100 Years of Irish Brewing in 50 Objects: #6 - A Drayman's Delivery Docket from Sullivan's Brewery (1892)

I could speak of the beer drinking capabilities of some of the Walshe mountain girls - but why should we cavil at the amount of refreshment which is taken after a walk of twelve miles from the hills, another return walk of similar length in perspective, and in addition holding on in the dance "to tire each other down" for some three or four hours? Could we say half a gallon of that washy stuff known in Ireland as "pale butt," was too much for a girl? You may think so, reader, but I do not. The question is, after all, one of stowage.

A Strangers Impressions of County Kilkenny – The Kilkenny Moderator - Saturday 19th July 1851

Those comments were made by a tourist who was staying in Bishop’s Hotel in Thomastown, Kilkenny and were in regard to a fair day in the town, and the people who came in from the countryside for dancing and socialising. Regardless of the comments on the ability of ‘the Walshe mountain girls’ to consume ‘refreshment,’ his description of a drink called ‘Pale Butt’ and it being ‘washy stuff’ is of interest to those curious about Irish brewing history. We must keep in mind that elsewhere in his report to the newspaper he twice mentions drinking Cherry’s Double Stout, so his opinion of other beers might be in relative terms but ‘washy’ can hardly be regarded as a praisesome term for any drink.

-o-

Our related brewing object is a delivery docket for a half barrel of Pale Butt from 1892, brewed by Sullivan’s Brewery which operated from James’s Street in Kilkenny on the site of an earlier brewery being operated by a Mr. Archdeakin in at least 1702. As ever with Irish brewing history the facts are a little muddy but the brewery on James's Street appears to have passed through different hands - for example a John Hennessy was a brewer on this street in 1788 - before the site became vacant in 1790. It was purchased and reopened by William Sullivan and William Loughnane in 1810. Mr. Loughnane appears to have left the business as it was operating as 'Messrs. Sullivans Brewery' in a newspaper article in March 1815 when a fire broke out in the malt house there. (Indeed, a portion of the brewery was destroyed by another fire in October 1880 while the funeral was taking place of the then owner James Sullivan's brother Francis - grandsons of William and sons of Richard Sullivan M.P.) The company - which employed 150 people at one point - actually consisted of two breweries and a bottling store for mineral water and soft drinks when a new brewery was completed not far from the original site in June 1877. This new site was possibly a repurposing of an existing brewery as there was a Hibernian Anchor Brewery on the street in 1859, and that fire in 1880 destroyed part of the old brewery, not this new premises. It appears to have stayed in the Sullivan family until it finally closed in 1919, the brewery being taken over by Smithwick’s and closed with the employees receiving 'a fortnight's notice that their services will be dispensed with.' according to one newspaper. Parts of the premises were subsequently used as a maltings by the Smithwick brewery and the site is now a carpark for Market Cross Shopping Centre. Advertisements from 1895 show that Sullivan’s were brewing a pale butt, a double stout, sparkling ales and hop bitters as well as manufacturing and bottling Mineral waters at this time.*

The half barrel of pale butt was delivered to a Laurence Long who had at this time a public house and grocery store on the corner of Barrack Street and the Castlecomer road, which is now known as Lenehan’s Public House. According to newspapers of the time he appears to have sold the business to Rose Lenehan in 1913 and took over a premises instead on John Street (now called The World’s End Bar) which he ran very briefly until his untimely death that same year.

The drayman who delivered the cask on his route was a J.(?) Dowling and the cask number was 2574. This number ensured that the casks could be tracked and returned to the brewery. It was also helpful if a full barrel of beer was stolen, and a newspaper report in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 26th of October 1892 records that a barrel of pale butt was stolen from a Mr. Grace on Parliament Street in Kilkenny and was tracked to a house on Horse Barrack Lane (which curves from Parliament Street along the front of the Smithwick’s brewhouse that is now the new Abbey Quarter Development Building) where the number confirmed it to be the missing cask. The two thieves who had attempted to sell the barrel to some public houses without success were sentenced to a fortnight hard labour in Mountjoy prison in Dublin.

-o-

The words ‘pale butt’ relating to a type of beer seems to be one of those relic terms which lost favour over time. It is certainly mentioned by William Ellis in the 1737 edition of The London and Country Brewer as ‘pale Butt-beer’ from Somerset, and over here in The Parliamentary Register: Or, History of the Proceedings and Debates of the House of Commons of Ireland in 1793 in an enquiry into brewing and distilling here ‘pale butt’ is mentioned twice as a common commodity before that date.

As we move forward in time ‘pale butt’ appears to be a term that remained much more common in Ireland than in England, Scotland, or Wales if the unscientific method of looking at mentions in the newspapers of the mid-19th to the very early parts of the 20th century is to be used as a measurement. (It was certainly still used elsewhere but it wasn’t quite as common and isn’t the focus of the topic here.) Breweries such as Lett’s. Watson’s, Cherry’s, Keily’s, Smithwick’s, Sullivan’s, Castlebellingham, Dower’s and others were all using the words to describe a beer style at one point or another. And although the term seems to have begun in England, its relative decline outside of Ireland is yet another reminder that although we share a lot with the island to our East, we are remarkably different in many ways, not least how language changed and evolved here or - in cases like this perhaps - stalled. With regard to brewing, this may be because of the large number of English brewers who came over to Ireland to set up and work in the breweries here, and the terminology they brought and left behind in the late 18th and early 19th century stayed here long after newer words and meanings had replaced them across the water, just as some ‘normal’ daily words in common use have remained here too.

From a practical point of view a beer butt is a wooden barrel that is twice the volume of a hogshead at 108 Imperial gallons and in the above-mentioned publication that Mr. Ellis asserts that it was the best size for fermenting and condition beers due to aspects of its physical size and volume and that ‘butt-beer is at this time in greater reputation than ever in London ...’ As we can see from the docket (and the mentions below) the beer certainly wasn't always supplied in a butt-sized barrel.

-o-

To find out where pale butt fitted into an Irish brewery's range of beers we need to return yet again to the advertisements in newspapers of the time in question, which is a somewhat inaccurate method of research in many ways but it is unfortunately one of the few resources we have, given the dearth of old brewing records available to the public. Taken singly they might be unhelpful but by looking at the many mentions and references we have we can begin to build a better picture of what type of beer this was and where it fits into our brewing history.

There are early mentions of Irish brewers brewing the style, for example a David Sherlock on Glover's Alley, a table beer brewer, had 'commenced the brewing of Porter, Ale, Pale Butt and 30s[hilling] Beer' according to The Dublin Evening Post from the 5th of January 1797 and in Saunder's News-Letter on the 9th of November 1799 Thomas Fullam advertised himself as a 'Pale Butt, Ale and Table Beer Brewer' on Constitution Hill in Dublin. (Pale Butt was his dearest beer of the three, which is worth keeping in mind for later.)  In The Hibernian Journal on the 21st of September 1805 William Robinson of 110 The Coombe in Dublin was advertising his ‘Pale Butt, Porter, & Small Beer Brewery’ while in Saunders's News-Letter on the 4th of July 1808 Andrew Maziere of James’s Street also in Dublin was advertising ‘Porter, Pale Butt, and Table Beer.’ An advertisement in Saunders's News-Letter on the 5th of April 1813 for beers from the Castlebellingham brewery mentions ‘strong ale and pale butt’ (in later advertisements table beer is also listed) and in The Tipperary Free Press on the 3rd of January 1829 Greer & Murphy of The Clonmel Brewery were listing double strong ale, pale butt, ale, porter and table beer all as separate products. Where prices are mentioned, pale butt is generally on the cheaper side of things with the odd exception, such as the early mention by Thomas Fullam above.

By 1835 Thomas Cherry of King Street Brewery in Waterford and Creywell brewery in New Ross was advertising what looks like a hierarchy of brewings as ‘XX and X ale, and Pale Butt’ (with ‘Beer’ tagged on to the end of the line up in later advertisements) in The Wexford Conservative of the 23rd of December 1835, and a list of beers for sale in The Drogheda Conservative Journal on the 31st of March 1838 lists pale butt, plain ale, X ale and XX ale in ascending order of price, with all but the pale butt listed as from Cairnes’ brewery in Drogheda, although they were brewing such a product in the previous decade so it may have been theirs too.

Up in Belfast Charles Murison was brewing nine beers in 1842 – XXX, XX and X ales, XX and X Brown Stout, Superior Porter and Pale Butt, Family Pale Beer, and Common Beer, which were listed in that order according to an advertisement in The Belfast Mercantile Register & Weekly Advertiser on the 22nd of February 1842. Most revealing is the following passage:

To those who prefer a stronger article for table use than beer, the Pale Butt will be found a very pleasant beverage, as a medium between Ale and Beer.

