rum was already distilled for quite some time. So what changed? It was the customers and these in turn were in my opinion heavily persuaded by massive advertising and became re-educated. The new shiny bright future was represented by white rum. Dark and heavy rums were even suspected to cause the 'hangover' because they contain bad fusel iols and all the other heavy (and bad) flavours. For this purpose, I would like to quote from 1990, which reflects such a opinion: 

"Seale believes one reason white rum enjoyed renewed growth was "Because is does not produce the hangovers and headaches of coulered rum". Caramel and other additives, along with the wooden casks dark rum was aged in, affected the colour and flavour of the rum, he said. And, he added, they contributed to the negative "after effects" of drinking as well." [461] 

Female charms working for rum
In this case it is rather decent.
Replic of an advertisment 1940 -1960
Source: www.zazzle.de
A hangover also appears when you are drinking heavily other alcohol stuff like beer or wine. Are they also bad? Even the finest stuff will give you an hang-over if you overdue it. White rum is there no better in that regard. It is alcohol. And a 'hangover' is nothing but a sign of poisoning. Ignoring these facts is just studiously ignorant. Alcohol is a poison for the body. Period. There is no need to talk about this. What matters is the quality and the dose of the alcohol which you are consuming. This requires responsible consumers and producers. I personally would rather consume a high quality of this poison in small quantities instead of drinking me into sure oblivion with cheap industrialized (white & light) rum produced en mass with a continuous type of still. But a distillery lives on revenues by mass and not by such small consumers, as I do represent. So why did Mr. Seale state this opinion in 1990? Quite easy. A few years later he established his own distillery and was a bottler of light and also white rum at the time of the interview. He just made marketing for himself and wanted to survive as a bottler. There is also no need to debate about this point. Further ahead, I have already addressed the problem of capitalism and the global market on the rum business. And as a customer in the 'information age', one should always be carefully and check from whom the provided information is coming. Is the source independent or not? 

What would be a solution? Prohibitions like the one in the US, just showed that it is useless to force the consumer in this respect by law to something. The quality of the alcohol, however, was worse by the illegal distilled moonshine. These were beyond the control of the state by the ban. Here, too, other authors have written entire books dedicated to this topic alone. I think education and awareness about this issue is much more of importance than to swing the club with the inscription 'ban' on it, in the hope that you build a new and better tomorrow. A ban also has the effect that the influence of the legislature tends to zero, because everything moves into the illegal sector, which itself does not really care for the health and interests of the consumers or the citizens of the state. The entire market in America was left to the organized crime. Is this a better tomorrow? With monitoring and control, which has become really easy in today's digital age, and thanks to the GPS tracker and smart phones? They did not exist back then. It's like terrorism dear readers. There is no complete safety. Not even in a total surveillance state, because in such a state you as a citizen are no longer safe from the actions of the state and the police. But I digress from the topic.

Captain Morgan Avertisment ca. 1951
Advertisment a la "Yo-Ho-Ho-Ho"
Suggesting: "This is for true pirates only" 
Trendy but totaly escapisting
 Source: www.pinterest.com
So there was a trend away from coloured and aged rums towards short-term matured and light rums, which sometimes even got their colour and congeners removed by the use of charcoal filters. These 'pale boys' conquered the rum market gradually. For customers who are looking for something 'special' the big brands are bottling some older rums and to adjust the appearance of the range the use of colouring matter is obligatory. Fluctuations of maturity due to the barrels can also covered up easily with the usage of this material. The industry never got rid of this useful toy in order to 'pimp' their rums optically and not to put it into the barrels prior to aging as it was in the old days (see Chapter 4). They only add it before the bottling. Many consumers are afraid that this material is used to fake a certain age, which the rum doesn't really have. I would like to rewrite this concern: Many manufacturers are faking a maturity optically which does not exist. The more mature a rum the more it becomes aromatic. Of course, this has its limits and depends largely on the starting material, the fermentation and distillation. This is the 101 of rum, which I will not go into detail here because it is beyond the scope. As I said this has its limits. You can't transform a light industrialized column rum into a full bodied Jamaica pot still rum through maturation in a barrel. That's impossible. 

More aggressive female charms
This advertisment provides a deep view.
Not only optically. 
Source: recluse.me
Therefore, a long maturation of such a product makes no sense beyond a certain point. On an unknown point of no return the barrel will heavily influence the content and will have an great impact on the rum and its flavour profile. This taste is not for the masses and only favoured by few connoisseurs and aficionados. Another reason is that through the angels share the contents of the barrels is decreasing and the production costs for such rums are just to high. A longer maturation needs time and time equals money. The logical extension of this profit-oriented thinking is the introducing of bottling's with no age statement on the label. So-called 'NAS' which stands for 'No Age Statement'. To 'spice up' the taste of young rums (or whiskys) of unknown age they are mixed with a portion of older ones. Then the colour is getting an appropriate appearance by the use of caramel. The final product then is getting a fancy or funny name with traces to an ancient tradition or dating back to certain dates of the distillery or the country of origin and et voilà: Your cash cow to milk the buyers more efficiently as before is ready to go to be unleashed on the unaware buyers. I call that "capitalism in its purest form." Although I am an advocate of maturity and do not necessarily see great age equal with great quality, since even old rums, when they are immature, are not really worth that lot of money which is printed on the fancy price tag. I will in no good conscience agree with such a practice or quality. What you should think about this whole topic is solely up to your own thoughts and mind. This is my humble opinion. 

You remember the "tramp stamps"
or "ass antlers"?
Bacardi wanted to be trendy in those days
and this was the result.
Ain't rum cool, 'ey?
Source: recluse.me
The mere fact that the before-mention EU-law has the same tightness as a colander doesn't make things easier. Sugar, for example, is not explicitly forbidden and caramel to design the optical color is also admitted, much to the dismay of purists (which I am not). I have nothing against the addition of sugar per se. I just hate it when a drink is too sweet. My taste has changed considerably over the years. This, however, and the fact that one can thereby clearly enhance an inferior quality of rum and make some flaws disappear is from consumer-legal point of view more than questionable. This was also the main point of criticism in the German rum community. But our mistake at that time was that we have not made it clearly enough nor did we communicated it correctly. Many just saw their favourite drink in danger. They acted like a deaf and blind man. And they also behaved like defiant little children. They didn't get the point. This was one of the main reasons why I turned my back to this 'fine community' and abandoned it. Why wasting time when it can be put into more efficient investigations such as this? There was no need for a debate and the "premium rums" are still selling quite magnificently. But all of this is about to change it seems. I have now read more then once that the quality of certain brands is going down the drain with each further batch which has being put on the market. The end of what is possible with the usage of sugar is apparently achieved and the quality has noticeably (alleged) deteriorated. Alleged because I will never drink this stuff myself in order to convince myself if there is really a change happening. Some companies that have used this practice were probably totally overwhelmed by their own marketing and the resulting success. The proportion of "older rums" in the Solera - systems influenced by the higher deduction from the barrels is probably getting lower and lower, as the younger ones are getting up and the drawn off spirits are more “aggressive” than the rums the years before. Am I an cynical badass right now? Not really. I'm no 'war-supporter' between the sweet tooth's and the buyers of bottlings coming from the independent bottlers. Besides my criticism would be a bit tooth-less. Why? Because I can't "rant" against sugar and still love dark Demerara rums which have been coloured by the means of caramel prior before aging at the same time. Even the facts that this is an old tradition coming from the Royal Navy and covered up by the EU-law doesn't help because sugar is also not strictly forbidden and therefore also allowed. Both type of rums were altered but they are legal. I would be a hypocrite. And the world is already full of those guys. I don't want to be a part of them. Whether you like it or not is up to you but, it is legal. However, I do not yet regret my decision of withdrawal from the German community to this day. I personally believe in the freedom of choice, although I think the law is far from being suitable or perfect (but what is perfect?). The introduction of new terms or categories would be an idea here. Nor is there a clear declaration requirement for the content. Because of this no one is writing on the labels what has been added. They don't need to and therefore they don't do it. Why should someone expose himself of using this technique? You may call it cheating, but I say it again: It is legal, although I don't like the results. Also a organization of controlling the improved law should be established. The best law is next to useless if no one is controlling the manufacturers. No one needs a “placebo” law. And we have enough bored out of the skull politics and officials in Brussels sitting around and issuing senseless laws (like the “accurate bending of bananas”, just google it and you can see what I mean). They could do the job... I guess. *cough* However, in this regard whisky and namely Scotland is far more beyond in the quality regulations. But as long as the rum lobby has the upper hand and the mass is all hot and horny on these "premium rums" nothing will change. Capitalism and “experts” determine where to go. The market is not interested in the opinion of some independent maniacs or grumpy connoisseurs like me.

English books about rum and the sugar industry
Who wants to take a closer look at the history of change and the influence of the cocktail scene with their creations to the rum market and can read English (which I am sure you can since you are reading this...) should look for the book "... and a Bottle of Rum" from Wayne Curtis and the book "Rum" written by Dave Broom. Also, the long out of print books "Rum Yesterday and Today" by Hugh Barty-King & Anton Massel and "The Sugar Industry in the Late 19th Century" by R.W. Beachey were invaluable sources of information about the change of this drink. I do not want to miss these books in my personal possession. Many other books have not yet been published in English. Of this, I am interested in some French copies. Let's see when they are getting "international".

In conclusion it can be said: The change was due to the change in consumer behavior (specific in taste), by the use of heavy advertising the great brands in the market and the global competitive pressure on the manufacturer with the associated extreme capitalism (fast, lots and cheap). Especially the last point helped the patent / Coffey / column stills to triumph over the pot still. She was the epitome of efficiency with the resulting 'pure rum'. Well, when I say pure then I really mean 'less flavour'. A manufacturer can hype this type of still and the resulting rums all he wants: I know why he is embracing this kind of distilling so much and it has nothing to do with passion, tradition and the love for rum, but with plain survival, panic and the crave for hard dollars / euros.

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Chapter 8
-
„The Big 9“ 
(1938 – 2013) 

 Between 1937 and 1938 the distillery of the Houston estate (formerly: Zorg en Hoop) in Demerara closed its doors forever. As of 1938, there were only 9 remaining distilleries, the "Big 9". All other distilleries were gone for good. The last distilleries were within the remaining factories, which by the time have gained the sizes of great sugar factories ('usines'). Smaller properties were either abandoned or acquired by these successful companies and thus swallowed. But their time was yet to come. The tables mentioned in Annex I are gathered from the respective sources.

La Bonne Intention (Demerara)

 History 

Detailed map section dated 1783 [210]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
A widow Changuion is mentioned as the proprietor of the plantation No. 48 La Bonne Intention on a map dated 1798. This woman is also mentioned in a book from 1888. But these are not the earliest references. [122] [123] [125] On another map from 1786, a F. Changuion (François Changuion) is listed as the proprietor of the plantation No. 27 on the east coast of the Demerara River. This plantation is probably the plantation which belonged to the widow Changuion in 1798. The position of the plantations on the maps of 1786 and 1798 are almost identical. [126] [127]




Map section dated 1784 [207]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
This Francois (Daniel) Changuion was for a short time the ad interim commander of the colony of Demerara in 1771. [203] [204] In my opinion the plantation La Bonne Intention can be traced back to this man. A map of 1784 mentioned F. Changuion as the proprietor of Lot 27 on the east coast of the Demerara colony. The plantation La Bonne Intention must have been established between 1759 and 1784. Why 1759? Because there were no plantations on the east coast on a map dated back to this year. Another map from 1783 shows a detailed view of the later La Bonne Intention plantation. [210] 




Map section dated 1786 [127] 
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl
At the time of emancipation (1834-38) Charles Anthony Ferdinand Bentinck and Henry John William Bentinck owned the plantation La Bonne Intention. [166] On January 26, 1848, Alex M. Laren bought this plantation for G$ 30,200. In 1860 A. McLaren and a certain PM Watson owned La Bonne Intention. [153] In an interview dated to September 14, 1870, a Mr. Russell declared that he is co-owner of the plantation. [169] A source from 1882 (Timehri) lists the explicit data (and Marks) of the plantations La Bonne Intention (LBI) and Beterverwagting (BVW) for this year. Both plantations were owned by Mr. William Russell and the rum production amounted to 80.238 gallons at 43.2% overproof. [377] This William Russel bought the plantation Tuschen De Vrienden in 1863. William Russell was knighted before his death in March 1888. [162] This William Russell is also dated in conjunction with the heirs of Josiah Booker (Junior) and John McConnell as the owner of the plantation La Bonne Intention from another source in 1882. [163] 

Detailed map section dated 1792 [209]
 Source: www.Gahetna.nl
In the Handbook of British Guiana from 1909, the company "Plantation La Bonne Intention Limited" is listed as the owner for this plantation. [378] On October 28, 1916, the La Bonne Intention plantation changes the ownership and was now the property of a local syndicate. [379]

From 1923 on the plantation La Bonne Intention appears no longer directly in the lists, but it is hidden behind the label "Ressouvenir Estates". The "The Success and Le Ressouvenir Company Limited" in the Handbook of British Guiana from 1909 merged with the plantation La Bonne Intention between 1916 and 1923. Thus, it belonged to the Booker Brothers McConnell & Company Limited by 1923. The plantation Success on the east coast was bought in 1902 from the Colonial Company Limited, which was liquidated in 1901. Her successor, the New Colonial Company, no longer possessed this plantation. Bookers first merged Success (EC Demerara) and La Ressouvenir and between 1916-1923 La Bonne Intention was added to the "Ressouvenir Estates".

