Ghost Trilogy XXI – Dumbarton Distillery Finished in a Moscatel Cask

Ghost Trilogy XXI. When Paladin first comes across a few circa 2000 laid down casks of Dumbarton. The excitement is beyond belief from our in-house “dram” team. Here is a “turn of the century” gem, from one of the behemoths of Lowland, producing a SINGLE GRAIN scotch for the likes of Ballantine’s. Base on our research, production capacity at its height is said to be 25 million gallons a year. It is hard to believe that very little of these casks now remain. At once, we knew we had to bottle it.

The fabled Jim Murray, in his 2014 Whisky Bible notes, had given it a roaring 96.5 points with the following accompanying quote “Truly great whisky. Forget this being a grain, excellence is excellence. Full stop.”

History of a Ghost Distillery – Dumbarton Ghost Trilogy XXI

The distillery is build on the site of McMillan Shipyard on Castle Street, in Dumbarton Scotland. At some point in its development, it is one of the largest distilleries in Scotland-period (some would argue the whole of Europe).

What is rather unorthodox is the distillery is known to have use a rather unorthodox security system, “The Scotch Watch”, to protect its premises. It is initiate in 1959 by Tom Scott and command by a gander called “Mr Ballantine”. Originally, it consists of just five Chinese white geese plus a gander. By 2001, however, the flock had grown to about 100 birds.

In 1988, Allied Brewers acquires Hiram Walkers. From which Allied Distillers is in it’s creation shortly afterwards. In 2001, Dumbarton had an annual production of 25 million gallons of whisky being the major contributor for Ballantine’s blends. At the time, roughly 2000 people work on the site of Dumbarton. The distillery uses maize exclusively, which is an import from Canada and America due to its overseas ownership and also contributes to blends of Canadian Club Whisk(e)y.

Unfortunately, by 2002, Dumbarton have become a very “old-fashioned” distillery with no major renovations made to the site since it is build in the 1930s. The distillery is very difficult to upgrade because the tall column stills went up through the concrete floors. Thus making the structure of the building very difficult to alter. So Allied Distillers moves its production to the Strathclyde Distillery. The security guards (geese) stays behind when Dumbarton closes in 2002 and after 10 years. The remaining seven birds were at last retire and sent to live with an existing flock at Glasgow Green. The buildings have now been demolishes to make way for a new housing development, including the site’s iconic red tower.