This is quite telling as it seems to confirm what we see in other advertisements, that pale butt appears to be a lighter and cheaper type of beer, or had certainly morphed into that by the early-to-mid-19th century. It is worth noting that I have used the word beer in the modern all-encompassing sense often here, but from what I have seen from this and other advertisements in the past we used the term ‘beer’ here in Ireland for the weakest and lightest form of brewed beverage – and this is probably a hangover from the popularity of table beer as a general beverage in the late 18th and early 19th century. It would appear that the name clung on here for a weaker brew, so at this time – and later – ‘ale’ didn’t mean an unhopped product and ‘beer’ a hopped one as it may have done elsewhere (or earlier) the terms were used to signify strength with our pale butt in the middle at this time.

So, just to reiterate, at this time it appears that of the paler brewings in Ireland we had in ascending order of strength and cost - ‘beer,’ then ‘butt,’ then ‘ale.’ (We also had ‘brown beers’ brewed by St. Stephen’s Brewery in Waterford and others, which were probably a lighter version of their ‘basic’ porter.)

If we want more reinforcement of this theory we can look at Sullivan’s rival in Kilkenny, the St. Francis Abbey Brewery of Edmond Smithwick who in 1852, just a couple of decades after commencing to brew on an old distillery site, was producing ‘Double, and Single, Stout Porters; Extra Strong, and Strong Ales, Pale Butt, and Table Beer’ in and advertisement in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 21st of January of that year. Helpfully too, St. Stephen’s Brewery listed their prices in The Waterford Chronicle in December 1874 which starts with a XXXX sweet ale at 21 shillings and drops through India Pale Ale, XXX Mild and Family Ale to Pale Butt at 8 shillings for a firkin of 9 Gallons.

As late as 1900 the brewers of Louth were publishing a list of price increases for their beers in The Freeman’s Journal that once again lists a range based on prices starting with the most expensive with strong mild ales then East India and Amber Ales, followed by Pale Butt and then Dinner and an enigmatic East India Beer and lastly plain ‘Beer,’ and if price equates to the quantities of ingredients used then we can take pricing as being a relatively safe way of judging the strength of the beer.  There are a few exceptions where a Pale Butt mention is prefaced with ‘Strong’ but generally speaking 'Pale Butt' appears to be a weaker brew than ale … ‘washy’ as described by the writer quoted above.

As to its exact taste, St. Stephen’s Brewery were involved in a dispute with a publican regarding the quality of their beer as recorded in The Clonmel Chronicle on the 8th of April 1874, where ‘two kilderkins [of East India pale ale] turned out inferior, and he had to sell all as pale butt.’ This gives an inkling of how it tasted as it was clearly not as strong in relative terms as their IPA. An article in The Freeman’s Journal from the 15th of March 1913 quotes an English writer from 1798 who wrote about ‘a sweetish malt liquor, called ‘pale butt,’ unlike anything I have ever drunk elsewhere,’ which again helps a little with how it tasted and reinforces that the name was not very common in England even at that time. Yet another mention in a court case recorded in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 27th of December 1865 states that ‘it would take a long time to get drunk on ‘pale butt,’' and another in The New Ross Standard on the 20th of September 1907 which mentions that Cherry’s pale butt was ‘not very strong.’

So, pale butt could possibly be best described as a low-hopped, slightly malt-forward beer, pale in colour, low in alcohol and cheap to buy – but still a little stronger and not as cheap as the ‘beer’ available at this time. All of which is of course pure conjecture, but it seems to be the correct assumption.

That term for a style of beer brewed in Ireland seems to have disappeared from the island in the first decade of the 20th century, but did the actual product itself disappear too? Perhaps, but it may have lingered briefly, renamed as a mild or X ale in some breweries, but with the huge popularity of porter and stout here it may have just disappeared, being unwanted and unneeded, and ultimately unfamiliar to a 20th century drinker. It might be argued that it returned in spirit at least in the new beers that appeared in the middle of that century like Phoenix and Smithwick’s Draught – low-ish alcohol beers that were made for drinking in relatively large quantities on social occasions.

-o-

On that note let us return to Sullivan’s Pale Butt and specifically to an account of a Harvest Home feast (a relatively common occurrence in the Big Houses in the past) from The Farmer’s Gazette on the 18th of October 1850 which seems quite fitting to end with …

HARVEST HOME AT FARMLEY CASTLE, KILKENNY

The annual substantial feast came off at this ancient and time-honoured establishment, on Saturday last, when all the workpeople, with their wives and families, were most sumptuously entertained. The rooms were most tastefully decorated with flowering shrubs and evergreens - “Nature's own darling hue;” and when the apartments were brilliantly lighted up, all had a most imposing and thrilling effect - thanks to the superior taste of Brette, the carpenter.
The dinner being over, the musicians poured forth their most soft and enchanting strains, which made the old and feeble forget their infirmities, and the youthful their previous toil, and all joined in the merry dance, which was kept up in the true Irish fashion, until very late hour.

“How gaily, even amidst gloom surrounding,

They still canst wake at pleasure's thrill,

Like Memnon’s broken image sounding,

Amidst desolation, tuneful still.'' 

Even the noble-hearted proprietor and his lady did not disdain to take the hands of their simple-hearted and grateful rustics, and share with them the pleasure of dancing the merry “foxhunter’s jig.” To the eye of the philanthropist, surveying at this moment the happy faces of the entire company, he could not but bless the source whose bounty contributed so largely to make so many of the children of toil and labour delighted and comfortable. Sullivan's pale butt, and Jamieson’s stingo, were done ample justice to, with abundance of tea and coffee for the teetotallers. Great merit is due to Mr. Mclntyre, the intelligent and respectable steward of the establishment, for the orderly manner in which everything was arranged.

As florid and loquacious as this report is it certainly paints a picture of enjoying a nice beer or two to celebrate an occasion, where all are welcome and there is something for everyone – even those wanting a ‘washy’ pale butt ...

Liam K

P.S. I have at times used the word beer in its modern general sense here as well as highlighting where in the past that same word meant the lightest of brewed beverages, and I hope the context of their use differentiates one from the other.

* Adapted from a piece on Kilkenny breweries I wrote about here, which lists any references.

(Here is the link to object #7)

Please note, all written content and the research involved in publishing it here is my own unless otherwise stated and cannot be reproduced elsewhere without permission, full credit to its sources, and a link back to this post. The docket and the attached image are the authors own and cannot be used elsewhere without the author's permission. Newspaper research and images are thanks to The British Newspaper Archive.

Tales from a Kilkenny Brewery #1: 'The Cavalcade of Loaded Drays' ...

Kilkenny has always been a city of events and fairs, which is a trend that has continued right to the present day with its hosting and support of the arts, comedy and food festivals. In the 1960s and 1970s it hosted a very successful beer festival which probably paved the way for all the other events that followed in the city, but if we go back to the 19th century it was famous for its fairs, where the emphasis was mostly on the serious business of the buying and selling of livestock more so than entertainment and experiences.

The Spring Fair held in March of 1858 was such an event, where the city was thronged for a weekend with people from all over the country and further afield for the purpose of trading in farmstock. It was purported to be the largest fair ever seen in the city by the reports of the day to the point that there were complaints about lack of space to be had for both people and animals, with the latter occupying every available free spot in the city. The hotels and other accommodation were packed to bursting and the city heaved with the movement of all those cattle, sheep, pigs, horses and of course people. One would imagine that the various sounds and smells, combined with the sights and general bustle of the city, made for a unique experience!

By Monday the trading was mostly done but the city would still have been crowded and full of activity as the logistical issue of getting the livestock from the seller to the buyer began. Huge amounts of cattle and sheep were being transported on that day by various methods including four special trains put on by The Great Southern and Western Company, with another having to be sent the following day such was the volume of animals in need of finding a way to their new owners.

On such a busy day it is probable that no one paid much attention at first to a drayman and his cart leaving Edmond Smithwick’s St. Francis Well Brewery and turning left on Parliament Street, as this would have been quite a common sight for the last couple of decades or so. But that drayman was quickly followed by another, and then another, and yet another until a column of drays and horses formed a slow-moving cavalcade that worked its way through the crowds of people and livestock as it headed down what was then King Street before turning left on to Rose Inn Street and jigging right on to John’s Bridge and over the fast-flowing Nore.*

By the time the procession had stopped emerging from the archway at the brewery it was an incredible fifty-three drays long. The size of each dray is not known but if we estimate they were possibly five metres long including horses and the rig itself, and allowing for another two metres or more between drays that makes almost 400 metres of a convoy of drays loaded with ale and porter. This would mean that as the first dray was going over the bridge the last one was only just exiting the brewery.