On the ground of the estate a new factory was established in 1959 and put into operation. The old plant was shut down in the very same year. [380] The property was handed over by the nationalization in 1976 to the Guyana Sugar Corporation. In 2011 the La Bonne Intention factory was finally closed. The sugar cane from there is now currently being processed in the factory at Enmore. [381] 

La Bonne Intention Distillery 


Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212] 
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
On the plantation La Bonne Intention was exclusively planted cotton in 1798. About 1833 the only remaining cultivation was sugar cane. The change was presumably sometime between 1798 and 1833. [7] And indeed, a source from 1851 lists only sugar (600,000 lb) for the crop of the year 1829. In 1835 there was beside sugar (538.657 lb) also coffee (3,000 lb) listed in the documented crop, but then disappeared without a trace in the following years. [222] It is therefore highly likely that the rum production began in the 19th century. The Plantation La Bonne Intention represented with some other competitors the colony of British Guiana in the category rum at the Calcutta International Exhibition of 1883/84. [226]



Map section dated 1798 [122] 
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/
In 1954 the La Bonne Intention Distillery produced 89,883 gallons of rum. According to another source it still produced 139,790 gallons of rum in the year 1959. However, there is a missing entry in the year 1960. [4] As from 1963 the distillery was no longer mentioned in the other reports. [2] [3] This gives the impression that the La Bonne Intention Distillery disappeared in 1960. What happened? I would like to quote a source:

„The Volume of production at Guyana Distilleries Uitvlugt distillery had been increased three times since it was first built by Bookers in 1960. For under a scheme of rationalisation it had taken over the output of four distilleries scrapped in 1969.“ [159]

The Uitvlugt Distillery, which was built or modernized by Bookers in 1960, took over the production of four rum distilleries scrapped till 1969. So I interpret this text. It is no coincidence that from 1960 on many distilleries disappeared under Bookers. But I want to remind that in 1966 Booker had to sell its property to the new Guyanese government. Booker had no longer full control over this distillery. The first victim of the said rationalization was the La Bonne Intention Distillery. The last active year of this distillery was 1959.  

Map section dated 1823 [185] [186] 
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org
It is no accident that there was the planned commissioning of a new sugar factory for this year. This new central plant should take the cane of the estate of La Bonne Intention, Houston and Ogle. The factory of Ogle was closed at the end of 1958. [380] This new factory on the La Bonne Intention estate had no longer distillery. After the modernization of Uitvlugt in 1960 the useful inventory was brought to the Uitvlugt Distillery. The rest has been scrapped.

The mark of the plantation and distillery is stated to be L.B.I. by many authors. In fact, you will find this mark in conjunction with the La Bonne Intention Estate. [27] It is also written on a bottle from Velier. If a still from the La Bonne Intention Distillery survived is highly speculative. I possess a bottle from the post-La Bonne Intention era dated back to 1998. The origin on the label is stated to be continuous still. But that could be almost any column still at DDL, except perhaps the one from Enmore and the two Savalle stills from Uitvlugt. I will make no suggestion here.

Mark from La Bonne Intention LBI

Established: Between 1759 and 1873

Founder: Francois (Daniel) Changuion

Location: On the east coast of Demerara, bewteen the Demerara river and the Mahaica creek.

Status: Distillery closed in 1959 ; Sugar factory closed in 2011

Stills: Unknown. Presumably scrapped.







Skeldon (Berbice) 

 History 

Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
William Ross (1787 -1840) was the son of Hugh Ross III of Kerse and Skeldon (Ayrshire). In 1804 he arrived in Berbice as a 17 year old man. William Ross received as the proprietor of the plantation Skeldon £ 17,295 2S 6D as compensation for 326 freed slaves in 1834. The name Skeldon thus goes back to Scottish roots. He was married with Helen Elizabeth Ross Drummond. [128] [129] You can find his name in a list of the colonists from British Guiana. [130] The East Coast of Berbice was only available for plantations up to the Devils Creek in 1799. [182] The Corentyne coast must have been completed up to the Corentyne river (border to Suriname) between 1799 and 1802. On a map of 1802 there are neither proprietors nor cultivations mentioned regarding the lots on the west bank of the Corentyne river. So there could have been no plantation with the Name Skeldon before 1802. [219] [220] The plantation Skeldon must have been founded by William Ross between 1802 and 1834.

Map section dated 1802 [219] [220]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl  & www.Gahetna.nl

The mark of Skeldon S.W.R. is supposedly the initials of "Sir William Russell". It was used for the identification of the Sugar Estate. [24] Theoretically, the mark could also stand for Skeldon William Ross. This man was after all the founder of this old estate. I did not find any more connections between Sir William Russel and the plantation Skeldon. After the death of her husband Helen Elizabeth Ross Drummond (1811 - 1863) married William Charles Metcalfe in 1846 and took his name. [404] The plantation Skeldon belonged according to a source in 1860 still to Mrs. Ross (under the name of Mrs. Metcalfe). [384] 

Skeldon on the west bank [193]
Source:  www.rootsweb.ancestry.com
According to a source from 1882 the heirs of William Ross still own the plantation Skeldon. Unfortunatley there are no explicit names mentioned. [382] The Handbook of British Guiana from 1909 mentioned "The Trustees of John McConnell deceased" as owner.These Trustees are the two sons of John McConnel who consolidated the three firms to Booker Bros., McConnell & Comany Limited in 1900. [378] Another source states that during his lifetime Mr. John McConnell acquired the plantation Skeldon. This meansthat the plantation 1came into possession of the (not yet merged) Booker Group between 1882-1890 as John McConnell died in 1890 and the change of ownership must have happened in this time period. [405] 

The Skeldon estate remained under the control of Bookers Demerara Sugar Estates Limited until the forced sale to the Government. The Skeldon Estate now belongs to the Guyana Sugar Corporation (Guysuco) and is still used today for the growing of sugar cane. In 2009, a new sugar factory at Skeldon was built and commenced operation in the same year. The old factory was closed down.

Skeldon Distillery 

© E.H.
Since when was sugar cane cultivated on the Skeldon plantation? I would like to quote a source regarding the coastal plantations of Berbice: “Cotton thrives best on the coast estates, and it is on these therefore that it is principally cultivated.” [183] This would be consistent with the proposed planting on the map of 1802. The coulor suggests cotton planting for the entire area. But there weren't any proprietors or cultivations listened by the time the map was drawn. Theoretically therefore a sugar cultivation would have been possible in 1802. [219] [220]


But judging by a report of 1847, the change of cultivation was made between the 1. January 1838 and the 31. Dezember 1845. Skeldon is still listened as a cotton plantation on the first January 1838. The additional statement "Converted into sugar" for the year 1845 indicates that till the 31. December the cultivation was changed. [172] The first public appearance of the Skeldon plantation in the rum business was at the Chicago World's Columbian Exposition in 1893. [179] The first distillation of rum was probably much ealier, but definitely not before the 1. Januar 1838. 

© E.H.
The Skeldon Distillery produced until 1960. There were 66,070 gallons of rum documented for this year. This is very little compared to last year with 147,531 gallons of rum. [4] The reason for this is quite simple and yet sobering. The distillery was shut down before the end of 1960. This exists also a notice about this. [6] Another good reference are the production figures in Table 4. There are no further records of the Skeldon Distillery since 1961. Sugar production was, however, continued. Another distillery was gone. It is no coincidence that Booker upgraded the Uitvlugt Distillery in 1960 and then scrapped the Skeldon Distillery in the sugar factory. After the La Bonne Intention Distillery the Skeldon Distillery was the second victim of the modernization under Bookers in 1960. Two further distilleries should follow.


Two bottlings of Velier from 1973 and 1978 indicate both a Coffey Still as origin of the rum. I have no idea which coffey still that was at the Uitvlugt Distillery. As above mentioned the Skeldon Distillery was already scrapped in 1960. Both rums come from the post- Skeldon Distillery era and it is impossible that both rums are from Skeldon itself. But I am afraid that not a single still has survived from this distillery.

The old Skeldon sugar factory
Source: pmtcalumni.org

Established: Between 1802 – 1834

Founder: William Ross

Location: On the Corentyne coast, near the border with Suriname. Specifically, on the west bank of the outlet from the river Corentyne.

 Status: Distillery closed 1960 ; New sugar factory active since 2009

 Stills: Presumably scrapped.




Blairmont (Berbice)


Detailed map section dated 1780 (1771) [187]
Quelle: http://en.wikipedia.org/
History 

Lambert Blair (1767 – 1815) has been an Irish plantation owner and tradesman, who made a lot of profit by slave dealing and owned 7 plantations in Berbice  by the year of 1799. Among them has been  Utile & Paisible as well as 6 plantations (lots), which have only been known and identified by numbers, on the shores of the river Berbice. Based on the source these are Lot 17, 18, 19, 20, 37 and 38. Lamber Blair received a compensation of  £83,530 8S 11D during the emancipation in 1834 for his 1.598 slaves. [131] The plantation got its name probably not until 1799. Some website states that the map of 1780, which is also shown in this article, actually dates back to 1771. This would imply that the eventual plantation Blairmont has been already exisiting in 1771 as a lot. [206]




Detailed map section dated 1802 [219] [220]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl  & www.Gahetna.nl
On a map of October 1798 you can find neither the name Blairmount/Blairmont nor Lambert Blair amongst the Lots 3 - 10 opposite of New Amsterdam. Instead, this map approves the ownership of Utile & Paisable (Lot 18 on the western bank). On this map, the unnamed Lots 3, 5, 17, 18 , 19 & 37on the wesern bank of Berbice also list the name Blair or "&" in the following slot, which means just about "like the previous plantation". [212] The plantations in possession of  the Dutch West India Company are labeled with "Compy:". I can't say for sure on which state the source given above is reffering to.





Map section dated 1802 [219] [220]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl  & www.Gahetna.nl
On a map of 1802 things have changed. Lots 3 - 5 don't belong to Lambert Blair anymore but Lot 20 is now in his possession and now the names of the plantations are finally declared: Bath (Lot 16), Catharina's Rust (Lot 17), Naarstigheid (Lot 18), Onderneemig (Lot 19) and Jacoba Wihelmina (Lot 37). The name of the plantation Bath might ring a bell for a few readers. [213] [214] [219] [220] Lamber Blair also owned several plantations on the coast of Corentyne in the east of Berbice (Lot 42 & 43), which haven't been under cultivation in 1802 yet. No plantings or names of the plantations are mentioned here. [219] [220]

 
 
Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
Lambert Blair has been the founder of the Blairmont plantation, which has originally been called  "Blair Mount". The source of the author is/was „Rev. James Williams' "Dutch Plantations in the Berbice and Canje Rivers" [34]. in 1834 the Blairmont Plantation belonged to a man named James Blair. He's been the nephew and successor of Lambert Blair. James Blair (1788 - 1841) later became a member of the parliament and represtented the interests of the plantation owners. [15] [164] [165] A certain H.S. Blair (Plantation Blairmont) is listed as a supporter of the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867. He contributed rums, including coloured as well as uncoloured ones.


Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source:  www.Gahetna.nl
This H.S. Blair, who's full name was William Henry Stopford Blair, was the brother-in-law and successor of James Blair. His sister was  Elizabeth Catherine, the youngest daughter of Lieut.-General the Hon. Edward Stopford, who was married by James Blair in 1815. If you might wonder, why this man is called Blair: he took  the name of his brother-in-law. [176] In 1862 Stopford Blair won a medal at the International Exhibition in the category rum, with the reference „Good, full of Charakter“. [177] William Henry Stopford Blair passed away shortly after the Paris Universal Exhibition in September 1868.



Blairmont, Albion & Port Mourant [192]
Source: www.rootsweb.ancestry.com
The owner of the plantation changed until 1882. The plantation belonged in that year a certain H.K. Davson. [382] This was Sir Henry Katz Davson. Sir Henry Katz Davson lived from 1830 to 1909. [383] His company, the Messrs. Henry K. Davson and Company, was based in London and linked to the firm Davson & Company Limited in Berbice. [168] According to the Handbook of British Guiana from 1909 the property was in the possession of "The Blairmont Sugar Plantation Company, Limited", which was a subcontractor of S. Davson & Company Limited. The neighboring plantation Bath in 1909 was directly linked as the property of the S. Davson & Company Limited. [378] The former plantation Providence on the east bank of the river Berbice was by this year already a part of the Blairmont estate. Later the plantation Bath was added to the estate and the local sugar factory closed down.

In 1955, a closer cooperation between the S. Davson & Co Ltd and the subcontractor Bookers Sugar Estates Limited was announced. [114] This simply meant nothing other than the transfer of the Blairmont estate into the possession of the Booker Group. There it remained until the nationalization of all estates and factories in 1976. The Blairmont sugar estate is still used by the Guysuco. 

Blairmont Distillery 

© E.H.
The few plantations across New Amsterdam on the west bank of the river Berbice planted exclusively coffee on an old map of the colony of Berbice from 1802. [171] The first documented planting of sugar cane on the plantation Blairmont is mentioned in a report and dated to the first January 1838. [172] So the change of cultivation was probably between 1802 and 1838. The first recorded production of rum is listed by the award of William Henry Stopford Blair in 1862. Maybe there's an older reference, but this is the oldest I found.

