AUCTION NEWS – Sponsored by Whisky Auctioneer

Words by Joe Wilson

Martin Mills
1974
24 Year Old

Unpicking the mysteries of sourced Bourbon brands is one of the greatest joys and frustrations for a whiskey collector, and while more often than not their hopes are pinned on Stitzel-Weller, there are few who express displeasure at discovering Heaven Hill behind the veil.

This is an incredibly rare bottling from Heaven Hill Distillery in Bardstown.

One of 4,284 bottles, this whiskey was barrelled in December 1974 and finally bottled in February 1999. It was produced for the Japanese market, who preferred the flavour of older Bourbon at the time, while the US mostly consumed younger whiskey.

Vintage Bourbon
1976
Kentucky Straight Bourbon, 70cl 2001

Vintage Bourbon is a boutique brand owned by Allied Lomar in California, who’s other products include Rare Perfection, Wattie Boone and Very Olde St Nick. They have been sourcing whiskey and bottling it for several decades.

Allied Lomar president, Marci Palatella, was Julian Van Winkle III’s agent in the Japanese market for many years, and their early bottlings were contracted to him at his Old Commonwealth Distillery. The Van Winkle partnership with the Sazerac company in the early 2000’s ended this agreement however, with the production of bottles such as this moved to Willett Distillery, where they were bottled by its owners, Evan Kulsveen’s Kentucky Bourbon Distillers.

This incredibly rare example of Vintage Bourbon was bottled by KBD using 1974 vintage barrels distilled at Willett prior to its closure in the 1980s. The company also bottled rare releases of their own Kentucky Vintage brand from similar stocks.

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