This is must have stopped people in their tracks – literally. The newspapers of the time states that ‘sensation caused by the passage of the vast cavalcade of loaded drays through the fair was great in the extreme.’ The use of those words - ‘sensation’, ‘vast’ and ‘extreme’ - give an inkling of what a sight it must have been to behold. (Note: I must admit to taking all of this with a small grain of salt, as it seems like a huge amount drays for a brewery to have, although they may have called in favours from other establishments. The reporter - quoted above - seems to imply it was all one delivery but of course the drays might have gone back to the brewery to be loaded again. How fifty-three drays, horse and drivers would even fit inside the walls of the brewery is another issue too ...)

This enormous quantity of ale and porter was destined for the export trade via the railway station at the eastern end of John Street, and specifically a train from The Waterford and Kilkenny Company who would bring the load (probably) to the docks in Waterford and from there onwards to other ports across the sea and thirsty palates in 'foreign' inns and taverns. It would appear from reports at the time that the stock had to leave that day regardless of the fair in order to make its sailing, as time and tide indeed do not wait for man - or brewery.

As to what beer was on those drays we do not know, but at the time the brewery was selling Pale Bitter Ale, XXX and XX ale and also XX Stout Porter. The load may have been mostly their stout porter as two English newspaper advertisements of the time carry advertisements for Smithwick’s Kilkenny Stout Porter, although the Kilkenny report mentions both ale and porter.**

I can find no record of how many barrels were sent but if we calculate that the drays could have held a double stack of perhaps 6 plus 4 to make 10 Irish barrels this would make 530 Irish barrels***, which in modern terms would be about 75,599 litres or 42,960 Imperial pints.**** Indeed the reporting of the day does say that the quantity sent was ‘immense’, so although there is a huge amount of guesswork here we could be looking at those sorts of figures – but be aware again there is no record of quantity.

(For context, Guinness were exporting 848 hogsheads of porter a week around this time and relatively smaller brewers like Watkins were sending 289 - a hogshead was roughly a barrel and a half in size.*****)

But by anyone’s measurement, that long line of drays and horses piled high with ale and porter must have been hugely impressive ...

Liam K.

(Adapted from a report in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 31st of March 1858)

*This is the route I assume it would have taken but it is not reported.

**The Worcestershire Chronicle on the 7th of April 1858 and The Gloucester Journal of the 22nd of May 1858

***This is at best an educated guess but I may not be very far off in my calculation, also I have seen images of drays with anything from two to perhaps twenty barrels stacked on them so this is an average guess. There is absolutely no proof of the quantity – THIS IS NOT FACT!

****I am assuming a barrel is an old Irish Barrel by liquid volume which would be 40 Irish gallons. An old Irish Gallon is 3.566 litres so an Irish Barrel contained 142.64 litres. FYI, tierces were slightly larger and dry volume barrels were also different.

***** The Waterford Mail - Tuesday 20th April 1858

All written content and the research involved in publishing it here is my own unless otherwise stated and cannot be reproduced elsewhere without permission, full credit to its sources, and a link back to this post. Newspaper image © The British Library Board - All rights reserved. With thanks to The British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk) from whom I have received permission to display this images on this site.

Beer Myths on Beer Mats? A Closer Look at the Legendary Marketing of Smithwick's and Kilkenny Ales

There are two much-captured street views in the extremely photogenic city of Kilkenny, one is the view up the steps on St. Mary’s Lane that frames the same-named church, while the other is down a cobblestone alley off Parliament Street that leads to a wide-doored archway over which are, in raised red lettering, the words, ‘E. Smithwick & Sons Limited.’ The other commonality between these two views is that both lead to places of worship of a sort for many pilgrims – or more accurately tourists these days - as St. Mary’s now houses the Medieval Mile Museum and the latter what was a world-famous brewery.

Both are of historic importance but the Smithwick's brewery - or the St. Francis Abbey Brewery to give it its proper name - is an establishment that I am mildly obsessed with for a number of reasons. It was the last of the great local (to me) breweries to close its doors; it was a huge employer for over the years to the people of Kilkenny; it was the originator of what is probably the first great Irish festival the Kilkenny Beer Festival in the 1960s, and as early as the 19th century its beers were celebrated beyond these shores and especially so in England. I could go on but suffice to say it brought wealth, pride, and recognition to the smallest city in Ireland and rightly deserves to be remembered, lauded and revered for the huge impact it left on Irish brewing history.

But is there a nagging issue, a grey murkiness that muddies its history, which means that the brewery has lost more than it has gained in the promotion of ‘Brand Smithwicks’ and becoming for the most part a single product within the portfolio of a much larger global company? This is a subject I have written and commented about before, both in a short history on brewing in Kilkenny and in a piece on the dubious history of Irish Red Ale, but I have never explored these legends one by one, so here I hope to do just that. I have picked three stories from Smithwick’s - and Kilkenny ale’s - marketing that come up in much of the advertising for these two brands, and which are used on their promotional material and advertisements.

Any history has its seeds of truth but unfortunately when marketing and monetary gain are added to the mix it can often lead to the blurring, inventing and erasing of history in order to create a marketable narrative, but is that the case with Smithwick’s and Kilkenny ales?

I will let you decide ...

Legend #1 - The Brewery was Founded on the site of St. Francis Abbey

Here is the back of an undated 'Kilkenny Irish Beer' beer mat where it says:

'Kilkenny Irish beer is brewed in the famous Smithwick’s Brewery. Founded in 1710 on the site of St. Francis’ Abbey, the brewery is set amidst the rolling green hills of Kilkenny. The special beer is made from only the finest natural ingredients and brewed to the highest of traditional standards.'

Ignoring that 1710 date for now plus the fact that the brewery was always in extremely urban surroundings with few if any 'rolling green hills' even visible from the site, we will focus on the admittedly loose implication that the brewery was founded on the actual site of the abbey building - an image that is often used with the Kilkenny brand, and a link that is used in the advertisements for Smithwick’s too. (Incidentally, as I have discussed previously in that article on red ales, Kilkenny beer was launched as a new beer in 1987 and was not available in Ireland until 1995 so its heritage has no real historical age. It was developed as a reaction to other Irish-touted beers in the late 1980s.)

The abbey building itself is not mentioned on the lease description from 1867, or when the site was sold in 1827 (both of these can be seen or accessed via that Kilkenny brewing history article), and in the 1868 Royal Society of Antiquaries of Ireland report concerning the condition of the tower it states that:

'The ruins of the Abbey including the tower were possessed by a person who had not the means of doing anything to preserve them. Although they adjoined the Brewery of the Messrs Smithwick, unfortunately they did not belong to those gentlemen - if they did, no subscription would have been thought of, for the work would have been done at once without assistance from any other source. The Messrs Smithwick had most liberally headed the subscription list with a donation of £10 ,and would afford any facility and assistance in their power.'

It was both magnanimous and logical that the Smithwick's family would assist in the upkeep and repair of the abbey but they clearly did not own it at this point.

Indeed the abbey building was up for sale in 1880 as can be seen in an advertisement in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 15th September 1880 which states:

CITY OF KILKENNY

AUCTION OF VALUABLE FREEHOLD PROPERTY AND FRUIT GARDEN.

MESSRS. McCREERY BROTHERS have received instructions from Mrs. Hayes to Sell by Public Auction. in one Lot, on WEDNESDAY. 22nd SEPTEMBER, 1880, At the City Court House, Kilkenny. at 12 o'clock, noon, Her Interest (Freehold) in the Dwelling House and Premiers, known as St. Francis' Abbey and Gardens. situate in the Parish of St. Mary's and City of Kilkenny (adjoining Messrs. Smithwick's Brewery). 

We can again see that it was adjoining and not part of the brewery at this point.

It is also worth quoting George Henry Bassett in The Kilkenny City and County Directory and Guide from 1884 states that:

'The Abbey itself with a very choice fruit garden and cottage was sold a few years ago for 600 to the late Mr. William Morrissey hardware merchant Mrs. Mary Morrissey his widow is now in possession.'

So although it was called ‘The St. Francis Abbey Brewery’ (which just followed on from the same named distillery) it was originally situated beside the abbey building but not part of it. There may have been a portion of it leased by the brewery of course but it certainly was not part of the property as such at this time, although the cooperage may have extended right up to the knave of the abbey as mentioned my George Measom in his guidebook in 1866 (More on this later). In other words the walls of the abbey building may have been used as the outer walls of some of the brewery structures.

The Kilkenny Moderator from Saturday 19th of May 1894 mentions some archaeologists visiting 'places of archaeological and antiquarian interest in the city, including St. Francis' Abbey, now [my emphasis] portion of the premises by the great Brewery establishment of Messrs. E. Smithwick & Sons' and in the same newspaper on the 6th of September 1902 in an article about the abbey it states that:

'The ruins of Francis Abbey, standing in an orchard the property of Mr. George Stallard, and adjoining the premises of the sell-known brewery, the property of Messrs E. Smithwick and sons, Ltd.'