The Blairmont Distillery still produced rum in 1960. The ordution figures are given with 272.699 gallons of rum. From 1963 on the distillery is no longer listed in the other above-mentioned report. [2] [3] [4] Now Looking at other tables, so there is also no mention in the production figures of 1963. The Blairmont distillery was most likely closed in 1962. [41] As part of the rationalization the distillery was brought out of service and the useful equipment was brought to the main plant of the Booker group located on Uitvlugt. At the Paris Universal Exhibition the Blairmont plantation delivered two variants of rum (uncoloured / colored) in 1867. So even Blairmont had practiced the tradition of colouring rums. [47] 

© E.H.
The mark of the Blairmont plantation/distillery is stated to be B. by many authors. Broom wrote in his book Rum on page 82 “.. and Blairmont B within a diamond.". If you look now at the label of the Velier Blairmont 1991 Full Proof Old Demerara, then the brackets <> hint the existence of a diamond. These newer rums after 1963 have a French Savalle as origin specified on the label. But the two French Savalle stills should be both origin from the Uitvlugt Distillery. So does this mean that both stills originally came from Uitvlugt? Or is one of them the original Still from Blairmont which could have been transferred to Uivtlugt in 1962? An interesting theory. But I have neither a proof nor do I know the age of both Savalle Stills. It is also plausible that not one still has survived from the Blairmont distillery after its closure. There is also another theory: a very earlier wooden continuous still could have been scrapped with the closure of the Blairmont distillery and one of the Savalle Stills in Uitvlugt replaced it. It is theoretical possible because many continuous stills in the beginning of the 20th century were built of local timber. When the change to new and modern continuous stills made of steel happened is very difficult to tell or to prove.


The Blairmont sugar factory
Source: www.internationalsteam.co.uk
Established: Between 1802 - 1834

Founder: Lambert Blair

Location: On the west side of the river Berbice, across from New Amsterdam.

Status: Closed 1962

Stills: The French Savalle Still was either scrapped or transferred to Uitvlugt and from there to Diamond DDL. A possible earlier still made of wood definitely has not made it to Diamond.

Albion (Berbice)

 History 

Map of Berbice ca. 1720 [188]
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/
There are no plantations on the coast of the colony of Berbice on a map dated back to ca.1720. [121] However, there are several plantations along the Corentyne east coast on another map dated back to 1802. But I did not find a sheet or note with names for the lots on this map. [171] At the beginning only the regions along the river Berbice was covered with plantations. According to two different sources, the first plantations on the coast of Berbice were established either in 1791 or 1796 [182] [205] One of the two sources states that all plantations on the east coast to the Devil's creek were established until 1799. The coast was not completely covered with lots until 1802. 



Detailed map section dated 1802 [219] [220]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl  & www.Gahetna.nl
On another map of 1802 we find the names of the proprietors of the lots on the Corentyne coast east of Berbice. Two of the names are very interesting. The names are Innes (Lot 5) and Ross (Lot 5). [219] [220] The name Ross is due to John Ross. John Ross is mentioned as the owner of the plantation Nigg in the London Gazette Issue 16885. This Issue is dated back to the 16th February 1814. [214] The name Innes is due to William Innes. William Innes and John Bond received £ 10,725 13S and 1D as compensation for the release of 225 slaves on the plantation Albion from the British government. [120] What has the plantation Nigg to do with the plantation Albion?

 Both plantations were sold for $ 1,000 on June 7, 1847. The lots of the plantations were also mentioned. According to this source the plantation Albion had the Lot 5 and Nigg Lot 6. [215] This coincides with the names of the proprietors on the mentioned map dated back to 1802. Even if there were no plantings mentioned the plantation Albion already existed as Lot around 1802. [219] [220]

 The Albion Estate is also mentioned in a letter from Henry Light to Lord John Russell. Henry Light wrote that the Albion Estate will commence the production of sugar in the next month. The letter dated to 15th September, 1840. [1] It is my understanding that Henry Light meant the first production of sugar on the Albion estate. According to the map of 1802 all the coastal plantations planted exclusively cotton or were planned to do so. In 1802 there were no sugar plantations on the east Corentyne coast. [171]

 This has not changed until 1 January, 1838. According to a report the plantation was still planting cotton on that date. The time period between the 1 January 1838 and the 31 December 1846 is marked with the words "Converted into sugar". The change of cultivation must have happened during that time. This would be consistent with the letter mentioned above, because the time the letter was written lies between 1838 and 1846. [172] 

In 1860 the plantation Albion was the property of the firm Cavan Brothers and Company. [384] They remained in their possession until the year 1865. In the said year, the Colonial Company Limited was established. This public company bought the plantations and properties of the firms Messrs Cavan, Lubbock & Co. (formerly Cavan Brothers and Co.) and Wm. Burnley Hume & Company. These were located in Demerara, Berbice, Trinidad and Barbados. [385] The Colonial Company Limited was liquidated in 1901 and Albion was transferred to the New Colonial Company Limited. [386] This company only lived until the year 1913. In the said year it was liquidated. [387] Albion eventually came into the hands of the firm Curtis, Campbell & Company Limited. With the subsequent merger of Messrs. Curtis Campbell & Co. and Booker Bros., McConnell & Company Limited on the 20 October 1939 the Albion estate went into the possession of the Booker Group. [113] [115] The Sugar Estate is still in use for the production of sugar cane under GuySuCo.

 Albion Distillery 

Mark from Albion AW (Enmore Still)
In 1966 there were still 370,622 gallons of rum verifiable produced in the Albion Distillery. [2] According to Dave Brrom there were only three distilleries left in 1971 and Albion was no longer among them. This means that the Albion Distillery was dissolved somewhere between 1967 and 1969. As mentioned above the Uitvlugt Distillery took over the capacity of four Distilleries scrapped between 1960 and 1969. The distilleries had already fallen victim to this change. Albion is thus the last and fourth distillery, which was probably scrapped during this period. This would lead us to the mention time period between 1967 and 1969. Why 1969? Because this year was explicitly mentioned as the end of the rationalization in connection with the Uitvlugt Distillery. Therefore I guess this must the last active year of the Albion Distillery. Finally I can tell something tangible regarding the date of closure. Ingvar Thomsen, a Danish journalist, had an interview with Yesu Persaud in 2005. Here comes the information from Mr. Persaud that Albion was closed in January of 1968. In 1969 the Albion distillery was already gone. [464]


The following marks have a connection with Albion: A.N. and A. W.. Velier states the mark A.W. on the label of the Velier Albion 1986 Full Proof Old Demerara 25 YO and a Wooden Continuous Still as origin (on the box). The mark of the Velier Albion 1994 Full Proof Old Demerara 17YO is A.N. and has also a Wooden Continuous Still stated as origin. The bottling Velier 1983 Full Proof Old Demerara 25 YO also has the Mark A.N. and the specified Wooden Continuous Still. Unfortunately I do not know the mark of the Velier Albion 1989 Full Proof Demerara, but it has also a Wooden Continuous Still as origin on the label. However, all rums are from the post - Albion era after 1969. 

The Mark AN may reflect the merger of the two plantations Albion and Nigg. There were direct neighbors. A source from 1841 also lists a Sugar Estate named Albion and Nigg. [196] Another source of 1851 gives them the Lot numbers 5 & 6 on the Corentyne coast. [197] So this style was distilled with a Wooden Coffey Still. According to the chart created by the Brand Ambassador of DDL Stefanie Holt the rum – style A.N. is nowadays being distilled on the French Savalle. Was there a change? It appears that way.
There is the rumor that the Port Mourant Still was involved in the creation of the mark A.W.. According to Luca Gargano the Double Vat Still was not transferred to Uitvlugt after the closure of the Port Mourant Distillery. It was first brought to the Albion Distillery and has spent a seemingly unknown period of time there. But at what point did the Double Vat Still leave Albion? One could now assume that the still left Albion after the closure of the Albion Distillery in 1969. But why did Cadenhead then release a 36 YO bottling with the name Uitvlugt and the mark P.M. on the Label? It also stated a pot still on the label as origin and the vintage 1964 (1964 – 2001). Albion existed at least until 1967. So how is this possible?

 I found something very interesting, that could bring some clarity into this puzzle. I found a kind of professional resume of a certain Harold Birkett. What has this man got to do with anything? In the list of his career, the following entry is to be read: 

„Albion Distilleries, Albion, Guyana (1965 - 1967) 
Manager - Fermentation, distillation, aging, blending, warehousing rum for 10,000 liter/day pot still batch rum plant and 6000 liter/day continuous still rum plant.“ [224] 

The Albion estate in the 1920's
Source: chs-jccss.org
There were only two distilleries left which possessed the pot or vat still in 1947. Versailles existed 1965 and is therefore ruled out. Thus these mentioned Pot Still can only be the Port Mourant Still. Fortunately, the production data of the Double Vat Still have been specified. Diffordsguide mentioned a production capacity of 3000 gallons for the first Vat Still and 2000 gallons for the second Vat Still. 10,000 liters would be 2641.72 U.S. Gallons or 2199.69 British (Imperial) gallons. Unfortunately, I do not know how much rum can be distilled from 3000 gallons of "Wash", but these production figures confirm my suspicion that the Port Mourant Still was located at Albion. [224] [225]





The Albion estate inmodernity
Source: chs-jccss.org
So, how can the Cadenhead bottling with the vintage 1964 and the mark P.M. be possible? There is the possibility that not only the Port Mourant Still was transferred to Uitvlugt. Some barrels full of rum could also have changed the location along with the still. This rum, however, could have not spent its whole time in the cool climate of Great Britain. Unfortunately, the rum is long gone and sold out. Thus these thoughts could never be proven to be true or not. I think one can safely assume that the Port Mourant Still went to Uitvlugt after the closure of the Albion Distillery. Luca Gargano was right.

However, a bottling under the label Velier with the name Albion with the vintage 1986 lists a Wooden Continuous Still as origin. This does not necessarily mean anything because a mark refers to a specific style of rum and these styles are not permanently connected to a specific still. The style of the mark A.W. could have been really originated from the Port Mourant Still and was later distilled in the Enmore Coffey Still. A source dated back to 1908 refers to the old Diamond Distillery and claims that their former wooden Coffey Still produced nearly the same rum as it was produced on their Vat Still. I already wrote that the Diamond Distillery once had a Vat Still. [86] So I think this theory is quite possible. 

© E.H.
I highly doubt it that an original Still from the old Albion Distillery has survived to this day. There is evidence that the very early rum coming from the Albion Distillery was distilled in a wooden Coffey Still. But the only remaining Wooden Coffey Still listed by DDL is the Enmore Still. I think it's safe to assume that the Enmore Coffey Still was able to copy the styles from Albion and thus the Albion Coffey Still was scrapped. If this now happened with the closure of Albion or within the premises of Enmore is not really of importance, because this still does not exist anymore.

Why I am so sure that there was a Wooden Coffey Still in Albion? Let's look at the numbers again. The above mentioned Continuous Still in the list of activities of Mr. Harold Birkett has produced 6000 liters of rum per day. [20] Now I would like to quote another source from 1983, which also states something really interesting: “The versatile John Dore-Tri Canada continuous still can process wash at a rate of 250 proof gallons an hour, replacing a wooden 'Coffey' still making 120 gallons an hour.” [20] So a wooden Coffey Still was able to produce about 120 gallons of rum per hour. This would be 1440 gallons of rum by a working day of 12 hours. If you assume U.S. gallons than the output would have been around 5450,99 liters, or if you are considering Imperial (British) gallons 6546,37 liters. This would almost fit the bill here. However, I do not know how long a working day was in that time. Of course all wooden Coffey Stills were not identical and I think the output varied a little between individual stills. But I do not think that they varied enormously. Therefore one can safely assume a Wooden Coffey Still at Albion around the time Harold Birkett was working there. However, this still was scrapped and does no longer exist.
© E.H.


 Established: Between 1802 - 1803

 Founder: William Innes

 Location: The estate is located west of the village of Rose Hall (now a city of about 8000 inhabitants) on the east coast of the River Berbice. More specifically on the coast Corentyne, west of the old Port Mourant estate.

Status: The Albion distillery was closed in January 1968

 Stills: The original Wooden Coffey still was scrapped.

Versailles (Demerara) 

 History 

Detailed map section dated 1759 [132]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl
We have to go back to the 18th Century for this Estate. The plantation Versailles was located just north of the plantation La Grange on a map of 1798. This plantation was called Des Granges in 1759. The plantations on the west bank of the river demerara with the numbers 2, 3 & 4 in 1759 were finally divided and split up to the plantations Meer Zorgen, Schoon Oord, 't Goed Fortuin, Versailles and Klein Poederoyen on the map of 1798. On this map of 1759 we can find the name L'Amirault. He was a joint partner of the former plantation Jerusalem on the east bank of the river Demerara. [132] [122]

The Plantation Versailles is mentioned for the first time on two maps of 1776. The proprietor was a certain Pierre L'Amirault. Then it must have probably been changed the ownership. On maps of 1783 and 1784, a certain Cornette is listed as the owner. Then another change occurred. P. Lamirault is listed again as proprietor of Lot 6 in 1786. This remains unchanged until 1798. Then L. Lamirault is listed as the owner of the plantation Versailles (Lot 8). Her Full name is Jeane Marie Luisa Lamirault. [217] [218] [122]

Detailed map section dated 1783 [211]
Source: http://www.gahetna.nl
This Jeane Marie Luisa Lamirault is listed in a register of the colonists from British Guiana. [133] The plantation Versailles is finally offered in 1816 by Jeane Marie Luisa Lamirault for sale. This woman was the widow of F.C. DeCornette. [134] Either she married F.C. DeCornette after the death of Pierre L'Amirault (her first husband), but retained her former name or she was the daughter of Pierre L'Amirault and had married this man. I do not know which possibility now would fit the bill.

