CRAFT by Under My Host® Issue No. 17 Made in America: Part II | Page 34

W W W. C R A F T BY U M H . C O M
or aged. It was distributed to local merchants in 31-gallon barrels. A lot of
Washington’s spirits went to his good friend, George Gilpin, that owned
stores in Alexandria. Gilpin received 2,000 gallons on consignment in 1798,
and it sold so well that he purchased 4,000 gallons outright in 1799.
The common whiskey sold for 50 cents a gallon and the fourth distilled
for $1 per gallon. Brandy sold for a little more than that, and it’s recorded
that $332 in tax was paid on the 4,500 gallons made in 1798. At the peak of
production in 1799, Washington made $7,500 gross profit from the 11,000
gallons produced, and it was the most profitable part of the plantation.
The Whiskey Tax was enacted in 1791 and resistance to it peaked with vio-
lence against the tax collectors in 1794, forcing Washington to call out and
assemble a militia of 13,000 men. The militia was sent to western Pennsyl-
vania where the Whiskey Rebellion was stopped, and the Federal Govern-
ment’s right to tax U.S. citizens was upheld. The Whiskey tax was also the
first tax levied by the United States government.
Several slaves worked in the distillery with Anderson, his son, John, and
assistant, Peter Bingle. The slaves’ names were Hanson, Peter, Nate, Dan-
iel, James, and Timothy. Five of the slaves were Dower slaves (they were
the property of Martha Washington from her first marriage) and one was a
rented slave. This meant that even after Washington freed his slaves upon
his death, these six continued to be enslaved when Washington’s nephew
inherited the gristmill and distillery following Martha Washington’s death.
The distillery burned down in 1814, but information of the operation was
preserved in Washington’s writings. The Mount Vernon Ladies Association
was formed in 1853 after Louisa Bird Cunningham was traveling on the Po-
tomac River and passed by the estate. Cunningham was embarrassed with
the estate’s appearance and, in a letter to her daughter wrote, “If the men of
the United States will not save the home of its greatest citizen, perhaps it should
be the responsibility of the women.” Cunningham’s daughter Ann Pamela
Cunningham convinced John Augustine Washington III, the last of Wash-
ington’s family to own the property, to sell the property. The mansion was
restored by the Mount Vernon Ladies Association and opened to the public.
Archeological work started in 1997 on the grounds of the original distillery
with reconstruction beginning in 2005 and completion in 2007. Vendome
Copper and Brass Works, Inc. was contracted to recreate the stills built by
George McMunn 208 years earlier. I had the honor of seeing how those
stills work firsthand over a four-day period.
The five stills on the property today were recreated by Vendome Copper
and Brass, Inc. from notes and examples now held in the Oscar Getz Whis-
key Museum in Bardstown, Kentucky. From smallest to largest, the stills
are named Elizabeth, Sandra, Maggie, Sarah, and Pam. Each one is a direct,
wood-fired, single batch pot still that rests inside brick fireboxes. Trust
me when I say they use a lot of wood in production because during lulls in