Although three days previously they had printed the same article, but stating that the abbey was inside the Smithwick's property. Whether this was an error corrected by the later publication or not I do not know, or if it was around this time that the existing abbey structure finally came into the hands of the Smithwick's business. It certainly appears to be in the possession of the brewery by 1907 as when talking about the abbey in Journal of the Irish Memorials Association of that year a Colonel White states that 'it is now a store in Mr. Smithwick's Brewery.'

One of the best sources for Kilkenny history is the Irish Historic Town Atlas for the city, and one of its maps for c. 1842 (based on the OSI maps) clearly show a starch manufacturer abutting the walls of the abbey building, with the brewery itself to the south of that business. That enterprise may have been part of the general Smithwick's business – I am unsure – but it served a different purpose to brewing. My contention would be that the brewery spread north over the course of the 19th century and into the 20th to eventually take over the whole site to where the Breagh river meets the Nore, the footprint it had when the brewery closed in 2013.

For fairness and clarity I must point out that in ‘Kilkenny and its Vicinity’ published by Browne & Nolan in 1851 and writing about the condition of the abbey, and commenting on how it was now being used as a ball alley, says that 'parts of the building form a portion of Mr. Smithwick's Brewery establishment,' although my interpretation of that is as I have already stated, that some of the walls form the boundary of the property rather than them being within the site itself, indeed I came across a mention in the Historic Environment Viewer for the site of the brewery regarding the removing of a cooperage structure that they had built up against the abbey itself. Also for balance yet again, in The Builder Vol.36 from 1878 there is a mention of 'the ruins of St. Francis Abbey in Smithwick's brewery' but I believe this was just an assumption made by people getting a general tour of Kilkenny.

So was the brewery founded on the actual site of the existing abbey building? I can find no verifiable evidence that the abbey was in Smithwick's ownership or occupation until around 1900, although the term 'site of' is open to the interpretation of being somewhere close to the abbey itself (Even the distillery of Patrick Brennan that became the brewery is mentioned as being at St. Francis Abbey in 1824 - more on this below) but the implication in some of the marketing could be interpreted in a way that implies the extant abbey building has been part of the brewery for centuries. It is possible and indeed likely that the grounds of the original general abbey site - and the other buildings and land that no doubt existed around the building - may have become home to the brewery site, but that much-advertised building has no verifiable ancient historic connection to the brewing of any Smithwick's beer. If what is meant by some of the marketing is that the brewery was situated on the general abbey environs then that may indeed be accurate.

It is a grey area in some ways but crystal clear in others, depending on the interpretation of the narrative.

Legend #2 – That Smithwick’s ale was first brewed in 1710

There are round fish-eye discs attached to the front of many pubs - in Kilkenny anyhow - that proclaim:

SMITHWICK'S

First brewed in Kilkenny in 1710

Still enjoyed at [pub's name] in 2010

There are also beer mats that proudly state 'Superior Irish Ale since 1710' or sometimes something as definitive sounding as 'Over 300 years ago in 1710, John Smithwick began brewing his famous ale at the St. Francis Abbey Brewery.’ Some are slightly less blatant with the phrase 'crafted and perfected since 1710' but all of the marketing again suggests, or in most cases states, that the same Smithwick's ale that is available today has been brewed for over three centuries, practically stating that nothing has changed in those three centuries. Almost all advertisements, including recent ones on mainstream television, also appear to imply this to be a true fact.

But there are many issues with this assertion of course, and again we will side-step the 1710 founding date for now and look at something relatively more recent. Firstly, I will repeat here a paragraph from one of my own aforementioned red ale posts:

"A report on Smithwick’s ‘275th’ anniversary in The Kilkenny People in 1985, admittedly 20 years after the launch of its kegged ale states that ‘public taste […] for ale had begun to change and a demand for a darker, sweeter ale became apparent late in 1965. Smithwick’s draught keg was developed [my emphasis] therefore to meet demand.’ So this also seems to rule out the possibility that Smithwick's Draught was a rebrew of an older XX ale or similar from Smithwick's wonderful repertoire of ales from the 19th and early 20th century, more is the pity, and seems to show that they were indeed mimicking in a way, another kegged ale that was selling well at the time - [Watney's] Red Barrel."

The original article I quote clearly states that what we think of now as Smithwick's ale was created in 1965 - not 1710.

If we want further evidence we can look at what was their most popular beer prior to this period - Smithwick's No.1 - which was a pale ale and not a red ale, as attested to by adverts such as one in the New Ross Standard on the 20th August 1966 that clearly mentions 'its rich golden colour'. We can look back to older adverts which mention other beers too, such as one in the Kilkenny Journal and Leinster Commercial and Literary Advertiser on the 31st of January 1852 that champions a 'Pale Bitter Ale', and we can also mention 'XXX & Pale Ales' from the same publication on the 15th of January 1868. Very importantly we can quote the Kilkenny Moderator on the 12th of March 1828 and in what was one of the first mentions of beer production from the St. Francis Well Brewery mentions:

'Porter, Pale Butt, & Strong Ale, in Wood and Bottle, of their own brewing.'

These are for sale in Edmund and Patrick Smithwick’s shop on High Street in Kilkenny. None of these sound anything like the current offering that is Smithwick's Draught, and if you had a 'famous red ale' would you not be mentioning it in your own advertisements for your own beers? It cannot be the porter as that was dark, the pale butt beer was - well - pale, and the strong ale may have been amber or reddish but the current version of Smithwick's can hardly be classed as a strong ale by any definition of the term.

Also, in a report on a breach of the public spirit licence in The Kilkenny Moderator of 3rd of May 1862 'Smithwick's pale ale' is mentioned in the context that it was a common commodity, and the Waterford Mail from the 10th of September 1869 in another court report about some of those accused 'testing the strength of Smithwick's "pale butt".'

An article in The Waterford News and Star from September 1873 mentions a strong, aged amber ale but that certainly sounds nothing like modern day Smithwick's apart from the colour perhaps - I would think that this is the XXX mentioned above.

Admittedly other various adverts from the 19th century mention just ales or mild ales in general but none mention this 'famous' reddish coloured ale that Smithwick's claims to have brewed for centuries. Again, just for clarity and fairness an advertisement in The Cork Daily Herald on the 11th of February 1882 for a Cork agent for the brewery's beers list their East India Pale Ale as well as that XXX ale mentioned above, plus an XX and an X ale. All of these may have been darker than their pale ale and possibly amber in colour as described above but I have given my thoughts on amber ales previously and although they did exist it is a stretch to connect any of those beers with Smithwick’s modern 1960s' keg ale.

Most interestingly, George Measom in ‘The Official Illustrated Guide to the Great Southern & Western Railway’ mentions a visit to Edmond Smithwick’s brewery in 1866 and talks about the ale production there, noting that there were 'two enormous pale ale vaults' in which were stored '4,000 hogsheads of ale.' He also mentions the malting process within the brewery and how carefully it had to be dried 'to prevent the slightest tinge or colour being imparted to the malt...' (no other malt or roasted barley are mentioned) and also with regard to the boiling of the wort he states that the coppers are uncovered 'to preserve the colour of the wort, which would be darkened by higher pressure.'

Does any of this sound like anything even remotely red-tinged? It sounds like pale ale being brewed with pale malt and being store in a 'pale ale vault'. The brewery was of course also brewing porter at this time, which just gets a mention in the heading but not later on. India Pale Ale gets a mention as being 'extensively brewed' by them so I am assuming that porter was in relatively small quantities, as were any other ales.

In 1892 according to The Dublin Daily Express of the 16th of August the St. Francis Abbey Brewery showed a 'large quantity of East India pale ale' at The Distillers, Brewers and Allied Trades Exhibition in The Rotunda in Dublin, implying that this was their bestselling ale at the time perhaps? Indeed the were awarded a Diploma of Merit for that beer and it was deemed to be 'equal to some of the best of the English brands' according to a later report in The Kilkenny Moderator. If they were brewing a famous red ale would they not exhibit it here too?

Moving forward a few decades an advertisement in The Sligo Champion on the 10th of December 1965 states that the pale Smithwick's No 1 was being called "Ireland's legendary ale. The clearest call of true Irishmen for over two hundred years.' and has the by-line of 'Ireland's traditional ale' so how can this product, which is obviously not the same as the new kegged ale offering, be this alleged historic ale as well as the modern kegged brew? (Not that the new brew was being touted as such at its launch, that assertion came much later.) In my opinion it simply cannot, it is just that the marketing shifted from one beer to the next when No. 1 was side-lined, even if bottles of the modern branding currently have a rather cheeky 'No. 1' on its label!