At the time of emancipation a certain Francis de Ridder registered 351 slaves on the plantation Versailles in 1832. This gentleman could have bought the plantation directly from Mrs. Jeane Marie Luisa Lamirault in 1816. [409] Later, the plantation Versailles came into the possession of a certain John Croal (1789-1853). [410] At his death he left behind not only the plantation Versailles but also the plantations Palmyra and Malgre Tout. [411] In the meantime the plantation Versailles came finally into the possession of the firm of Thomas Daniel & Company. In 1882, the heirs of Thomas Daniel still owned the plantation Versailles along with the plantation Chateau Margo. [382] A source from 1985 mentions the estate of Versailles, consisting of the former plantations "Malgré tout" and the southern half of "Klien Poderoyen". [388] There was probably a merger between 1853-1882.

Detailed map section dated 1786 [127]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/
The property has been bought in 1896-97 by the firm of Meers. Wieting and Richter Limited. This firm formed a local syndicate, which is mentioned in the Handbook of British Guiana from 1909. It was called the "Versailles Plantation Company Limited". [389] [378] In 1917, Wieting & Richter still owned the "VERSAILLES Plantation Company Limited". [390] Wieting & Richter also owned the plantation Nismes, which until 1922 apparently merged with Versailles, as in the said year, the company "Versailles and Nismes Sugar Estate Companies, Ltd" is mentioned. [391] Finally, a source from 1929 linked the estate directly with the Booker Bros., McConnell & Co., Ltd., in 1929 as owner of the Versailles estate. [393] The name changed to Versailles Estate Limited until 1934. [113] By 1937, the plantation Schoon Ord merged with Versailles and the new name was henceforth the "Plantation Versailles & Schoon Ord, Estates Limited". [395] Apparently the name changed again and in 1949 the property was listed in the possession of the "Plantation Versailles & Schoon Ord Limited". [396]

Detailed map section dated 1792 [209]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
The mentioned Mark V.S.G. in Sascha article in connection to the Versailles Estate, could be the combination of all three plantations (Versailles, Schoon Ord, Goed Fortuin), because as we have seen, the property Versailles took a variety of other plantations. The Mark SXG might also point to a merger of another two plantations (Schoon Ord & Goed Fortuin). It is clear that the Schoon Ord plantation distilled rum and send some samples of it to the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867. Among them were not only uncoloured rums but also a coloured version. [47] The Versailles sugar factory was closed in 1978. [10] The Versailles Estate is no longer used by the Guysuco.


Versailles Distillery 

According to the old map of 1798 Versailles planted exclusively coffee. [122] [123] On the old map of 1798 is given as a cultivated plant coffee. [122] [123] In a list of the slave population of all Sugar Estates in British Guiana in 1833, the plantation then finally planted sugar cane next to coffee. [7] This changed in the period between 1838 and 1846. Coffee was finally dropped in favor of sugar cane. [172] According to another source the Versailles plantation produced in 1829 already more sugar (192.850 Lbs) than coffee (66.340 Lbs). In 1842 were actually only 678 Lbs coffee left. Coffee is no longer mentioned in the crop of 1845. [180] 



Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
 The construction of a sugar mill on the Versailles Plantation is also mentioned in a report on timber loads in 1854. [8] Almost as if it were not important. But a mill allows the direct processing of sugar cane on the plantation, and thus resulting in molasses for rum production. The rum production probably began in the 19th Century. Both, the neighboring plantation Schoon Ord and Versailles, represented British Guiana at the Worlds Columbian Exposition in Chicago in 1893 with rum samples. [179] 





Map section dated 1798 [122]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/
Schoon Ord, which later merged with Versailles, occurred much earlier on public exhibits with rum samples, such as the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867. The Versailles Distillery was still active in 1966 and produced 58,290 gallons of rum. [9] The production figures of 1967 (3,406,000 gallons of rum) give the impression that the Versailles Distillery was still producing rum, if you compare it with the output of all Distilleries in 1966 (2,642,076 gallons). This is not a proof, because we do not have the individual production figures of the five remaining distilleries. But the distillery is no longer mentioned from 1971 onwards. This means that the Versailles Distillery disappeared between 1967 – 1971. According to the interview by Ingvar Thomsen the distillery of Versailles was only closed in November 1978. This means that the rum distillery was closed together with the factory in this very. [464] If you take a close look at the production numbers then you can't help but notice that Versailles was almost always the smallest rum producer. Did they only posses the Single Vat Still? It almost looks that way.

From this old estate comes the aforementioned Single Wooden Pot Still. The still itself was transferred to Enmore after the closure of the Versailles Distillery. She was famous for its golden rums for long aging. [21] Here are not any doubts. This still is in the possession of Diamond Distillers Limited. According to Diffordsguide the Single Wooden Pot Still / Single Vat Still was party renewed with new wood in 2006. [173]



Mark from Versailles VSG
Established: Between 1759 and 1776

Founder: Pierre L'amirault

Location: The Versailles estate was located on the west side of the river Demerara. On the opposite site of the capital Georgetown and south of the city Vreed De Hoop (Peace and Hope / Friede und Hoffnung).

Status: Distillery and factory closed down in November 1978.

Stills: Single Wooden Pot Still (Single Vat Still)


Enmore (Demerara)

History 

Map section dated 1784 [207]
Source: www.gahetna.nl
Supposedly the Enmore sugar estate was established around 1840. At least some sources are claiming that. We will see soon enough that this is not the case. Thomas Porter (1748 - 1815) was an English trader from Tobago who sought his luck in British Guiana and found it there. He bought Lot 27 in 1782 on the east coast of Demerara to cultivate cotton. He began with only 20 slaves. In 1798 Thomas Porter owned the plantations Hoope (Hope), Paradise and third plantation without a name but the Lot number 24. In 1800 he returned to England, where he built the "Mansion Rockbeare House". He left his plantations to his two sons Henry and Thomas II. [135] [136] [137] 




Map section dated 1786 [127]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/ 
The aforementioned source said something about a Lot 27, but I am not sure to which map itself refers to. A certain Porther is mentioned as the proprietor of Lot 44 on the east coast of Demerara in 1784. I think it's referring to Thomas Porter. [207] Another map of 1792 showed that Thomas Porter already owned two plantations, consisting of three lots. The unnamed Lot 24 with the neighboring plantation Haslenton belongs to the plantation Hope Lot 25 and the nearby plantation Paradise in Lot 27 [208] [209] 






Map section dated 1792 [209]
Sour ce: www.Gahetna.nl
His son Henry Porter (1791 - October 15, 1858) was given the sum of £ 35.960 14S 8D as compensation for his 569 slaves on the plantation Enmore during the emancipation by the British Government. [138] The plantation Paradise was given to his brother Thomas II. He awarded £19.295 8S 0D for 385 slaves on this plantation as compensation. [139] The plantation Enmore must have become her name under Henry Porter. Their neighboring plantations Porters Hope and Haslenton identifies her as the unnamed plantation owned by Thomas Porter in 1792 (Lot 24). So I suppose that the Enmore plantation was perhaps the first plantation of Thomas Porter and was later passed by to his son Henry, which finally gave her the infamos name Enmore. 



Rums from the Enmore Coffey Still ELCR & EHP
Walter Rodney wrote in his book from 1979: „E.H.P. was used as the call letters for Enmore, commemorating E. Henry Porter.“ [26] Thus, the putative founder of Enmore Edward Henry Porter is meant. In another book from 1957 the following marks are associated with the Enmore estate: In a book from 1957 following Marks are associated with this Estates at Enmore. N.P., K.F.M., E.H.P., M.X.E. and K.F.. [27] The initials K.F.M. Are associated with the plantation Lusignan. The plantation Mon Repos (M.X.E.) amalgamated with the plantation Lusignan (K.F.M.) in 1930. [28] The Mark of Mon Repos MXE could mean Mon Repos & Endragt. The Mon Repos plantation is actually mentioned by that name in a list of 1833. [16] This plantation presumably distilled rum and contributed some samples to the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867. [47] The Mark E.H.P. can be traced back to the wooden continuous still. It was the original still of Enmore. With the closure of Versailles its famous Single Vat Still went to the Enmore Distillery. According to Velier there is another mark wich is directly linked with the Enmore Still. The mark is called E.L.C.R.. [170] So this Mark defines a lighter rum from this wooden continuous still, while on the other hand the rum with the mark E.H.P. seems to have more body and depth of flavor. The meaning of E.LC.R. is not quite clear. Some members of the Minsitryofrum-forum believe it means Enmore Light Coloured Rum. How about Enmore Light Coffey / Column Rum? Unfortunately, there is no evidence for this theory.

Rums from Enmore with the marks REV & KFM
I found something interesting about the Mark K.F.M. : „K.F.M. means K.F. McKenzie. The rum in question was made from muscovado molasses, and was distinguished even from the Lusignan rum which was a by-product of the 83. 84. vacuum-pan. Generally speaking, Guiana rum did not enjoy as high a reputation as that of Jamaica.“ [29] So it seems that the Lusignan plantation has distilled a style of rum with the mark K.F.M.. I also found something interesting about the plantation itself. Kenneth Francis Mackenzie (1749 – 1831), born in Redcastle Ross-shire (Scotland), bought the said plantation Lusignan somewhere between the late 1780s and the early 1790s. In his honor the mark of the plantation Lusignan became K.F.M.. [140] [141] The plantation Lusignan later amalgamated with Enmore and rum with the mark K.F.M. was produced in the Enmore Distillery (and bottled under the label of Cadenhead for example). The plantations Enmore and Lusignan both belonged to the Enmore Sugar Estates Ltd. in 1948. [32] This would confirm the amalgamation and the mention of the mark in the book from 1957. 

Map section dated Oct 1798 [212]
Source:www.Gahetna.nl
The meaning of the mark R.E.V. remains a mystery, for now. For the moment the marks A.W.M. (pot still), V.N.L. (column still), X.P.D. (pot still) and E.D.G. (?column still?) also do not share their secrets with us. The Mark N.P. could be used for the plantation Non Pareil (or Nonpareil). This plantation was located directly adjacent to the Enmore plantation. [30] Both plantations later amalgamated and were mentioned together in one line. [31] Non Pareil itself was turned into a village and later abandoned in the 1940's.. [48] This plantation once had a sugar factory. The schematics of this factory where shown on the Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84. Thus this plantation could also have distilled rum in the past. [181] 




Photo of the old Enmore plantation (undated)
Source: inguyana.blogspot.de
The plantation was still owned by the Porter family (the heirs of Henry Porter) in 1860, since Henry Porter died in 1858. Ludovic Porter, a family member, is specified as the manager of the plantation. [384] A source from 1882 is more closely there. According to her Aylmer Henry Porter was the owner of Enmore plantation in 1882. [382] This man lived until 1902. In the Handbook of British Guiana from 1909 the “Trustees of Henry Porter, desceased” are listed as owners. This was probably Henry Aylmer Porter, who previously died 7 years ago. [378] The next clue I found relates to the year 1923. Here the Booker McConnell Brothers & Company Limited is named as administrator (agent) of the estate. However, they were not the owners. I do not know who was the owner behind Bookers in 1923.[392] A source from 1927 still mentions the Bookers as agents of Enmore. [394] Finally a source from 1934 states the Enmore Estates Limited as property of the firm Curtis Campbell & Company. Unfortunately I do not know when the change of ownership occurred. [113] What happened after that, however, is clear. With the merger of Curtis Campbell & Company and Booker Bros., McConnell & Company the said Enmore estate became property of the Booker Group. The property itself remained in the firm Enmore Estates Limited. [396] [13] The Enmore property continues to be used by the Guysuco. Since 2011 the sugar factory takes over at Enmore the cane of La Bonne Inention property. [381] 

Enmore Distillery 

Map section dated 1798 [122]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/
The Enmore plantation mainly produced cotton until the year 1813. From that year on the production of cotton was gradually converted into sugar, since the price of sugar rose and the ones of coffee and cotton were falling. In 1829 both coffee (22.785 Lbs) and cotton (55,500 Lbs) were grown and harvested. One year later, in 1830, the majority of the crop consisted of sugar (60,000 Lbs). Coffee (8,600 Lbs) and cotton (3,300 Lbs) were only minimally represented. [180] Around 1832 the Enmore plantation was a thriving sugar plantation with approximately 728 slaves. [11] In my opinion the Enmore plantation could not have began with the distilling of rum before the 19th Century.

Enmore was only represented with a sugar sample at the London International Exhibition in 1862 (Appendix A position 15). It was contributed by a certain L. Porter. [178] At the Paris Universal Exhibtion 1867 Enmore was once again only contributing some varieties of sugar samples, obtained from vacuum pans (Appendix A positions 26 & 28). [47] 

Map section dated 1823 [185] [186]
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org
With the merger of Messrs. Curtis Campbell & Co and Booker Bros., McConnell & Company Limited the Enmore estate went into the possession of the Booker Group on 20 October 1939. Therefore both plantations, Enmore and Versailles, belonged to the Booker Group. [115] The Versailles Distillery was closed after the independence of Guyana in 1966. So the Single Wooden Pot Still went first to Enmore. The Enmore Distillery was later transferred to the Demerara Distilleries Limited, which was a subsidiary of Guyana Distilleries Limited. We will encounter this name again when we take a closer look at the Uitvlugt Distillery. [160] After the independence of Guyana the newly formed government took control of the assets of the Booker Group. Finally Booker sold their corporations in 1966. 


