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Release Notes
Sheep Dip is a small batch, handcrafted, premium blended malt Scotch whisky. It marries together single malt whiskies from around Scotland in an enigmatically refined blend that packs plenty of punch.
Inspired by a long history of entrepreneurial Scottish farmers taking distillation into their own hands, this rich and fruity blended malt whisky pays homage to an era where these illicit spirits traded hands across Scotland, via farmers merchants from the Islands to Speyside. Where quality and community came before the excise man, and where a barrel of “Sheep Dip” held liquid-gold for those select few who knew where to look.
Inspired by a long history of entrepreneurial Scottish farmers taking distillation into their own hands, this rich and fruity blended malt whisky pays homage to an era where these illicit spirits traded hands across Scotland, via farmers merchants from the Islands to Speyside. Where quality and community came before the excise man, and where a barrel of “Sheep Dip” held liquid-gold for those select few who knew where to look.
Ian MacLeod Distillers
The Bottler: Spencerfield Spirit
| Established: 2005 |
| Silent since: False |
| Address: Spencerfield Farm House, Inverkeithing, Fife, KY11 9LA, Scotland, UK |
| → website |
Reverend Andrew Robertson wrote in a statistical account "The spirits are said to be of a fine even superior quality and the sale of them is extensive. It seems to be in a prosperous and flourishing state".
Spencerfield Farmhouse, our HQ, sits upon the high ground to the east of Inverkeithing in Fife, surrounded by fields of wheat and barley and Scotland overlooking the Firth of Forth and the monumental Forth Rail Bridge. Here the house has stood since it was built around 1510 as a defensive tower house watching over Inverkeithing harbour and guarding the trade routes between the Highlands, Edinburgh and the south.
Spencerfield is still today surrounded by fields of barley, however we are more dedicated to sending whisky to market than any other product.As a farm there are a few animals hanging around the most important apart from "Dug the delivery dog" are the horses. There is "Good Job" our thoroughbred brood mare out of Oh So Ripe by Kings Ride and her two progeny "Besom" a three year old filly by Missed Flight and " Hamish" a two year old gelding by Weldnaas , Good Job is due to foal any day to Bollin Terry.
If there is no one in the office I can guarantee that we are all off racing probably at Perth the northernmost racetrack in Britain a fantastic day out.
However, enough survived of the house for it to be featured in Blaeu"s famous Atlas of 1654.
Today on the Farm
In 1559 the land at Spencerfield was gifted by the Franciscan Friary of Inverkeithing to John Scott. The farmhouse was initially built as a defensive tower house with an outlook across to Queensferry and the Forth in the south, to Dunfermline in the north and westward to Stirling. Four stories tall with crow stepped gables to a z-plan design with an entrance to the second floor on the north face in shadow where enemies found it more difficult to observe comings and goings of the inhabitants.
Life remained turbulent in Scotland and after Charles II was executed in 1649 Cromwell sent troops north to deal with the traditional royalist supporters. After a winter of bombarding the Fife coastline in 1651 the battle of Inverkeithing was fought and Cromwell"s troops were victorious; if that can describe leaving 2000 Scottish royalists dead on the battlefield near Rosyth Castle. Awaiting transport back across the Forth the troops were billeted at the house where their celebrations fuelled with whisky from the distillery next door got a little out of hand; the revelry resulted in the soldiers setting light to their gunpowder store and blowing off the east wing of the house. The house was then ransacked before they left according to the historian Reverend Wm Stephen with "a great quantity of silver plate, arras, hangings, carpets and other household plenishing".
Inverkeithing Distillery
The first dedicated distillery on Spencerfield Farm estate was built in 1795 by Duncan Montgomery by the Keithing Burn. When the existing brewery and malt stead was erected in 1784 by Messrs Duncan, Montgomery and Pinkerton was expanded and became a distillery. The business flourished and by 1860 was employing a working Coffey"s Patent Steam Still producing a Lowland malt whisky for the English and local markets.
"James Anderson was born at Spencerfield in 1745, the year of the Jacobite Rising. The next forty years witnessed a total transformation in Scottish agriculture as new ideas spawned by The Enlightenment were introduced. "James Anderson, as a tenant farmer or tacksman, could count himself a pioneer of these improvements. Intelligent men educated in parish schools, they were often well read and their views were accurately described by the Scottish Bard, Robert Burns. "Farms on the fertile lands of the east coast were well-suited to growing barley for London brewers and much more importantly the Scotch whiskey trade. In 1788, Scotland"s "great distillers" led by the Haig and Stein families faced ruin, precipitating a financial crisis very similar to that we are experiencing today with the failure of our banking system. "It is not difficult to deduce that rather than face financial ruin, James Anderson old as he was, chose to brave the north Atlantic and seek a new life with is family in the United States. If he had known that the French Revolution would have driven up prices of agricultural produce, he might have stayed; but that would have deprived Mount Vernon of its whiskey distillery."
From Spencerfield Farm on the banks of the Forth, farmer and distiller James Anderson set sail for America in 1791 with his wife and seven children. There he advised George Washington to get into the whiskey distilling business and helped America"s first President become the country"s biggest producer of whiskey. Spencerfield Farm is still in the whiskey business today. The Spencerfield Spirit company produces and distributes two brands of whiskey, Sheep Dip malt whiskey and Pig"s Nose, a deluxe blend, to the States. In 2005, husband and wife team, Alex and Jane Nicol, launched Spencerfield Spirit, an independent drinks company, fighting to save orphan brands for the iconoclastic whiskey drinker. "Orphan" brands are once famous brands neglected by large companies because they are not seen to be profitable. The first two whiskies rescued from obscurity by Spencerfield Spirit are Sheep Dip and Pig"s Nose. Both whiskies achieved cult status in the 70s and have been lovingly recreated by Richard Paterson, Scotland"s only third generation master blender. The phrase "Sheep Dip" is slang used by farmers for whiskey and Pig"s Nose takes its name from an old farming saying "as soft as a pig"s nose".
Alex Nicol of Spencerfield Spirit explains: "Whiskey belongs on Spencerfield Farm and we are very proud of our links to the story of America"s whiskey. "Using his knowledge and experience of farming and distilling, James Anderson left our land in Inverkeithing and became Farm Manager for George Washington, encouraging him to open the first rye distillery at Mount Vernon. "The distillery, in West Virginia is a classic replica of what small country distilleries looked like in Scotland at the time and under Anderson"s guidance, it became an overnight business success.
"We are following in his footsteps by keeping whiskey deeply rooted to Spencerfield Farm and honouring his memory by bringing whiskey from his homeland to his new found home in the States. "As Washington is regarded as a symbol of the USA, we believe that James Anderson deserves recognition for his entrepreneurial achievements, making him the undisputed Father of American Whiskey." Professor Michael Moss from Glasgow University who has carried out vast research into the history of Scottish Whiskey supports this claim.
from Spencerfield Spirit