When Smithwick’s briefly rebranded much of their ale to the ‘Time’ name there were advertisements that listed their produce and none sound like an old red ale recipe, in fact the whole Time rebrand was a modernisation of their beers and the closest sounding at a push – Extra Time – still does not sound like our modern Smithwick's ale. You can read more about that branding hiccup in my post on the subject.

Finally, Michael Jackson in his Beer Companion book published in 1993 can tell us that Smithwick's was then brewed with 'highly modified pale ale malt, three percent roasted barley and 20 percent corn syrup' plus various hops. That certainly does not sound like a recipe that has been around since 1710, and although Jackson may have been wrong about certain facts on Irish brewing this seems to be too accurate a recipe not to have been acquired in or from the brewery itself. And in Iorwerth Griffiths' much read and appreciated Beer and Cider in Ireland published in 2007, he gives a recipe that he says may not be up to date, but the implication is that it was certainly the recipe at one time, which sounds quite like Jackson's and may be from the same source. The fact that they both mention roast barley as an addition to the brew is of interest as roasted barley, as distinct from roasted malted barley, was not to the best of my knowledge in use in the early- or mid-19th century and certainly not in 1710.

Even if we dismiss all of the above and we did consider the assertion that it is the same beer that was brewed when the brewery began, then by considering the changes that would have taken place in the brewing process, and the ingredients and the equipment, the only way any claim can be entertained that it is the same beer from centuries ago is to employ Trigger's reasoning from Only Fools & Horses regarding the broom he had all his working life. He just changed the head 17 times and put 14 new handles on it.

If you do that with a beer can it still be the same beer?

Legend #3 – That the Smithwick's brewery was established in 1710

Just about every advertisement, label and beermat makes this claim, the implication being that essentially the Smithwick’s family has being brewing in the same site for over 300 years. Many sources, which perhaps come from information from the brewery itself, mention the name of a Richard Cole as having a brewery on the site and that he was somehow connected with a John Smithwick who commenced brewing in 1706 or 1710 depending on the source.

This is a problematic assertion to prove in many ways, mostly caused by lack of available evidence, and a story regarding an almost hidden brewery - or owner - existing for over a century in plain sight in Kilkenny, which because of the Irish Penal Laws forbidding ownership of certain property by Catholics, had to be kept hush-hush ...

Let us look at what we do actually know about the brewery and its owners, for example Pigot's Trade Directory of 1824 does not list any Smithwick's as brewers and indeed mentions Patrick Brennan as a distiller at St. Francis Abbey. Although a Smithwick and O'Callaghan are shown as both grocers and wine merchants, so clearly Edmond Smithwick was not afraid to be known to be connected with a premises and business at this point in time. Quite the opposite in fact, as he was a well-known businessman, as was his father John before him. And no, that John is not the one who allegedly founded the brewery although some histories I have read seem to suggest he was, as they somehow lose a couple of generations of the family! This seems to be a problem with most of the purported history, both official and repeated - that these two Johns are conflated and we are somehow to ignore a whole generation of the Smithwick’s clan - namely the 'first' John's son and  the other John’s father – an enigmatic Peter Smithwick. Even if you look at a video from the Smithwick's Experience here, it shows various members of the family but seems to combine those Johns into one character. It would be wonderful to hear more about that Peter and how he influenced - or perhaps did not - his son to become a merchant and in turn influenced his grandson Edmond to build his brewery but I can find almost no information about him in any of the available brewery information, which is remarkable given that according to the alleged history of the brewery he would surely have inherited the 'secretive' business at one point.

More evidence of Edmond’s own business interests is shown in a notice of a partnership dissolution between the aforementioned Edmond Smithwick and Owen O'Callaghan in Finn's Leinster Journal on the 7th of July 1827 where he is shown to be a merchant dealing in 'grocery, wine, spirit, oil and colour, soap and candle' as well as a 'corn, flour, and boulting business'. O'Callaghan received the latter business and Edmond partnered with a Peter Smithwick (probably his brother who may have been named after his grandfather who I mention above?) on the former. So he was certainly a well-known business man and unafraid of having his name attached to these businesses prior to his involvement with the brewery, even before he went on to be a mayor of Kilkenny.

The advertisement from when the site where was up for lease is in my post on Kilkenny breweries as mentioned above, and the site is described as an 'Extensive Distillery, Malt House, Corn Stores, and Water Mill' which was 'now in full working order.' (Implying it is a relatively new reconstruction.) The advertisement says that the distillery could be converted into a brewery at zero cost, implying that it was not a brewery at that time. To make spirits in a distillery you need to make a ‘beer’ of sorts first so it would make perfect sense that it could be converted into a brewery as much of the equipment was the same.

So it appear by looking at these advertisements that Edmond Smithwick took over the lease of the distillery property in 1827, with beer production commencing some time after that and beer was certainly being produced by 1828 as per the advertisement mentioned above.

The Brennans still owned the actual site up to 1867 when it was in The Court of Chancery. And according to a petition in The Irish Law Times and Solicitors' Journal, Volume 1 of 1868 the site was due to be auctioned later that same year, as referenced in my Kilkenny article. So at this time the Smithwick’s family did not own the site, it was just leased to them. An interesting note on the petition states that the site was held in two leases, one dated from 1753 from William and Anne Archbold to an Ambrose Evans, and the other from 1780 by a Rev. George Evans to and Edward Evans. No mention of a Cole or Smithwick at those dates.

George Measom again in ‘The Official Illustrated Guide to the Great Southern & Western Railway’ states in the title of his description that the brewery was established in 1828, and it seems strange to me that the brewery would allow this date to be published if they knew it to be wrong. Indeed Measom would surely have had to ask someone when the brewery was established in order to get the date for his publication so why at this point did they not say 1710, as surely Edmond knew his own history?

By the way, that 1710 date seems only appear at the end of the 19th century, so perhaps that was when some paperwork was found mentioning some connection between a John Smithwick and Richard Cole and the fact that there was a brewery on Richard Cole's property, although this would have been common enough, as a brewhouse would have been a normal building to have on many farm properties or those attached to medium or large houses. The output would generally be consumed by the workers and those who lived in the house more so than for sale to the public.

There is an advertisement for the 275th anniversary for the brewery in The Kilkenny People on the 27th of September 1985 mentions Richard Cole living in Kilcreene Lodge (although he actually seems to have lived in Archer's Grove outside the city according to family biographies) and obtaining a 'fee farm grant' for the site that later became the brewery, although it is a little vague on the details and completely omits any evidence of brewing on the site until 1827. In the New Ross Standard 25 years earlier on the 18th of March 1960 the wording is equally vague in an article about that Time rebranding that was presumably given consent for publication by the brewery, where it states that 'The firm of Smithwicks was founded in 1710 by John Smithwick. At the same time, one Richard Cole, founded a brewery in Kilkenny. The two firms, Smithwicks and Coles, combined to be known as Smithwicks Brewery.' This hardly makes sense, as seemingly the brewery had to be kept secret according the current line of history touted by the marketing so how could it be known by that title? (Also, according to biographies Richard Cole was an army Colonel and later an M.P, there are no mentions of any other businesses.)

Tellingly, the aforementioned Historic Town Atlas for Kilkenny states clearly that 'Smithwicks, the best-known Kilkenny brewers, acquired Brennan's distillery in 1827 and established St Francis' Abbey Brewery', and this is a serious publication - the definitive guide to the history of Kilkenny. Not infallible of course but also rarely - if ever - wrong in my experience.

In the masterplan for the redevelopment of the brewery site on the Kilkenny County Council website the authors do mention that the 'first documented brewery in operation within the grounds of St Francis' Abbey has its origins at this time. In 1706 a fee-farm grant for what is now a part of the modern brewery property was leased to Richard Cole by the Duke of Ormond. Cole established a partnership with John Smithwick, who came to Kilkenny in 1710' although they then go on to say that there 'is little documentary evidence for this first brewery, though it appears to have been a small retail operation. Although apparently successful, the business did not remain in the Smithwick family after the death of John.' [All my emphasises] Firstly I certainly find it strange that in what is a very good history of the area around the brewery that there is a certain ambiguity, and that there is no references to the source of this information given it flags the source of almost every other fact, so unfortunately there is no corroborating evidence to these assertions. Secondly it is interesting to note that they say for a fact that the brewery fell out of the hands of John after his death. Personally, I find much of this very vague and I wonder were the authors being deliberately ambiguous in order to conform to the prescribed Kilkenny history of the brewery so as not to anger multiple parties. It is difficult to know …

Another source of knowledge on brewing in Kilkenny - Thomas Halpin - who is referenced in the HTA above wrote an article for the Old Kilkenny Review (I possess a physical copy) of 1989 and in it he mentions that a 'fee farm grant for what is now part of the modern [my emphasis] brewery property was granted to Richard Cole, who lived in Kilcreene' which later became the home of the Smithwick's family. Tellingly to my mind, Halpin goes on to say that 'there is no evidence available as to how [a] mercantile partnership between Messrs. Cole and Smithwick progressed.' It is worth pointing out here that Halpin worked for the Smithwicks brewery, and he skips forward in his piece on Kilkenny brewing to the site that was acquired by Edmund Smithwick in 1827, as I have mentioned above.