Finally the Guyana Distilleries Limited (Uitvlugt), with their subsidiary the Demerara Distilleries Limited (Enmore), amalgamated with the Diamond Liquors Limited (Diamond) and became the company Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL), which still exists to this day. [161]

 According to Sascha the Enmore Distillery was closed 1993. But if the informations of some independent bottlers are correct, then the last distillation at the Enmore plantation was in 1995. All stills and the useful equipment was transferred from Enmore to the Uitvlugt Distillery.According to the information from the interview of Ingvar Thomsen the Enmore distillery was closed in April 1994. Since this information was given relatively "timely" (2005) and comes from Yesu Persaud, I think we can safely assume that this is the right date of the closure. [464] The sugar estate of Enmore is still in use and a packing plant was built there. The last remaining Wooden Coffey Still at DDL comes from the old Enmore Distillery. It consists mainly of wood and has been supposedly built around 1880.


Rums with the mark MEA
Established: Between 1784 - 1792 (1798 - 1823)

Founder: Thomas Porter (Lot) / Henry Porter (Name)

Location: The estate was on the Demerara east coast. So in between the river and the Demerara Mahaica Creek.

Status: Distillery closed in April 1994 ; Sugar factory is still active

Stills: Wooden Coffey / Continuous Still



Port Mourant (Berbice)

History 

Marks from Port Mourant MP, MPM, UPM
According to DDL the Port Mourant Sugar Estate was established in 1732. To this end, I found no source other than DDL itself referring to this year. But I found something else, even if not quite as old. A certain Esq. Stephen Mourant is mentioned in a list of colonists of British Guiana. He died on 19 April 1824. You can also found a William Carabin Mourant in this list. [142] The Port Mourant Estate is mentioned in an issue of the London Gazette in 1823 as the property of Stephen Mourant. [143] So the name of this estate can be traced back to this very man and his family. I will later go into the details of the founding of the estate when we take a closer look at the Port Mourant Distillery. 

In 1824 Stephen Mourant died as you can see in an issue of the London Gazette, dated to January 4th, 1825. [365] The directly next owner of the plantations was most likely Donald Ross. During the emancipation Donald Ross got from the British government for his 147 slaves a compensation of £ 12.083 14S 9D in 1835. Donald Ross died in 1839 and this year any concerned companies or persons with business related to the Port Mourant plantation were called to assert their rights. Donald Ross had three brothers: George, Hector and John Ross, which were all plantation owners in British Guiana. [144] [365] In March 26th, 1842, the plantation was eventually sold to a certain M. Rader G for $ 32,000. Sugar cane was still planted on the plantation. [12] The trade name for rum from Port Mourant was P.M.. So the initials of the plantation were used for identification of the barrels full of rum, molasses or the sugar coming from Port Mourant. [33] There was a release of a bottling under the label of Velier with the vintage of 1997 and the mark U.P.M.. U. stands apparently for Uitvlugt (Uitvlugt Port Mourant). That would make sense, because the Port Mourant Still was producing rum in Uitvlugt in the year 1997. My thanks goes to Cyril of durhum.com! Thanks for the hint. ;) So P.M. is without a doubt the style of rum coming from the old Port Mourant Distillery. The Mark M.P.M. is a slightly lighter version of the style P.M. and has been bottled by WMCadenhead and Velier. The meaning of the mark G.M. also remains unclear. Cadenhead bottled some rums from the vintages 1974 and 1975 with this Mark. What I can say is that the rum leaves a light impression on the palate and the finis. Perhaps a light version of P.M.? Who knows. 

On July 24th, 1851, the firm John Kingston & Company is mentioned in connection with the Port Mourant plantation as it was again to be sold via sequestration. According to another source John Kingston, the owner of the before mentioned company, bought Port Mourant in 1852 and kept it until the end of the 20th century. [367] [368] What happened after that? I found something very interesting. In 1906, the company George Fletcher and Company was contracted by Booker Bros., McConnell & Company to deliver a new sugar mill for Port Mourant. It is precisely this company, which was bought by Bookers in 1956. So they already knew the company for a very long time by the time of the buyout. Bookers must have bought the Port Mourant plantation between 1900 – 1906 and transferred it into another subsidiary. This subsidiary is mentioned in the Handbook of British Guiana from 1909. It was the "Plantation Port Mourant Limited." [378] [397] Bookers held a firm grip on this estate until the forced sale through the nationalization. Until 1960 the plantation was transferred to the Booker Sugar Estates Limited. [13] There is evidence that the Port Mourant sugar estate was combined with the Albion sugar estate, which seems more than possible and logically since the two plantations were neighbours.

Port Mourant Distillery 

Map section dated 1780 (1771) [187]
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/
So let us get back to the foundation date of Port Mourant. According to some authors and DDL itself the Port Mourant Distillery exists since the foundation of the plantation in 1732. I have no idea on what sources this claim is made. However, this statement assumes that the plantation had right from the start sugar cultivated on its fields. Why? Because rum was only a by-product of the sugar industry at the time. I have found something very interesting during my research for this article. On a map of 1802 all plantations on the east sea coast of Berbice were all cotton plantations. There was therefore no single sugarcane plantation on the coast of Berbice in 1802. Thus a utilization of molasses from a neighboring plantation is also impossible. So the rum distilling tradition on the Port Mourant plantation can only have began in the 19th Century. [171] In addition I would also like to quote another source from 1841: 




Map section dated 1802 [219] [220]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl  & www.Gahetna.nl
„Before Berbice surrendered to the British, in 1796, almost all the plantations were at a distance from the coast, considerably up the banks of the Berbice and the Canje; but within a very short time after the colony came into our possession, the plantations were greatly extended. The west coast was first cultivated; and, in the year 1799, that to the eastward of the river Berbice, as far as the Devil's Creek, was cleared and cultivated. This part was surveyed and cut into two parallel lines of estates, with a navigable canal between them for the convenience of water-carriage. Behind the second row of estates run the river Canje, both the banks of which are cultivated with sugar, coffee and plantains. The estates are distinguished as follows: those on the line facing the sea are the coast estates; the second line consists of the canal estates; and the remainder are called the Canje estates.” [182] 

Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
Another source from 1888, a certain Pieter Marinus Netscher, wrote that the Governor of Berbice, Abraham Jacob van Imbijze van Batenburg, already gave order to establish 46 Lots with 500 acre each on the east coast of Berbice on January 12, 1791. [205] On a partial section of a map from 1799 you can see these plantations along the east coast up to the Devils Creek. These would be consistent with evidence of another source from 1842. These another source also states that the lots were only established up to the Devil's Creek in 1799, but no further than that. Another map from the October 1798, drawn by Cap. Thomas Walker, confirms this assumption. There were also only plantations up to the devils creek. There were no plantations from the Devil's Creek up to the mouth of the river Corentyne. [212] You can't find the name Mourant either on the map. 

So there was no plantation with the name Port Mourant on the east coast of Berbice before 1791, 1796 or even 1798, no matter which source you would prefer. The map of 1780 (supposedly from 1771) shows only the plantations on the river Canje. Another note states that all plantations on the coast exclusively cultivated cotton: “Cotton thrives best on the coast estates, and it is on these therefore that it is principally cultivated.” [183] This would also coincide with the map from 1802. You will also not find the name Mourant on this map. [219] [220] Further evidence provides a issue of the London Gazette: 

London Gazette, Issue 16794, 26. October 1813
Source: www.thegazette.co.uk
„Whereas I the undersigned, by authority obtained from His Excellency J. Murray, Brigadier-General and Acting Governor of Berbices dependencies, &c. &c. &c. granted upon a petition of F. Cort, as attorney of Charles Simpson, John Wilson, and Alexander Grant, who are attornies for John and Robert Gladstone, of Liverpool, Merchants, have caused to be taken in execution and sequestration, the cotton estate Port Mourant, situated on the Corentyne coast of this Colony, with all its slaves, buildings, cultivations, &c. the property of the said Stephen Mourant.“ [216]

This should push any remaining doubts aside and will make it clear for everyone. There was a cotton plantation named Port Mourant on the east coast of Berbice in 1813. There was no sugar cultivated at the time of the above mentioned sequestration. But it is undeniable that the cultivation changed and cotton was dropped in favor of sugarcane. Even Pieter Marinus Netscher wrote that the planting of cotton did not last long and coffee and sugar replaced it bit by bit. But he did not mention a exact date or time period for this change. A report from 1847 gives us the production figures of the Port Mourant plantation. Sugar was cultivated between the time period 1 January 1836 to 31 December 1846. [172] So the change had to be done between 1813 - 1836. It is my opinion that the Port Mourant Distillery had been established during this time period. And really: I found something interesting. I quote from an issue (17764) of the London Gazette, dated to November 13th, 1821:

London Gazette,Issue 17764, 13. November 1821
Source: www.thegazette.co.uk
„Sale by Execution.- First Proclamation

Whereas I the undersigned by the virtue of authority received from His Honour Henry Beard, Esq. President of the Honourable the Courts of Criminal and Civil Justice of this Colony, dated the 19th January and 20th March 1821, granted upon the petitions presented by H. Stall, qq the heirs of the Late William Ord, deceased, plaintiff, against Stephen Mourant, defendant, have caused to be taken in execution, and placed under sequestration, the sugar estate called Port Mourant, situated on the Corentyn Coast, within this colony, with all its cultivation, slaves, buildings, and further appurtenances whatsoever thereto belonging ; be it therefore known, that I the undersign, or the Marshal for the time being, intend to sell at execution sale, after expiration of one year and six weeks, from the 2nd day of April 1821, the abovementioned estate called Port Mouant, with all its cultivation, slaves, buildings, and further appurtenances whatsoever thereto belonging and specified in the inventory, laying at the Marshal's Office, for the Inspection of those concerned, in order to recover, out of the proceeds of the sale of the said estate (if possible) such sum of money for which the same was taken in execution, and put under sequestration : all conformably to the regulations of the Honourable Court of Civil Justice of this Colony, dated the 20th December 1820, respecting the sale of the estates by execution therein.

The first proclamation published, by beat of drum, from the Court-House of this colony, and further dealt with according to law.--Berbice, 15th April, 1821.“ [364]

Demerara Rums from Guyana
The cultivation was thus changed from cotton to sugar between 1813 – 1821. It was during this period when the Port Mourant Distillery was most likely founded and converted the resulting molasses of sugar production into rum. The plantation itself was founded between 1802 - 1813.

So when was the Port Mourant Distillery closed down for good? To this end, no one seems to know something tangible, or do not want to make it public. Let us look once again in the production figures in the mentioned reports of the comptrollers. The distillery produced 215,884 gallons rum in 1954. [3] But the distillery was already gone in 1958. There are no production numbers for the years between 1958 – 1960. [4] So the Port Mourant distillery was apparently decommissioned in the time period of 1954 – 1958. And indeed, if you take a look again in the production tables you can find the last active year of the Port Mourant Distillery. It was the year 1955.[42] Other sources are mentioning this year in conjunction with the closure of the Port Mourant factory. [43] [44]

© E.H.
Now there is an interesting possibility, or rather a theory which I unfortunately can notverify. What if the statement of DDL is based on an inscription on one of the metallic copper parts of the Vat Stills, on which the year 1732 is readable? What would this mean? According to the above research it would be the only be consistent and concluded to assume that Stephen Mourant got one or both stills from another plantation. This plantation could be one from the upper lands of the river Berbice which were subsequently abandoned in favour for the coastal region or from a plantation residing in the neighboring Dutch colony of Surinam. There was rum distilled too. The Port Mourant Stills would therefore probably the former equipment of an old and abandoned plantation, which itself bought the equipment or the copper parts in the year 1732. In this particular year the trade relations with Berbice were considerably eased. Perhaps from England. The greenheart timber was then sourced from Guyana itself, or the stills could have been made by order in England, like the Enmore Coffey Still, which was also allegedly made at first in England with exported wood from the colony. Now this is all very theoretical and remains a presumption as long as the source of DDL concerning the year 1732 has been made public. The distillery itself has not been established in this year. The possibility that the copper parts of both or one of the stills could be as old as 1732 still remains. But the parts or the stills were purchased from elsewhere, namely, during the transition from cotton to sugar cane between 1813-1821. However, since the wood is replaced at regular intervals, these metal parts are the only components that still could be that old. 

Thus the fate of the Port Mourant distillery is finally resolved. It probably fell victim to the rationalization under the Booker Group, a few years before Uitvlugt became the main distilling plant under Bookers. However, the Double Vat Still came first to Albion and not to Uitvlugt. She remained there until the closure of the Albion distillery 1967-1969. After Albion was gone forever the Double Vat Still came to the main plant of the Booker Group. I wrote extensively on this subject in the text about the Albion estate and I would like to refer to this text section. So all rums from 1955 should no longer come from this old estate. There are no doubts about the identification of the still. The Port Mourant still is in the premises of DDL and is still in use for the creation of rums, used in some of the famous El Dorado blends.

© E.H.

