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Does anyone know the answer to my friends question posted below:
I was digging in the back of the dining room closet and ran across a bottle I'd forgotten about, and really looked at it for the 1st time in years. We don't drink, so there hasn't been any reason to use it, but I never got rid of it because I figured I'd use it as a flavoring agent one day, then forgot about it. Now I'm curious about it. It's labeled Red Heart Rum, Percentage of Alcohol 45.6 Bottled by Henry White (label torn here) Contents 1 pint 8 fluid ounces. Across the top of that label it says 'Registered at the United States Patent Office'. On a second label, below that on, it says:
RED HEART RUM
Guaranteed by Henry White & co. to be the Product of the Island of Jamaica, bottled by the Port of London Authority Shipped only by Henry White & co, London. There is another label on the back which says 'This fine old Jamaican Rum is widely known and justly celebrated for its great age, purity, and other excellent qualities. The Capsules are stamped, and the Corks branded, "Henry White & Co.," without which none are genuine.
The cork is somewhat damaged. The glass bottle has some bubbles or blisters in it, and has that large dimple in the bottom which I, rightly or wrongly, associate w/ blown glass bottles.
I'm curious about the possible ago of this rum, and also whether it is still any good. (thinking of somewhat damaged cork - it has a faint rum odor to it). When I tried googling Red Heart Rum and Henry White & co, I mostly came up w/ South Africa, and this clearly isn't a rum from SA. Does anybody know anything about this rum, or this brand, or this company, or a place I can start looking for some useful info? My curiosity is getting the better of me!
I googled some too. I probably got what you got. Henry White, 1850s, Crimean war, Navy Rum, the labels been bought and sold numerous times. The rum is popular in South Africa -number one selling dark rum- but it's just bottled there; it's still a blend of Jamaican and/or Carribean rums (The sources? differ on this point.) One source said that as the Wray and Nephew 17 started running low Trader Vic would supplement this rum or Coruba along with a Wray and Nephew 15 in order to make mai tais. So, maybe the flavor profile's similar to Coruba. That might help as long as today's Coruba tastes at all like yesterday's Coruba. As to the age of the product, If the bottle says Henry White and co and not United Rum merchants, I guess we know the product's older than 1948. But the blown glass bottle thing probably tells you that. Here's something: on page 23 of Ted Haigh's Vintage Spirits he's got a picture of a bottle of Henry White and Co. Red Heart which he dates from 1945, does your bottle look like that? Here's another flavor profile of the old product: "Red Heart Rum, the oldest, purest, and finest stimulant of the age, especially selected for hospital purposes by the Society for Aid to the Sick and Wounded in the late French and German War. Rum varies in quality as much as port wine or claret, and it is only the finest and oldest descriptions that have the beneficial effects so justly ascribed to the Red Heart Rum by the medical profession, so that when Red Heart Bum is recommended in cases of consumption, cholera, dysentery, low fevers, colds, overworked brains, &c, unlike other Rums, the Red Heart Rum is totally free from any bilious properties."
Thanks Greg! I forwarded your note to my friend - it was good information. We googled too, but you came up with some stuff that we didn't. She figured the bottle was at least 40 years old, but the Ted Haigh's book reference should help even further.
Appreciate the help,
Cat
Since my friend and her husband don't drink, and after Blair's suggestion last night, I sent her a note asking if I could buy the bottle. Of course I mentioned that the rum would still need to be inside of it :-)
If this works out, we'll do a tasting.
Cat
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