Yet another source is Iorwerth Griffith's book that I mentioned above. The chapter on the Smithwick's brewery mentions the Cole/Smithwick lease but states that 'that there is no mention of brewing in the document' with some authority, which of course does not mean that there was not brewing happening on the site at this time, but it seems like the author had first-hand knowledge of the original document.

In 2013 Art Kavanagh published a book on the history of the Smithwick family, and in it he states that the John Smithwick who allegedly founded the brewery in 1710 was a protestant (and descended from a military family with origins in Hertfordshire and with Cromwellian connections) until marrying his second wife and from then the family became catholic although the author seems to think that John may not have converted, although his gravestone is in St. Canice's Cathedral graveyard -it is quite visible with an archaic spelling of Smithwick. It was John's grandson - also called John and discussed above - who was involved in importing and exporting businesses and bought estates in and around Kilkenny, becoming quite wealthy and well regarded according to the Kavanagh. As I have already stated, this does not sound like a person who had a secret brewery that was set up by his grandfather. I would expect that if this later John owned a brewery he would have announced it to all, as the Penal Laws that were supposed prevent catholic from owning land, etc. seemed to have little effect on his standing or ability to do business, although I do not doubt it may have had some effect on parts of it and they are certainly not to be dismissed lightly. (To remind you again of the confusing timeline, it was Edmond the son of this second John who bought the distillery and converted into a brewery in 1827, as we have already discussed and as is confirmed by the author of this book.)

Very tellingly is a talk given by Walter Smithwick at Kilcreene Lodge to the Kilkenny Archaeological Society and published in 1960 which states that, 'Just before 1710 a young John Smithwick came from Tipperary to Kilkenny and started his business in the year 1710. Unfortunately, there are no records to show his precise business at that time.' [My emphasis.] He goes on to say that, 'In 1706 a Richard Cole of Kilcreene obtained a fee farm grant from James, Duke of Ormonde, of [a] portion of St. Francis Abbey Brewery.' Absolutely no reference to a connection with John Smithwick is mentioned, and the Smithwick's did not come into possession of the house for many years after. Straight from the horse's mouth it seems ...

John (Edmond's father) Smithwick's house on High Street in Kilkenny was to be let according to an advertisement in The Kilkenny Journal, and Leinster Commercial and Literary Advertiser of the 6th of July 1836 and is described as a place where there was carried out 'an extensive trade and which was lately rebuilt in a very substantial manner' and it contained 'a large and commodious shop, parlour' and other rooms - including eight bedrooms! Again, does any of that sound like a person who would need to be secretive about owning a brewery regardless of any remnants of penal laws that remained? 

So where exactly was the property leased by Richard Cole in 1705? Most sources give the impression it was close to the old brewery site, just off of what is now Parliament Street and therefore implying that there was a continuation of brewing on the site from around that period to when the brewery closed in this century. But there some issues with this if we look at the actual lease details, which we can via the Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland, which has a transcript of the original deed in its archives recorded by John Lodge (1692–1774) the deputy keeper of the records in Dublin Castle which reads:

Deeds of lease & release made 24 & 25 September 1705 whereby James, Duke of Ormand, for the sum of 40. 2. 8. Granted in fee farm to Richard Cole of Kilcreene, in [..] Liberties of Kilkenny,

Three thatcht [sic] tenements & gardens without [..] Black Abbey gate between the river & the city-wall.

To Hold as fully as the same were lately demised to Lady Evans, at the rent of 1£, two turkies [sic], or 5sh., receiver’s fees, & suit of courts & mills.

If we are unsure whether this is the actual lease in question there appears to be a more florid version of the lease on display in the Smithwick's Experience that can be seen and read in one of the images on this site. Apart from the additions to that one - or omissions of the one described above - we can see that they appear to be the same deed.

Three thatched cottages outside the Black Abbey gate (which still stands by the way) between the city walls and the river is quite easy to track down, as the walls and the river are easy to pinpoint and it has to be the Breagagh river that is being referred to, which flows into the Nore.

And here we can see the general site (red circle) on a map from c. 1780 – admittedly after the time of Cole – which show buildings in an area just outside the Black Abbey gate and between the walls and the river. Surely this is the site - or very close to it - given the description?

I have also placed an arrow at the end of the lane that leads to the Smithwick’s brewery site in the top picture, which is 200 meters away and across what was then the Coal Market. Not exactly close given the compact size of the city to anyone familiar with the city.

Another lease may exist but I have not found one, and as mentioned above it sounds identical to the one exhibited in the Smithwick's Experience - unless there is another there. Was there ever a brewery on this site near the Black Abbey? I do not know but I can find no reference to one in common sources.

There is no doubt that the Penal Laws did prevent Catholics from holding certain positions, property, etc. and it would certainly have prevented certain aspects of trade. I am not expert enough on this part of our history to dig very deep into how well it was enforced or not, and indeed a John 'Smithwith' [sic] from Kilkenny signed a petition that was published in The Dublin Evening Post on the 17th January 1792 imploring the authorities to rescind some of the barriers to trade, so it is important not to dismiss these laws entirely but certainly something does not seem right about the reason why the early generations of the Smithwick’s needed to be so secretive

We can see that there is no doubt that our John, the grandson of the alleged originator of the brewery, became quite a wealthy man during his lifetime and was certainly a well know public figure who owned or leased property in the city. A question that occurs to me is if he was in fear of the penal laws, as presumably was his father and grandfather, would they have risked the wrath of the authorities just to brew what was surely a moderate amount of beer? And surely at some point, given the cut-throat business ethics of the time, someone would have told the same to the authorities?

So to sum up, given the available evidence I can find nothing to say that the Smithwick’s were brewing prior to 1827. That there was a John Smithwick in Kilkenny in 1710 there can be no doubt, and he may have formed a partnership with a Richard Cole but I can find no evidence of either party brewing anywhere, although brewing for home consumption could certainly have taken place on various sites, perhaps even Archer's Grove which was owned by Richard Cole but is nowhere near the modern brewery site. I can only find evidence that the brewery dates from 1827 and the first beers brewed in the Smithwick’s name were brewed in that year or the following one. It is quite possible that the John Smithwick from 1710 did indeed form some sort of business but it seems unlikely given what I have researched that it anything to do with commercial brewing.

So I will leave the reader to decide if they think that a brewery owned by anyone in the Smithwick's family existed from 1710 ...

---

The Smithwick family appear to have been good, kind and generous people - perhaps more needs to be made of that and what they gave to the community of Kilkenny - and it is worth pointing out that many of the legends grew and took flight after their period of ownership of the brewery and the brand had finished. There are many interesting tales and probably even some fun frivolous stories that could be told about the people who owned, brewed in and worked in the brewery which can be based on facts, such as Edmond saving a child from drowning in 1841, and a large eel stopped the brewery from operating in 1921, or how a cavalcade of 53 drays loaded with porter and ale made its way from the brewery and onward by train to a ship, all destined for the export market. Although there have been less positive reports too, such as a boycott of Smithwick's beers proposed by the Irish National League in the late 1880s due to a tenant's rights issues. Any of those facts plus many more that I have found could at the very least be printed on some beer mats ...

And we could listen to real interviews from those who worked on the brewery site, we could taste the actual old brews like that Pale Butt and a Smithwick’s porter, or their famous and popular 19th century IPA. There are endless real possibilities to what could be told about this inspirational and interesting brewing company. 

Wouldn't that be a better Experience...?

Liam K.

(1st and 3rd image are from the author's collection, the 2nd and 4th are via Ebay beer mat sellers.)

(Old map of Kilkenny is via Wikimedia Commons here.)

All written content and the research involved in publishing it here is my own unless otherwise stated and cannot be reproduced elsewhere without permission, full credit to its source, and a link back to this post. With thanks to The British Newspaper Archive (www.britishnewspaperarchive.co.uk), Virtual Record Treasury of Ireland, and Google Books from where I accessed much of the content.

Giving it Both Barrels: 19th Century Sketches of Smithwick's & Sullivan's Kilkenny XX Porter

The history of brewing in Kilkenny is a topic I keep returning to again and again as there is such a wealth of real history to be mined in old newspapers and publications online, as well as in physical books. Although sadly, I am not aware of any publicly accessible archives for any of the breweries in the city, which is also very much the case for most of Ireland's lost breweries with a couple of notable exceptions such as Perry's in Rathdowney and Murphy's in Cork. My own hometown of Carlow also has some brewing history of course, but its beers and breweries are not as famous and never reached the successes of the two main breweries in the neighbouring city down the road, and although I am still sporadically researching the brewing history of this town - and I have amassed a sizable file about it - it is more often the case that I come across something relating to Kilkenny as far as any local-ish brewing history is concerned.