Established: Plantation between 1802 – 1813 ; Distillery between 1813 - 1821

 Founder: Stephen Mourant

 Location: The estate was located east of the village of Rose Hall (now a city of about 8000 inhabitants) on the east coast of the river Berbice. More specifically on the Corentyne east coast.

 Status: Distillery and factory closed in 1955.

 Stills: Double Wooden Pot Still (Double Vat Still)

Uitvlugt (Demerara)


Map section dated 1776 [217]
Source: http://www.gahetna.nl/
History 

There are two maps of 1759. On one of the maps is no reference to the plantations on the west coast of British Guiana. On the one of the two, which is basically a copy of the first one, are handwritten notes but no information about the year when they have been added. There, a certain Johan Frederik Boode is mentioned as the owner of the plantation Groote en Klyne Uitvlugt. The plantation Cornelia Ida was the property of the Hon. v. Rynevelt & Zoonen. Thus, this note must have been added between 1759-1786. Why I am so sure about this time period? Because on a another map of 1786 a certain J. Boode is mentioned as the proprietor of the plantation Cornelia Ida. [132] [145]

Map section dated 1784 [207]
Source: http://www.gahetna.nl
A map of 1783 shows on the east coast a plantation with an owner named Boode. [210] The picture becomes more accurate if we compare the names of the owners of the neighboring plantations with the maps from 1784 and 1798. [122] [207] This means that the De Uitvlugt plantation (1798) from J.F. Boode was already owned by him in 1783 (Lot 21 on the map 1784). The names of the proprietors of the neighboring plantations have only changed slightly until 1798 and thus confirm this suggestion. A further refinement is possible by looking on a map of 1776. There the plantation De Uitvlugt is mentioned together with the name Boode. [221] Therefore Uitvlugt must have been founded between 1759 – 1776.



Map section dated 1786 [127]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/ 
Johan Berend Christoffer Boode Frederick was born on 17 February 1733 in Blankenburg (Brunswick) and died on 28 December 1796 in Demerara. He owned five plantations in Demerara and Essequibo, including the plantations Uitvlugt and Cornelius Ida. The latter was later inherited by his granddaughter Anna Catherina Duker. One of the sources, Jean-Paul Arnoul, claims that Johan Berend Christoffer Frederick Boode already arrived in 1749. [146] [147] [127]

Andreas Christian Boode (sometimes called Andries or Andrew Christian Christian Boode Boode) (1765-1844) was a Dutch plantation owner. He was the son of Johan Berend Christoffer Frederick Boode. J.F. Boode registered 306 enslaved persons for A.C. Boode (his son) on the Groote en Klijn Uitvlugt plantation 1832. He was awarded with £ 14,236 16S 6D as compensation for the freed slaves during the emancipation by the British government. According to a list of colonists from British Guiana he died in 1844. I found a more accurate date on a web site referring to the 31 Oktober 1844. [147] [148] [149]

Map section dated 1792 [209]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
The Groote en Klijn Uitvlugt plantation, which is mentioned in 1833, has the neighboring plantations Zeeburg and Vrees an hoop. The plantation De Uitvlugt on a map of 1798 has the neighbors Zeebergen and Vrees en Hoop. I think we can safely assume that the Groote en Klijn Uitvlugt plantation was the former De Uitvlugt plantation. There are some discrepancies about the date of birth of John Christian Boode. One source claims he was already 18 years old in 1824 and another one, a list of colonists of British Guiana, states 1816 as year of birth. However, the date of death is the same for both sources. It is the first Februar 1870. [147] [150]


Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
DDL itself indicates that the Uitvlugt sugar estate was founded in the 18th Century. The meaning of the name is supposedly translated as "Flowing out". [25] The Uitvlugt plantation is mentioned in 1841. [36] A book brings the following marks in association with the Uitvlugt Estate: ICB/U, ICB/C, DK and ICB. [37] Which former plantations that once had been is yet to be determined. The mark ICB/U is directly associated with Uitvlugt by several authors and DDL itself. 


A possible theoretical explanation of this mark would be the name of the founder (Johan Christoffer Boode / Uitvlugt). However, Johan is written with "J" and not "I". Maybe it has changed over time from the "J" to "I" or it has a very good reason for this notation. That's all purely theoretical and I have no proof for this. Nevertheless this thought is at least an interesting approach. According to a report of K&L wine merchants the mark stands for Isaac Christiany Boody/Uitvlugt. [418] This sounds like an distorted version of Johan Christoffer Boode. D.K. was the mark used for the identification of the plantation De Kinderen, which was located west of the Uitvlugt plantation. The Mark SP ICBU can be found on the Velier Uitvlugt 1988 Full Proof Old Demerara 17 YO. The meaning of SP has yet to be determined. [418] Two new Rums from Velier have the Marks ULR and MGS. ULR means Uitvlugt Light Rum. What is behind Modified G.S. has yet to be determined. But both rum should come from the French Savalle Still. Perhaps the S stands for Savalle, but who knows.

The Uitvlugt sugar factory with the "mark" on the chimney
Source: guysuco.com
Andreas Christian Boode (1765 - 1844) had a son and a daughter. This daughter, Phoebe Boode, married a certain Isaac William Webb Horlock in 1826. [408] The plantation was after the death of Andreas Christian Boode ceded to his son John Christian Boode. According to K & L Wines the mark for Uitvlugt stands for "Isaac Christiany Boody / Uitvlugt". Did this Isaac William Webb Horlock has anything to do with the name Isaac in the mark of the plantation? Maybe there was a partnership between the two men that led to this abbreviation. However, this unfortunately I can neither confirm nor deny. In 1860 the plantation Uitvlugt iis in possession of a certain J.C. Boode. [384] This is John Christian Boode (1807-1870), the only son of Andreas Christian Boode. John Christian Boode married Clementina Elizabeth Mary Bayntun, the daughter of Admiral Sir Henry Bayntun William on June 6, 1834. He had two daughters and died on February 1st, 1870. [406] [407] [408] Then the plantation seems to have been sold because A.C. McCalman(?), the heirs of Josiah Booker and John McConnell were the owners of the plantation Uitvlugt in 1882. [382] McConnell was the only one in 1885 who remained in possession of the plantation, as the last of the Booker Family, John H. Booker, sold his shares to John McConnell in 1885. [369] The Handbook of British Guiana from 1909 mentioned the "Trustees of John McConnell (deceased)" as the owners of the Uitvlugt plantation. [378] These were his two sons and the firm McConnell & Company Limited who was merged in 1900. From 1934 on it was listed in the subsidiary of the Booker Demerara Sugar Estates Limited. This state of affair continued until the nationalization in 1976.


Uitvlugt Distillery 

Coffee was still planted on the De Uitvlugt plantation on a map of 1798. [122] [124] The Groote en Klijn Uitvlugt plantation harvested coffee and sugarcane in a report on the slave population in 1833. [7] As of 1 January 1838 there was only sugarcane left in cultivation on the now called Uitvlugt plantation. [172] So the change of cultivation has happened between 1798 and 1833. And indeed: If you look into another book from 1851 you find more production figures. For the year 1829 it listed almost only sugar (874.350 Lbs) and a very minimal amount of coffee (5,000 Lbs). Coffee has completely disappeared in the crop of 1832. [181] Is it highly unlikely, that the Uitvlugt Distillery was established far before 1798. 


Detailed map section dated 1798 [122]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/
Whether the two original French Savalle stills, which have now been assembled as a four column still at DDL, are really from the 18th Century is not so plausible in my opinion. Why? Armand Savalle and his son Désiré Savalle invented the Savalle Still in the 19th Century. A U.S. patent regarding the Savalle still is dated to the year 1868. How can a still from the 19th century be dated back to the 18th century? [174] [175] Unfortunately the age of the Estates has nothing to do with the history of the distillery or the distilling of rum on this plantation. The Estate is older that the actual distillery was. The foundation dates of the estates are often used for the sake of marketing. A mere window-dressing, if your asking me. They indirectly suggesting a tradition of rum distilling that has never existed. At least not in such high ages, as it is the case with the Port Mourant Distillery, which I already mentioned in the text of the Port Mourant plantation. 

© E.H.
The distillery was renewed by Bookers in 1960 and transferred into the subsidiary Guyana Distilleries. Since that year she took over the output of four scrapped distilleries. All of them fell victim under the rationalization process under Bookers. Port Mourant was already decommissioned in 1955 and could therefore not be counted to the four closed distilleries as of 1960. The distilleries in question were: La Bonne Intention (1960), Skeldon (1960), Blairmont (1962) and Albion (1968). Apparently all the stills of these distilleries were either adopted or became dispensable if they already had a similar still in Uitvlugt. All four mentioned distilleries were in the possession of the Booker Group. Guyana Distilleries remained in the possession of the Booker Group until the (forced) sale of all possessions to the Guyanese government in 1976. [159] 

Johann Barend Christoffer Fredric Boode
Painted by Anton Graff
Source: search.ancestry.com
The distillery was rebuilt reopenend again in Uitvlugt on 27 August 1975. The Minister of Ecomnomic Development Desmond Hoyte gave a speech there. [40] In 1983 the Guyana Distilleries Limited (Uitvlugt) finally amalgamated with the Diamond Liquors Limited (Diamond), or shortly DDL. [161]

The last active year of the Uitvlugt Distillery was 1999. Bristol Spirits Limited, A.D. Rattray and Plantation Rum have released bottlings from this vintage. According to the interview by Ingvar Thomsen the Uitvlugt the distillery was closed in December of 1999. So this was actually the last year of this distillery. [464]  The useful equipment and operational stills came to the Diamond Distillery, where they still stand to this day. Dave Broom could take a good look at those stills on his journey for his book Rum around the turn of the millennium. They can also be seen on the official website of DDL. The Uitvlugt sugar estate is still in use.

Only the French Savalle stills were preserved from the Uitvlugt distillery. A kind of column stills, which produces a light distillate. Whether both really come from the Uitvlugt distillery or one has come from the old Blairmont Distillery is apparently resolved by the official side. Here comes the information that both stills are from Uitvlugt. Whether this is true or not is hard to trace back. But it think it would be possible that one of the Savalle Stills may have come from the Blairmont Distillery. This would not be contrary to the official statement that both stills came from Uitvlugt. This would have happened already in 1962 and nearly 38 years had passed until the closure of Uitvlugt 2000. A considerably long time with the possibility to forget or to loose informations during the change of ownership over the past 38 years. But of course this is only a theory without a proof.

© E.H.

 Established: Between 1759 und 1776

 Founder: Johan Berend Christoffer Frederick Boode

 Location: On the Demerara west coast. The village of the same name has approximately 2000 inhabitants.

 Status: Distillery closed in December 1999

 Stills: French Savalle Still(s). Each still has two columns. Together they form a four-column still.


Diamond (Demerara)

Map section dated 1759 [132]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl
History 

According to Diffordsguide the Diamond Distillery was founded around 1670. I found no evidence for this time period. Maybe this information is once again provided by DDL. This year, however, is not associated with Diamond directly on their Homepage. The earliest proven date I could find was the year 1753. By the time the Diamond plantation was the property of a certain John Carter. [151] 1752 and 1670 are not very much the same. However, I found some information which make the year 1670 as foundation of the Diamond Distillery very unrealistic. 



Detailed map section dated 1783 [211]
Source: http://www.gahetna.nl
The information mentions the name of Laurens Storm van's Gravensande. Laurens Storm van's Gravensande was the Dutch commander of the colony Essequibo from 1742 to 1772 and was at the beginning of his career the secretary of commander Herman Gelskerke. He reached Essequibo in 1738. After the death of Gelskerke in 1742 Gravensande was promoted to command the colony of Essequibo. [198] [199] In fact, this Storm van's Gravensande founded the colony Demerara, situated between the rivers Berbice and Essequibo, in 1746. The establishment of Demerara was possible due to economic difficulties in the colony of Essequibo and his administrative talent. [200] I would like to quote a source:
Map section dated 1784 [207]
Source: http://www.gahetna.nl
“However, the difficulties were overcome, the first applicant being Andries Pietersen, probably a Swede, who got the consent of the Company in 1745 and received a grant, on the 3rd of April, 1746, of 2,000 acres on or near the Coeleriserabo Creek. Four other grants were made on the same day, all up the Demerara River, one on the Camoeny of 1,000 acres to Bastian Christiansen, probably another Swede. Christianburg was granted later to Christian Finet of the same nationality.” [201]
The first encouragement of a piece of land by Storm van's Gravensande in the colony of Demerara, and thus the establishment of the first plantation, is the date of the third April 1746. There were not granted plantations before this date. This makes the year of foundation of the Diamond Distillery before 1746 far more than unrealistic. A further source conrfirms this allegation:
“On the promptings of Storm van's-Gravesande, the first plantation on the Demerara was established in 1746, and six years later the rapid growing new settlement had its first commander appointed, although he remained subordinate to the now director-general of Essequibo.” [202]
Map section dated 1786 [127]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/ 
There is only one conclusion in my humble opinion: The plantation Diamond was founded between 1746 – 1752 until the mention of John Carter as proprietor. He actually could be the founder of the Diamond plantation. The name John Carter is also mentioned on an old map of the colony of Essequibo and Demerara in 1759 as the owner a plantation called Diamond. The year 1753 is also mentioned with his name. The properties were located on the east side of the river Demerara. According to the map it was a sugar plantation. 





