Glenturret 1965-1990 - 25 Year Old - Cadenheads Miniature

Glenturret claims to have started life in 1775 as an illicit Highland distillery called Hosh, which was renamed Glenturret a century later before being dismantled in the 1920s. The current Glenturret distillery was reborn on the Hosh site in the 1950s and was taken over by Highland Distillers (later Edrington) in 1990. Edrington made Glenturret the home of their Famous Grouse blend in 2002 before selling the distillery in 2019 to the crystal manufacturers Lalique.

Glenturret is a small distillery with a capacity well under half a million litres a year, the vast majority of which used to be destined for Famous Grouse. The distillery makes a small quantity of sought-after peated whisky named Ruadh Maor. Glenturret’s core range has been completely refreshed under the new owners, while at auction older long-aged official bottlings are often good value and well worth seeking out.

In 1842 George Duncan established a wine merchant and distillery agency business in Aberdeen. Duncan was joined in the early 1850s by his brother-in-law William Cadenhead, who took over the business after Duncan’s death in 1858, changing the company’s name to Wm. Cadenhead. When Cadenhead died in 1904 the company passed to his nephew Robert Duthie, who developed the spirits side of the business.

Duthie died suddenly in 1931, and employee Ann Oliver was put in charge of Cadenhead’s. Sadly, Oliver’s tenure ended in financial difficulty and on her retirement in 1972 the business was forced to sell its entire inventory. Cadenhead’s was acquired soon afterwards by J & A Mitchell, proprietors of Springbank distillery, who relocated the business to Campbeltown. Cadenhead’s has flourished under Mitchell’s stewardship, releasing many legendary single malt bottlings in the 1980s and 1990s and now has outlets in Edinburgh and London as well as Campbeltown.