That was the case with two 19th century Irish scenes by Edmund Fitzpatrick that appeared four years apart in The Illustrated London News, and both of which I chanced upon at different times. In both cases my eyes were drawn to the casks in the corner of the illustrations and the names printed on them, names I was quite familiar with from my interest in Kilkenny's brewing history - although you would have needed to be living a very hermitic life to have never heard of Smithwick's St. Francis Abbey Brewery in this country, or further afield. Sullivan's Brewery, which was on James's Street, has been rebooted or reborn in recent years too, although its new brewery tap is on the opposites side of the river.

Edmund Fitzpatrick was and illustrator and painter who was either originally from Freshford in Kilkenny or certainly lived there for a period. According to one source he was born there 1822 and died in London in 1896 and he was certainly residing there in 1858 as he advertised in The Kilkenny Moderator in November that year that he had 'lately arrived from Paris and London' for a short stay and that he was available for commissions. (The Library of Ireland has a short but interesting biography about his life on their website here.) He has some paintings hanging in Kilkenny castle, so his finer artwork was also held in high regard it appears, which is hardly surprising given the quality and dynamism of his newspaper sketches.

He was quite prolific with his work and created many illustrations for newspapers, some of which were Kilkenny focussed so it has hardly a surprise that he was familiar with the two biggest breweries in the city, and that he decided to include them in his works. The first illustration appeared in The Illustrated London News of March 15th 1853 to accompany a piece about how St. Patrick's Day was celebrated in Ireland. It is a joyful picture of someone's home and full of interesting-looking characters and imagined stories. It also perhaps gives an insight to the dress of the day and what people drank, and what they consumed those drinks from - whiskey and porter at the very least, from stemmed glass and pewter tankards. How real or imagined it is I do not know but I quite like the picture when I first came across it and especially when I noticed the 'Smithwicks XX Porter Kilkenny' on the barrel. The accompanying text and other illustrations certainly have issues that I will not raise here, but it is just nice to see a name check for a famous local brewery.

Drowning the Shamrock on St. Patrick's Night - Drawn by E. Fitzpatrick

The second image is also from The Illustrated London News, this edition from January 24th 1857 and it shows a few travelling school masters debating various subjects. Again, it is full of wonderful characters and more importantly for us we can see a cask of 'Sullivans XX Porter Kilkenny' sitting once again in the right hand corner. And again, the accompanying text is full of 'Oirish' words but I quite like the actions and expressions here too, even if the drawing seems a little cruder and perhaps a little more hurried.

The Irish Schoolmaster - Drawn by E. Fitzpatrick

Regardless, it is good to see Mr. Fitzgerald being fair and giving equal advertising space to both of the big Kilkenny breweries! It might raise the question as to whether he was berated by the Sullivan's into including them in an illustration having used Smithwick's porter in the other one?

Of course, we cannot get too excited about these, after all it is not like the are factual records or photographs, but maybe that is not the point.

Perhaps we should just appreciate the illustrations and the recorded anecdotal history for what it is, just another way of getting the information about our lost brewing history out and findable, and in to the public eyeline - highlighting actual beers that really did exist in Kilkenny in the middle of the 19th century.

And they do say a picture is worth a thousand words ... so perhaps I need not have waffled on so much?

Liam K.

The original images and accompanying articles can be found here and here via Google Books. These images were originally posted by me on my Twitter account on the 18th of August 2019 and on the 15th of November 2021.

All written content and the research involved in publishing it here is my own unless otherwise stated and cannot be reproduced elsewhere without permission, full credit to its source, and a link back to this post.

Brewing History: Irish Red Ale Part III - Immigrant or Emigrant?

Well here we are at last, and in this the final part of my trilogy on Irish Red Ales, you can once again expect more questions that definitive answers, and more vagueness than actual facts, but I will certainly do my best to steer this difficult topic onwards towards a conclusion that is less of a grinding halt and more of a squeaky trundle towards a slippery patch of black ice ...

In part one of this series I dealt with the ancient records of red ale in Ireland, and part two concentrated on the complicated case for the availability of ‘red’ (amber) ales in the 18th, 19th and early 20th century which brought us rushing past the 1950s and now lands us squarely in the 1960s, where Irish brewing was going through a revolution with regard to drinking habits, accompanied by an onslaught of new brands all vying for the attention of the modern, trendy beer drinker. Bright lights, bright bars and bright-ish beers were what a large percentage of younger people craved and wanted.

Of course the 60s were a decade of change in Ireland on many fronts but relevant to our story are those changing tastes of the young (and not so young), fickle Irish beer consumer. Lagers and imported ale brands pushed by modern marketing techniques and clever wording began to influence what was being drunk in both pubs and at home. Our brewing heritage was also being 'consolidated' as a certain brewery flexed its stout muscles and wrapped its arms around most of the smaller Irish brands and breweries that were unable to compete with the bigger domestic breweries or deal with the influx of foreign brands and brewing companies that arrived on our shores in this period.

And so, with practically all of the major domestic ale brands now in Guinness’s warm and all-encompassing embrace, that behemoth of Irish brewing decided to bring the fight for the small-but-growing ale market in Ireland to the frontline of the pub countertop and to repel the assault of the English kegged ale brands that were making relatively large noise in the marketplace. (They were to have a second battle on the lager front but that is a story for a different post.)

And it is from this point that our story continues with a tight focus on a certain so-called Irish Red Ale …

If you ask anyone within these shores to name an Irish red ale almost all will say ‘Oh, Smithwick’s of course!’, but the curious thing is that Smithwick’s Draught seems to have never branded or advertised itself as a red ale - in print at least - until sometime after it launched its Pale and Blonde ales, so within the last decade or so. The reason for this was of course because ‘Irish Red Ales’ as a term did not really exist in the vocabulary of Irish beer drinkers until the early to mid-1990s at a push, as far as I am aware, and even then it was not a well-known term outside certain circles. That is not to say that reddish coloured ales did not exist in the sixties, seventies, and eighties, as they clearly did, but they were just called ales or - at a real push - Irish ales or 'Traditional' ales from what I can see from advertisement, labels, and beer mats.

But let us go back to the turmoil of the 1960s that I mentioned above, and to a time just after Guinness had finally taken over Smithwick’s completely in the mid-sixties and it had launched Smithwick’s Draught as a new brand in 1966/67 along with a bottled version called Smithwick’s ‘D’. This just after the period when most of the Smithwick’s beers had been rebranded as Time ales. Smithwick’s No. 1 ale seems to have survived that rebranding, and indeed after the bold experiment that was Time was brought to an end it was being promoted quite heavily in bottle only in newspapers during this period of the mid-sixties, with advertisements promoting its ‘rich golden colour’ by the way! Considering that ‘No. 1’ was an award-winning ale that had survived from at least the early 20th century it is perhaps a little surprising that this ale was not used as a launching pad for Smithwick’s Draught and that instead Guinness appear to have gone for a completely new beer, not least in colour. So why invent this new amber-ish coloured ale instead of a rich golden one? I do not know the actual reason of course but I believe there is more than just one reason for this decision...

The first issue is that Guinness & Co., of course, already had in its stable a successfully marketed, bestselling, and attractive ‘bright’ pale ale in Phoenix, which had been launched the previous decade and was doing very well domestically at this time in keg and bottle. Phoenix had already taken sales from Smithwick’s No. 1 in the past so it would make little sense to pitch one pale ale against the other, as it would have meant stagnant revenues and a pointless war amongst themselves. What may also be relevant if that Beamish & Crawford launched Celebration Ale - another ‘bright’ beer - in early 1966 and that was enough competition for Phoenix. (Perry’s ale still existed too, as did Macardles of course, bot controlled by Guinness but perhaps neither brand merited a rebrand at this time - Perry’s at this point was just an occasionally available draught ale.)