Map section dated 1792 [209]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
On another map of 1798 the name Diamond disappeared and the names Klein Diamant (J. van Ryneveld & Zoon) and Groot Diamant (Gehrecke) were replacing it. Apparently the Diamond plantation was either divided into two plantations, or the Groote Diamant plantation was the former Diamond plantation of 1759. The neighboring plantation named Golden Grove in the south is almost at the same location on both maps and underpins this assumption. [132] [122] [123] [151]
A detailed map of 1783 shows the two plantations Little Diamond and Great Diamond. So it seems that both plantations appeared earlier than 1798. [211] A comparison with other maps is supporting this assumption. 
 

Map section dated Oct. 1798 [212]
Source: www.Gahetna.nl
In the meantime a certain Samuel Welsh was the proprietor of the Diamond plantation in 1762. [152] The ownership then changed during the years. On 4 October 1848 the plantation Great Diamond was bought by M. Steele & G.H. Loxdale for G$ 9,050. At the date of sale the plantation was harvesting sugar. In 1856 the plantation Little Diamond was also bought by M. Steele & G.H. Loxdale. [154] I found no further evidence regarding the plantation Little Diamond after this purchase. The Great Diamond plantation itself is still mentioned. She was listed in a issue of the London Gazette on 10 November 1876 among the awarded winners of the Philadelphia International Exhibition. [155] The company Loxdale Steele and Company thus bought the plantation Great Diamond in 1848 and Little Diamond in 1856. [398] The said company, however, ceased to exist on 12/31/1860. [399] What happened then? 

Sandbach, Tinne & Company in Liverpool (McInroy Sandbach & Co in Demerara, the name changed to Sandbach Parker & Co. in 1861) bought both plantations (1856 they had shares in the estate Little Diamond). Little Diamond disappeared from the records of the sugar estates. The name of the other plantation later changed to "Diamond". But by 1910, it is still sometimes called Great Diamond. [156] [157] In 1891 the newly founded “Demerara Company Limited” took over the Diamond plantation together with the Wales plantation from Sandbach, Parker & Company Limited. [400]

The Diamond distillery was transferred into a new company in 1967. It was the Diamond Liquors Limited. Thus the distillery was separated from the direct sugar business, but remained still under the roof of the Demerara Holding Company. [401] [158] The property remained in possession of the Demerara Company Holding until 1969. In this very year the three subsidiaries "Demerara Company", "Sandbach Parker" and "Diamond Liquors" were sold to "Jessel securities". Finally, the property was nationalization on May 26th, 197. [402] [403] 2010 Guysuco already announced a closure of Diamond Estates. [54] These words apparently followed by deeds, as the estate really closed its doors also around 2012/2013. [55] 

Diamond Distillery 

Map section dated 1798 [122]
Source: http://dpc.uba.uva.nl/
On both plantations Klein Diamant and Groot Diamant was planted coffee on the map of 1798. But there was sugarcane cultivated on the former Diamond plantation of John Carter around 1759. It seems there was a change in the cultivation between the two years. After the year 1798 the cultivation changed again and in 1833 both plantations harvested coffee as well as sugarcane. There is no proof, that the Diamond plantation under John Carter pressed sugarcane and gained molasses for the distilling of rum. The plantation had not its own mill on the map of 1759. It is theoretically possible to have done that with the next sugar mill on the plantation De Vrindshap (The Friendship). But I found no evidence for this theory. So the foundation of the Diamond (Groote Diamant, Great Diamond) Distillery was therefore not earlier than in the beginning of the 19th Century. [132] [122] [123] It is proven that both plantations exclusively planted sugarcane in 1838. Apparently Coffee was no longer profitable enough and was dropped in favor of sugarcane. [172] This is confirmed by another source of 1851. [180]

Map section dated 1823 [185] [186]
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org
The heirs of Steele and Loxdale contributed two sugar samples and 7 different and uncolored rums to the Paris Universal Exhibition in 1867 (Appendix A positions 88-94). According to the catalog, two of the rums were 9 years old (items 89 & 94). Therefore we can assume a proven distillation of rum on the Great Diamond plantation in the years 1857 or 1858. Another source from 1851 mentioned the production of some proof gallons of rum on the Great Diamond plantation in the table XIV. [223] But unfortunately it mentioned no exact date. So I assumes that shortly after Steele and Loxdale acquired the plantation in 1848 the distilling of rum began. [47] 

In 1983 the Diamond Liquors Limited (Diamond) amalgamated with the Guyana Distilleries Limited (Uitvlugt) and their subsidiary the Demerara Distilleries Limited (Enmore) to Demerara Distillers Limited. [161] Today's Diamond Distillery (Demerara Distillers Limited) is also located near the old Diamond sugar estates, on the eastern bank of the river Demerara south of Georgetown, right on the East Bank Public Road leading from Georgetown to the Cheddi Jagan International Airport . [50] [51] The installation of a large distillery with a continuous still on the Diamond Plantation is mentioned in a book of 1891. [18] Diamond is one of the last surviving rum producers who can trace is origins back to the old times. All aforementioned stills were transferred to the rum distilling plant of Demerara Distillers Limited. This cultural heritage is often used by DDL as a kind of figurehead. You can see a few of them on the website of the manufacturer.

Mark from Diamond <> W & SVW
I know three marks coming from Diamond. The Velier Diamond 1981 Very Old Demerara 31 YO has the mark S<W>. This probably means an S and a W within a diamond. The Velier Diamond 1996 Full Proof Old Demerara 15 YO got the mark S.V.W.. The Velier Diamond 1993 Full Proof Old Demerara 12 YO has a diamond and a W right next to it. Perhaps this mark is identical to the <W> from the Velier Diamond 1981. Unfortunately I do not know the exactly meaning of it. Perhaps they are the initials of a previous owner (Samuel Welsh)? Maybe not. Maybe W means Welsh or the Mark represents a long gone plantation acquired under Sandbach. The Diamond estate merged over the decades with the plantations Providence, Herstelling, Farm (Rust & Vrede), Peter's Hall and Ruimveld (t).


© E.H.
Now lets use our brains a little bit and do some mental acrobatics dear readers. A new rum from Velier with Diamond on the label with the vintage of 1999 and 15 YO has the Mark <S>. A S within a diamond. Also, I've seen a picture using the combination S.S.N.. This mark was on the back label of the Velier Diamond 1996 Full Proof Demerara Old 16 YO. A new blend from Luca Gargano contained rum from Diamond 1995 with the Mark <SV>. When I saw these combinations I gave it some thoughts and I finally realized something. The Mark S.V.W. could be a combination of <SV> and <W>. One would then simply omitted the brackets of the diamonds. The same could be with the mark S.S.N.. This could most likely be a combination of the known mark <S> and the new mark S.N.. I have never seen this mark S.N. before and according to the theory it might have been in a diamond, so <SN>. Of course, this is purely theoretical, but certainly possible. The Mark S<W> could be a modified mark (similar like M.P.M. to P.M.). Unfortunately, there is no evidence for this, or at least I can not find it. Over the decades the Diamond distillery absorbed enough plantations, which may hide behind those marks. I have not yet entirely identified the mark which originally belonged to the Diamond distillery. According to the information of Ingvar Thomsen the Mark SVW is mentioned for 1950's along with the Diamond Distillery. Maybe this is the original Mark and thus the original rum style of this old property? [464]

© E.H.
I do not know which old stills originally belonged to Diamond prior to the consolidation. But I guess it could be one of the metal column stills which are mentioned in Saschas article. On some bottlings with Diamond on the label is a Coffey still specified as origin of the rum. But this is just a guess on my part.

Established: 1753

Founder: John Carter

 Location: It was located south of Georgetown on the east bank of the river Demerara.

 Status: Active

 Stills: Metal Column / Coffey Still (Metal Continuous Still)




----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 9
-
Lost Distilleries of British Guiana 

46 of the 55 distilleries in existing in the fiscal year of 1898-99 had to give up their operation until 1938. I do know their names and their stories, more or less. With the next major update to version 3.0 I will eventually shed light on these forsake distilleries. But for now this state of information provided to all of you will have to do it. As a little teaser I would like to post a table for the said fiscal year.

“5. The number of Distilleries licensed and their output according to Fiscal Districts is shewn in the following statement:--

1898 - 1899”
District
Number
Gallons
Bulk
Proof
North Essequebo
3
124,047
178,527.48
South Essequebo
4
82,465
118,720.65
Essequebo River
2
30,529
43,830.12
West Coast, Demerara
8
283,482
409.074.86
Foward
17
520,523
750,153.11
West Bank, Demerara
6
82,220
117,827.69
Georgetown
4
175,127.25
267,048.44
East Coast, Demerara
8
291,814.75
416,119.94
Mahaica
7
273,631
399,435.44
West Coast, Berbice
2
148,246
213,011.34
Berbice River
5
169,676
244,968.17
New Amsterdam
4
331,591
488,111.62
Corentyne
2
110,489
165,586.67

55



The listed plantations represented the colony British Guiana with rum at various international exhibitions. Many names have been forgotten and probably only known to the natives of Guyana. This little section is a kind of reminder for this lost distilleries

Anna Catharina
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 18, coffee & cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(uncoloured & coloured)
Adelphi
(Berbice, New Amsterdam)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Anna Regina
(Essequibo, east coast)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(uncoloured & coloured)
Aurora
(West bank of the Demerara river or west coast of Essequibo)
(Map of 1798, Lot 57 “Verlassen” oder Lot 44)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(uncoloured & coloured)
Bee Hive
(New Bee Hive)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 6, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Belle Plaine
(Wakenaam Island, Essequebo river)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white & coloured)
Better Hope
(Beter Hoop; Beeter Hoop)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 58)
(Map of 1823, Lot 15)
London International Exhibition 1862
(uncoloured & coloured)
Cane Grove
(West bank, Mahaica creek)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white)
Chateau Margo
(Chateau Margot)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 49, coffee & cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white)
Cornelia Ida
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 17, coffee & cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white & coloured)
Cuming's Lodge
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798,presumably Lot 65 oder Lot 66)
(Map of 1823, Lot 9)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(coloured)
Cove and John
(John & Cove; formerly Cove und The John)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 19 & 20 , cotton)
(Map of 1823, Lot 49 & 50)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
De Willem
(Demerara, West coast)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Enterprise
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 30, cotton)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white)
Farm
(The Farm)
(East bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 18, coffee)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white & coloured)
Greenfield
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 5,cotton)
London International Exhibition 1862
(coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Goldstone Hall
(Berbice, New Amsterdam, Canje Creek)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Hope
(Hoope)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 25, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Hope and Experiment
(Berbice, East coast)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Herstelling
(East bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 798, Lot 16, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Houston
(formerly Zorg en Hoop)
(East bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 9, coffee & cacao & sugar)
(Map of 1823, Lot 7)
London International Exhibition 1862
(coloured and 4 years old)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Helena
(De Helena)
(Mahaica creek, West side)
(Map of 1798, Lot 11, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
La Grange
(West bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 12, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Leonora
(De Leonora)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 21, coffee & cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(2x white)
La Jalousie
(The Jalousie)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 10, coffee)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
La Bonne Mere
(Mahaica creek, West bank)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
La Resouvenir
(Le Resouvenir)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 51, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
La Union
(L'Union)
(Essequibo, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 14, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Lusignan
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 39, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Maryville
(Leguan Island, Essequibo river)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Melville
(Mahaica Creek, West side)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Mon Repos
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 44, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Montrose
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, vermutlich Lot 53 & 54, cotton)
(Map of 1823, Lot 18)
London International Exhibition 1862
(uncoloured & coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Metenmeerzorg
(formlery Meer Zorg & Met Zorg)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 26 & 27, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Nismes
(Nimes)
(West bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1759, Lot 7, coffee)
(Map of 1798, Lot 14, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white)
Ogle
(formerly La Reduit)
(Demerara, East coast)
(KMap of 1798, Lot 62)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & colourd)
Peter's Hall
(Petershall)
(East bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1759, Lot 7, sugar)
(Map of 1798, Lot 12, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white and/or coloured)
Philadelphia
(Essequibo, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 17, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(2x coloured)
Providence (Berbice)
(Berbice, East bank of the river Berbice)
(Map of 1802, Lot 4)
London International Exhibition 1862
(coloured)
Providence (Demerara)
(East bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 13, sugar)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Rose Hall
(Berbice, Canje Creek, later on the east coast of Berbice)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncolourd & coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Reliance
(Berbice, Canje Creek)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white & 2x coloured)
Ruimveldt
(Ruimveld; formerly Ruim Zigt)
(East bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 8, coffee)
(Map of 1823, Lot 6)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Success
(Succes)
(Demerara, East coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 50, cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white and/or coloured)
Smythfield
(Smithfield)
(Berbice, East bank of the river Berbice)
London International Exhibition 1862
(coloured)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Schoon-Ord
(West bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 10, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(uncoloured & coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Stewartville
(Stuart Ville; formerly Vrees en Hoop)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 22, coffee & cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Taymouth Manor
(Demerara, East coast oder West side Maicouny creek )
(Map of 1798, Lot 1)
(Map of Oct. 1798, Lot 1 & 2 oder Lot 1& 2 )
Paris Universal Exhibition 1867
(coloured)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(white & coloured)
Tuschen de Vrienden
(Essequebo, East river bank near the coast)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(2 x coloured)
Calcutta International Exhibition 1883-84
(coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Vreed en Hoop
(Vreede en Hoop)
(West bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1798, Lot 5, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white)
Wales
(West bank of the Demerara river)
(Map of 1823, Lot 23)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)
Worlds Columbian Exposition Chicago 1893
(white & coloured)
Windsor Forest
(Windsor Forrest)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 9, coffee)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Zeeburg
(Zeebergen)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798, Lot 24, coffee & cotton)
Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(coloured)
Zeelugt
(Zeelucht)
(Demerara, West coast)
(Map of 1798 Lot 1, sugar & coffee)

