Thomas Street Distillery, Dublin, Ireland.
Extract from Alfred Barnard’s historic tour of every whisky distillery in Great Britain, published in ‘1887’
Before its restoration, it was so disfigured by buttresses built up against the side walls, and altogether was in such a ruinous condition, that only sufficient remained to indicate its former stateliness.
The Still Houses contain eight Pot Stills – there are no patent stills on the premises – holding from 12,000 to 20,000 gallons respectively. There are five powerful engines averaging from 16 to 30 nominal horse power; one of them is a Siddely and Mackay Dee Engine for reducing water some twenty degrees for worting purposes in summer, the only one in use in Dublin; all the engines are models of brightness and cleanliness. There are seven boilers 30 feet long by 8 feet in diameter, and four sets of three-throw pumps; also a powerful brass pump in the Still House.
The Storage Warehouses, one of which is over 360 feet long, are capable of holding 23,000 casks, representing upwards of 1,250,000 gallons; but this is only a part of the storage capacity connected with this Distillery, for the Company own large Warehouses and vaults at Mount Brown and elsewhere capable of containing 6,000 casks. The Company also have at Mount Brown large maltings, capable of making 16,000 barrels of malt per autumn. The Kilns and Maltings at this place are most complete in their arrangements, and cover nearly as much ground as the Distillery at Thomas Street.
The works at Thomas Street cover in all seventeen acres, and extend to the Quay, crossing two streets in their progress, and it is possible to enter the building on the left-hand entrance in Thomas Street, and by means of bridges and gangways to keep almost under cover till you find yourself again at Thomas Street, having completed the circuit of this fine work. There is upwards of a mile of belting enclosed in a two-feet square case, in addition to an almost equal length of continuous screws for conveying the grain into the various departments. The principal Chimney Stack is a fine structure, 120 feet high; it was finished in the year 1860, having been built entirely by the workmen employed on the premises, who completed the work in less than two years. Besides this fine structure, there are three other Chimney Stacks in different parts of the works.
The water used comes from the Vartry and the Grand Canal.
The Whisky is Dublin Pot Still of the finest quality. The annual output has reached in some seasons the enormous quantity of nearly 2,000,000 gallons. Like that of the other Dublin Distilleries, however, it has been reduced considerably during the past few seasons. The Whisky is shipped to all parts of the world, the foreign exports being more particularly to Canada, the United States, and Australia, and is well known and appreciated everywhere.