Secondly, they saw the real enemy as the English brands and breweries that were looking long and hard at the Irish market - but in particular Watney’s Red Barrel which was making serious inroads¹ into kegged ale sales in Ireland and was being heavily advertised from 1964, and especially so when it began being brewed in Lady’s Well Brewery in Cork - then owned by Watney Mann - in mid-1966. Red Barrel was not 'red' of course, although what appears to be a publicity shot of a tankard of the ale in ‘The Murphy Story’ certainly shows it as ‘red’ as modern Smithwicks.¹ There may also have been a subliminal perception that it was somewhat darker than it actually was given its name. Having said that, Boak & Bailey’s post on Red Barrel show a dark golden(?) beer when it was rebrewed, and the brewing records shown in their post states it was 27 EBC (Or maybe 24 EBC in Ron Pattinson’s linked-to version within their post), so approaching amber in colour perhaps. (Michael Jackson's Beer Companion says that Smithwick's was 29 EBC by the way.) More proof of its darkish colour is in the replies to that post, where Gary Gillman from Beer et seq. flags a video that clearly show Red Barrell being poured in the 60s and it is indeed quite an amber colour very like Smithwick's Draught's shade in this advertisement. It was also moderately hopped at 30-32 IBU and was 3.8% ABV according to that post, so certainly not a dissimilar beer to what we believe Smithwick was when launched, if perhaps a little more bitter and (perhaps) a little less 'red'. It is worth noting too that other advertisements from this period such as the one flagged above appear to show Smithwick's Draught slightly paler than today’s version, and I am assuming it might have gone through one or more changes or tweaks in the interim - although I have no proof of that and images, and especially those from publicity material, can be notoriously unreliable but I am not sure if there was a huge difference between Red Barrel and Smithwick's colour-wise at launch

I have very little doubt that Red Barrel was Guinness's target, and a darker coloured Irish keg ale with a good provenance suited their portfolio too, plus it distanced Smithwick's Draught from Phoenix. Also, it might be no coincidence that just like Time ale before them they used a barrel or keg as their pump font, as perhaps a dig at the little red barrel that Watney’s used for their ale font, albeit Smithwick’s version was white and more stylised. (Intriguingly there was an alcohol free version of Smithwick's made in the 80s or 90s I believe - I have undated labels - that was sold as Smithwick's AFB - alcohol free bitter!)

A report on Smithwick’s ‘275th’ anniversary in The Kilkenny People in 1985, admittedly 20 years after the launch of its kegged ale states that ‘public taste […] for ale had begun to change and a demand for a darker, sweeter ale became apparent late in 1965. Smithwick’s draught keg was developed therefore to meet demand.’ So this also seems to rule out the possibility that Smithwick's Draught was a rebrew of an older XX ale or similar from Smithwick's wonderful repertoire of ales from the 19th and early 20th century, more is the pity, and seems to show that they were indeed mimicking in a way, another kegged ale that was selling well at the time - Red Barrel. (Incidentally, these few sentences in an editorial advertisement no doubt approved by the company, blows a large and gaping hole in the Smithwick’s brand’s current - and ridiculous - assertion that their beer has been going since 1710!)

What is certain is that Guinness desperately needed a ‘new’ keg ale to compete with newcomers and that the direction they chose to go was a success, as they soon made progress in the Irish ale market to the point that in a couple of years¹ they were ahead of all competitors - including Phoenix by the way - although they would be soon challenged and pushed by Beamish & Crawford brewed Bass on its introduction in 1968 /69.²

But how or when did Smithwick's become known as an Irish red ale in Ireland? As I mentioned earlier, I think it was only since the last rebrand that included the blonde and the pale, so that is just in the last few year - although I am not quite sure I believe that myself even though I can find no evidence in advertisement and bottle labels to the contrary. It may have been marketed as a red ale on foreign shores before that time but apart from it being lumped in with other ‘red’ ales in newspaper reports in the late nineties and editorials I cannot see it branded as such.

But its nitrogenated distant cousin Kilkenny Ale, certainly was…

Kilkenny was launched by Guinness first in Germany in 1987 and was later released on the Irish public in 1995, as Guinness no doubt felt that Caffrey’s ale was trying to sneak into the market with its nitro ale. The export version of Kilkenny was 5% abv and the Irish version was a little weaker at 4.3%, but it is important to point out that the kegged version was not just a nitrogenated version of Smithwick’s according to any sources I can see in newspaper reports, it was a new formulation to piggyback on the success of the international success of Killian’s Red Ale in my opinion. (Killian’s Red was the subject of a great deep dive by Martyn Cornell, which I have posted a link to at the end of my post.) The bottle export version was also 5% and presumably not nitrogenated in any way and Kilkenny was certainly marketed and mentioned as a red ale in most, if not all, markets. (It is currently sold in Ireland as an Irish Cream Ale - certainly a term that did not exist here until very recently either - and is 4.3% abv, which suggests a recipe change since its original German launch.)

One curious mention I found was for the launch in Ireland in 1993 of a 5% red coloured ale called ‘1710 Export’ in bottle. A mention in the Evening Herald’s ‘The Diary’ - a social gossip column - in November mentions the beer and states that Guinness’s Smithwick’s marketing manager said that it ‘was not just Smithwick's with a fancy new image “It’s based on and American red beer recipe” … “it’s a totally new product.”’ A smoking gun you say...?

Am I the only person who thinks that this may have been a bottled version of Kilkenny ale, which was being brewed in Kilkenny for export at this time? Why would Guinness develop another 5% export red beer when they already had one being brewed in the same brewery? I can find very little more information on this product but if it is not export Kilkenny then and if the quote is to be believed, it shows that Guinness via the Smithwick’s marketing wing was looking into replicating and improving on certain American red beers at this time, or at least one being sold there as an Irish Red Ale. If '1710 Export' was Kilkenny ale being trial launched on the public then the above quote certainly highlights its actual original provenance, and that if far from these shores. 

So, the final iteration of ‘Irish Red Ale’ did not really originate here at all but in America and other foreign markets, although a reddish ale did exist, in Smithwick’s Draught, it was never known as such here. I am not sure where the other traditional ‘red’ that is Macardles ale fits into this colour-wise or otherwise - it is possible it morphed into a darker ale sometime in the 60s or early 70s, like Phoenix may have done at a later date, but it was marketed as a 'Traditional Ale'. (Another ale, brewed for export in Dundalk by Guinness, called Twyford was marketed as an ‘Amber’ ale sometime in the 80s I think.)

The other big culprits in this whole red ale saga are homebrewers, and microbrewers who lifted the term as it applied to international ‘Irish Red Ales’ and made it into a believable style, that was then reimported back into Ireland under that name by the early batch of Irish microbreweries aided and abetted by other macrobrewed versions like Murphy’s Red Ale launched in Germany first in 1995 and Beamish Red which was launched in England the following year.

Suddenly we were swamped in red ales by name and style, apart from as I have mentioned, the one ale that most people think of as a red ale - Smithwick's - which makes me wonder why I have spent so long discussing it!

And yes, I am aware it is an Irish ale that is red...

So it looks to me like this age of red ales had no real, provable connection with the two previous eras of red/amber ales apart from the obvious one of the actual colour. There is most probably a connection between Kilkenny Ale and Killian's Red and therefore at a push that Enniscorthy Ruby Ale allegedly brewed up to 1956, and that may have some connection with the older amber ales of the previous centuries but again I can find no proof - and of course they would have been completely different formulas and recipes, unless some of them just coincidentally happened to taste very similar - but we will probably never know that …

That last point brings me towards the conclusion of what has turned out to be quite an interesting - in a niche way and relatively speaking - if convoluted journey in Irish red Ale, and towards an important question that I mentioned in the last post.

Does any of this really matter? Is any of this significant in any way?

Personally the answer is yes, as the importance for me lies in the research and the recording of the facts - with some amount of conjecture admittedly - that I have put into these posts. For too long we have let the marketing gurus of Irish breweries twist the facts to suit their flawed narrative, It is high time we set the record straight on as much of Irish brewing history as we can - and many have been doing this a lot longer than me I must add.

There are huge gaping holes in this incomplete history that I cannot currently fill that may bridge the gaps between centuries, styles, and recipes that I may discover in the future, and I am quite sure that this is a subject I will return to time and time again. If and when I come across new information then my hope is that these posts will evolve in time and perhaps my conclusions and opinions will change give new information.

But for now, I am happy to reiterate that there is no link between the three Irish Red Ale eras, although a red coloured ale of sorts probably existed in all of these times.

I am also happy to repeat what many knew already, which is that Irish Red Ales (in capital letters like that) as a moniker for a group of similar-ish beers is a very new term.

But I am most happy to report that the same group of beers brewed by some of the many microbreweries on the planet are one of my favourite styles, so let us not fixate too much on the subject of labels and just drink and brew more red ales, although I fear it is too late to stem the arguments - and also that I might just have made things worse...

Cheers!

(There is an epilogue of sorts to these posts here ...)

Liam

(Martyn Cornell's Killian's Red Ale article I mentioned above is here.)

All written content and the research involved in publishing it here is my own unless otherwise stated and cannot be reproduced elsewhere without my permission, full credit to its source, and a link back to this post. References to newspaper is available via email or DM to me. The image at the top of the post is my own.

¹ Chapter 9 of The Murphy Story by Diarmuid Ó Drisceoil & Donal Ó Drisceoil

² Beamish & Crawford - the History of an Irish Brewery by Diarmuid Ó Drisceoil & Donal Ó Drisceoil

Please let me know of any errors you see in this piece and I will do my best to rectify them - or argue my case ...