Paris Universal Exhibition 1878
(white & coloured)


These are now only those plantations that have represented their colony at a public event or exhibition. A source from 1851 lists yet more plantations, which distilled rum. Their names were Kitty, Vryheid's Lust & Anchor Sheet, Cuming's Lodge, Montrose, Felicity, Amersfort, Vive La Force, Golden Grove, Eccles, Profit, Richmond Hill, Good Intent, Nouvelle Flandres, Cloonbrock, Garden of Eden, Aberdeen, Better and Henrietta.
Furthermore, this source also confirmed the production of rum at the aforementioned plantations Nismes, La Bonne Intention, Great Diamond, Greenfield, La Grange, Windsor Forrest, Marysville and Zeeburg. [223]


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Chapter 10
-
The beginnings of the presence 
(Demerara Distillers Limited) 

Screenshot from the D.D.L. website
This is no advertising!
 Copyright belongs to DDL
The origins of this company dates back to a subsidiary of Bookers. Demerara Distillers Limited was officially founded in 1952. You will not find this name in the 1950's. Instead one finds a very different company: It's Albion Distilleries Limited. This company was founded in 1952 and thus also erected a new distillery on the Albion estate in the end of 1956. It was this company that took over the Vat Stills from Port Mourant (closed in 1955) and used them on this new distillery until January 1968 Albion was itself closed and the inventory was taken to the Booker main plant on the Uitvlugt estate. [423] [424]

You have to go back a little further to understand the whole development. In 1946 the company United Rum Merchants through the merger of three companies Alfred Lamb & Son Limited, White Keeling (rum) Limited and Portal, Dingwall & Norris Limited was established. U.R.M. had these three companies as subcontractors. Precisely this company (U.R.M.) was incorporated into the Booker group in 1947. In 1951, the new subsidiary Booker Rum Company Limited came under the roof of United Rum Merchants. The Booker Rum Company Limited managed from 1951 on the marketing activities of rum from British Guiana. The bulk rum and some other products were managed by another new sub-contractors, which also was added to URM in 1951. It was the Booker Produce Limited. These companies regulated the business around rum. [425] [426] [427] [429]

In 1960 a new distillery was built on the Uitvlugt estate and put into operation the same year. There was also from that year on in this distillery, for how long is not known to me, produced gin for the local market and the West Indies. It was Bookers Rum Company Limited, which blended the rum and exported it together with the gin. But it was not manufactured by Bookers Rum Company Limited but by the Albion Distillers Limited. This company had the distilleries in Albion, Uitvlugt, Enmore, Versailles, La Bonne Intention (closed 1951), Skeldon (closed 1960) and Blair Mont (closed 1962). The Albion distillery was merged with Uitlvugt in January 1968 and the small distillery on the Versailles estate was closed along with its factory in 1978. Albion Distilleries Limited seems to have vanished since 1972. A yearbook of the Caribbean from 1972 still mentions the company Albion Distillers Limited. From this period it disappears. Also the trail of the Booker Rum Company was lost from this year on. Only Guyana Distillers Limited seems to exist. [452] By 1975, the only remaining distilleries were at Versailles, Enmore and Uitvlugt. I think it would have been only a matter of time until Bookers would have closed down the distilleries in Enmore and Versailles, since the main plant under Bookers was the one at Uitvlugt. [428]

Screenshot of the D.D.L. website
This is no advertising!
 Copyright belongs to DDL
What about the distillery at the Diamond estate? It was first part of Sandbach, Parker &Company and later belonged to the Demerara Company Limited (from 1891 on) and in 1967 the distillery was transferred to the Diamond Liquors Limited, which from then on managed the business around rum. In 1969 the company "Jessel securities" bought the Contractors of the Demerara Company in British Guiana, went bankrupt and the subcontractors were eventually nationalized. In 1976 the state-owned company Guyana Liquors Corporation (GLC) took over the Diamond Liquors Limited in the same year after the nationalization. Shortly after the subsidiary of Bookers, the Guyana Distilleries Limited followed suit. In 1976 the Guyana Liquors Corporation had the last distilleries in Guyana under its control: Uitvlugt, Versailles, Enmore and Diamond. It was G.L.C., which planned the modernization of the warf in 1977 and the construction of the new bulk terminal for tankers in 1978. In 1983, those two companies were merged to Demerara Distillers Limited (DDL). In the context of increased efficiency and cost savings all stills were finally centralized on one distillery. This meant the closure of the Enmore distillery between 1993-95 and the closure of the Uitvlugt distillery in 2000. Only a warehous full of barrells remained on the Uitvlugt estate. Demerara Distillers Limited formally belongs to Guyana Liquors Corporation. In 1992, the brand "El Dorado" was started with a 15 year old blend. There was also a 12 year old blend, the "King of Diamonds 12 YO". In addition there was also a "Fruit Cured Rum", probably the successor of the "Bookers Fruit Cured Rum", and a rum called "High Wine('s)". Apparently DDL wanted to make themselves more independent from the bulk trade. The rum brand of El Dorado is being bottled in Guyana. In 2002, the El Dorado 21 YO came to the brand portfolio of DDL. Also the "King of Diamonds 12 YO" disappeared and his gap was filled with the El Dorado 12 YO. However, I don't know exactly when this last change happened. Probably the first "El Dorado 25 YO" came to the international market in 2005/2006 and represented the first of its kind (Distilled 1980). Since then there are regular releases of this limited edition or "premium blend". For aficionados or connoisseurs DDL released the "Single Barrel" series in 2007. To this end, the styles (Marks) EHP (Enmore), ICBU (Uitvlugt) and PM (Port Mourant) were bottled. You can get these bottlings in Europa only via Utopian prices. 

Like many other official bottlers DDL is using sugar to 'spice up' their rums or to make them more accessible for more customers. An amateur connoisseur named Jonny Dreier had checked out several rums with its own method and measured their sugar content and the results are pretty sobering. By far the most "doped" rum is the El Dorado 25 YO, but that does not really surprise me. Why? A rum with 25 years in the tropics has a solid wood influence in his flavour profile. This taste is not easy enjoyable for the wide-mass and mostly only accessible to aficionados and connoisseurs. This woody and angular taste can be very well covered up with sugar. You can make the woody taste disappear into the 'background' of the flavour profile or let it completely vanish. The only sugar-free products known to me from DDL are the Single Barrel rums. Of these, I only know the "PM" version and this is a good rum, but was unfortunately diluted down to death (40%abv).



------------------------------------------------------------------

Conclusion

© E.H.
The mere fact that even very old bottlings with the old names on the labels were not distilled in these distilleries brings a bitter-sweet aftertaste to every dram. This is less dramatic regarding rums coming from the old wooden pot stills or the Enmore Coffey still. But it is very disappointing in the case of Albion, Blairmont, La Bonne Intention and Skeldon. The stills from these distilleries have either changed their location or may have been taken out of service when there was a still who could produce the same quality and flavor profile. It makes a lot of sense from an economic point of view. The marks on the barrels are therefore not directly connected to the stills. Sascha thought that they are linked to the old rum styles. So they identify the style of rum who was made in these long closed distilleries.
As an example may be mentioned the Cadenhead Dated Distillation Enmore KFM 12 YO and 16 YO. Both bottlings were distilled in 1991. The specified pot still on the label would be the Versailles Single Wooden Pot Still. But the Mark K.F.M. indicates the former Lusignan plantation. This plantation has verifiable produced rum with this mark. The original still from this plantation is presumably long gone. I do not now which kind of still it originally was. [29] As Enmore took over Lusignan they also took the knowledge of creating the rum style K.F.M. and maybe even their still(s). The Know-How to produce the rum was transferred. This is proves the vintage 1991 with the mark K.F.M. and the name Enmore on the label. The rum in question was produced with the only remaining Single Vat still which was clearly in the possession of Enmore: the Versailles Still. Why keep several of them in service if you only need one Single Wooden Pot Still to produce different styles (marks)? Unfortunately the Versailles Still was the only pot still at Enmore. At least the only pot still, whose existence is also proved. Or for that matter: the only Single Wooden Pot Still (Single Vat Still) which has been preserved at all.
© E.H.
If you are now thinking "Wait a minute .... Versailles is V.S.G., right? " Yes indeed it is. The rum style VSG was distilled on the ancient Versailles plantation and was also produced with this pot still. But as I mention it before: One still is capable of producing different kind of styles. The V.S.G. rum – style can be traced back to the the Versailles plantation. The K.F.M. rum - style of 1991 is also from this pot still, which stood at Enmore in 1991, but corresponds to the old style of Lusignan, which was acquired long before Versailles. Unfortunately older rums which could be traced back directly to Lusignan have not survived. There is only the hint that Lusignan distilled rum. This means that various pot still rums with Enmore on the label could be traced back to the Versailles Single Wooden Pot Still. I also suspect that some of the rum styles from different plantations disappeared forever with their amalgamation. And I also think there was a simple reason: the styles were not so different. Was the rum - style from Versailles always V.S.G.? Was the name of rum from Versailles always VSG? Hardly, because the other two plantations in the mark (Schoon Ord, Goed Furtuin) were added later, probably after the Versailles estate distilled rum. Allegedly every plantation in the 17th century did distill rum. What happened to the rum-style of the plantation Schoon Ord, who has contributed rum to the Paris Universal Exhibition 1867. These are all questions without answers.
I hope I did not confuse you too much. It is, at least, a very interesting theory. Unfortunately, there is no further evidence to prove this. I emphasize it again: These are guesses on my part.
The question regarding the stills remains. Why keep two similar stills if you only need one. It is more cost effective to scrap one of them and keep the other one in active service. Anyone who has ever tried the rums from the Single Wooden Pot Still and the Double Wooden Pot Still would agree, that one still could not replace the other one. The flavour profile is just too different. This happy circumstance perhaps preserved the Versailles Single Wooden Still. The Port Mourant Double Wooden Pot Still might not imitate the rums from the Versailles Still.


A small notation of my own: There were many plantations with the same name at the same time. For example Mon Repos. There was one on the Demerara east coast and another one on the east bank of the river Berbice. The same case with Providence and many other names. The lack of ingenuity in the past could still cause a lot of confusion today. ;)

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Intention

My main purpose of this article was actually to satisfy my own curiosity. At the beginning it was not even an article. It was just a bunch of notes and links in a text file. After a few weeks it was too much data to maintain oversight without giving it a proper shape. So I decided to bring order into this chaos and the subsequent article has adopted it's basic form. Over the time the article was getting bigger and bigger. I added more and more details. This is much reflected in the chaotic assignment of the footnotes. What surprised me a lot over the time, were the half-truths which were spread throughout the Internet. The founding year of Port Mourant, for example, was one of those half-truths, or rather, one of the errors. Several colonial sources and maps showed that there may have never been a sugar cane plantation with this name in 1732 on the east coast of Berbice, let alone a distillery. Port Mourant was at the beginning a simple cotton plantation. I think you will agree with me when I say, that you can gain no molasses from cotton in order to produce rum. I have found no clues or hints regarding the year 1732 in connection to the Port Mourant plantation.
 
A question, which I asked myself in the very beginning of my research, still remains unanswered. Why had DDL never undertaken a research about the origins of the plantations and their history? They could have used it for the sake of marketing. I never found a logical explanation and could therefore only speculate on possible motives. It is a pity because DDL could bring more light into the darkness of Demerara rum than anyone else. But apparently they prefer not to.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Final thought
I hope I have cleared some of the misunderstandings regarding Demerara rums and their distilleries. I do not claim to know everything. I also do not claim that this article or work is perfect or nearly finished. It is full of holes and there are still a lot of questions unanswered. But I begin to realize that some questions will never be answered. Demerara rum will never loose this fascinating aura of the forgotten. And I have to admit... I am glad it never will.
 
But why did I do all the work? Do the buyers out there nowadays still care for the history literally in their glasses or do they only want to gulp it down and be done with it in our very fast and consumption dominated era? Is rum only “just” a cocktail ingredient and no serious sipper? Is for the pure pleasure not a whisky "something more serious" than a rum with all the unlabeled additives? Who am I that I dare to ask such a question? Am I a romantic misty-eyed nerd? Maybe a little. Who is perfect. Am I an expert? Fortunately not, thank goodness. There are already enough out there in the rum-scene (and in the world) which are calling themselves like that. I don't want to be a part of that. Am I an amateur and maniac who loves rum? Undeniable.

Marco Freyer
 

Update: The footnotes have been removed for the time being.  
 

For the Tables: Please click here.

2 Kommentare:

  1. chivas16. Juli 2018 um 08:14

    I am very impressed when reading your post, thank you for the information you shared

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  2. Unknown14. September 2018 um 20:51

    First class research
    I spotted only one small error under Uitvlugt,namely Admiral Sir Henry William Bayntun
    Diamond produced the famous rum Russian Bear loved by the PPP(East Indians led by the Marxist Cheddi Jagan)but I have rather forgotten Bookers local brands
    Can you help please ?

    Regards


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