Black Tot rum, the soul of the Navy

1 August 2023 | Interviews & Meetings
Black Tot rum, the soul of the Navy

Meet Mitch Wilson, Black Tot Brand Ambassador

Today, Black Tot Rum is a distinct brand in the world of rum. Could you tell us more about the origins of this brand?

For over 200 years, the Royal Navy issued a daily ‘tot’ of rum to every sailor at sea. Safer than water, and longer-lasting than beer, rum became the preferred tipple of the fleet until on 31st July 1970, when the last tots were handed out – a day forever known as Black Tot Day.

The rum blend that the Navy had created for its fleet was unlike any other rum blend in the world. It began in the early 1800s and brought together rum from all around the world, from many distilleries that don’t exist today. With Black Tot Day in 1970, after more than 160 years of continuous blending, the last remaining rum from this historic blend was stored in stone flagons and locked away.

In 2007, a former Navy crewman approached Sukhinder Singh to enquire about selling one of these flagons of Royal Navy Rum. This flagon was 1 imperial gallon (4.54 litres) in size, glazed and wax sealed. When Sukhinder opened this flagon to taste it, he was blown away by the quality of the rum inside. He knew there was something special here that had to be shared with the world.

Sukhinder spent two years tracking down the remainder of these Navy flagons around the world, purchasing them and bringing them all to his warehouse in Scotland. There were many different vintages of flagons – some from the 1950s, as well as those bottled in 1970 after Black Tot Day. Sukhinder realised that each vintage of flagon had its own flavour profile (as the Navy blend changed over the years depending on the supply) and so a blend was created of these two eras of flagons. Sukhinder bottled this blend and named it Black Tot Last Consignment. Only 3000 bottles were made, and it is truly a piece of liquid history - a rum that gives you a real insight into the flavour profile of genuine Navy Rum.

Since then we have expanded our range, with Black Tot Finest Caribbean and Master Blender’s Reserve – these more modern blends pay homage to the original blend, each with their own distinct flavour profile.

The brand pays tribute to the rums of the Royal Navy. What were the characteristics of the rums consumed in the Royal Navy?

As Navy Rum has no set definition, most of the Navy Rum we see today bears little resemblance to the original rum drank by the fleet. One of the biggest surprises to me when first tasting Black Tot Last Consignment was its complexity – the layers of flavour and depth to the rum went far beyond any Navy Rum I had tried before. We have tried to keep these characteristics in mind with our more modern blends as well.

One of the reasons for its complexity, was that Navy Rum was one of the world’s first multi-country blends. By sourcing rum from multiple territories, the Navy set a precedent for rum blending which has endured now for over 200 years. We still see the influence of Navy Rum today, where both brands and cocktails will call for rums from multiple origins, blending different styles and flavours together to create something bigger than the sum of its parts. This is one of the most unique aspects to the rum world when compared to any other spirit category, which rarely mixes spirits from different territories.

One of the other key parts that is often referenced is the ABV – while sailors were made to drink their rum watered-down in a mixture known as ‘Grog’, each ship was issued rum at 54.5% ABV – this was known as ‘Navy Strength’. With our Master Blender’s Reserve line, we continue this tradition.

Why was it necessary for the Royal Navy to source rum from multiple territories, instead of sourcing from a single territory?

This was more of a logistical necessity than a choice made for flavour. The Navy drank so much rum, that it would have been impossible to source all of it from one distillery or location. At the peak of its rum-drinking tradition, the Navy were consuming millions of litres of rum per year – so when it was decided to construct one continuous rum blend for the fleet, it was necessary to buy rum from multiple sources. When the Navy blend first started in the early 1800s, the rum would have all been small batches from pot stills. We wouldn’t see column still rums (most famously Caroni) enter the blend until much later on, and the industrial multi-column stills seen today were yet to be invented.

Another reason for the Navy to buy from multiple sources was that rum was tied to sugar production, and the amount of rum produced would have had much more of an agricultural link to the harvesting of the raw material back then. Historically, the more sugar that was made in a place, the more molasses you would have, and therefore more rum could be produced there. A shortage of sugar (and therefore, molasses) would mean that less rum was produced in that region that year. Today the modern rum world is very different - declining sugar industries around the world mean that many islands are left with a constant shortage of molasses for their rum production, meaning it is necessary to import the molasses needed specifically for rum production. Rum is no longer a by-product of the sugar industry – in fact in some places, more sugarcane is being planted specifically to make more cane juice and molasses for the rum.

Among the iconic bottles of the brand, there is obviously the Black Tot Last Consignment. What do we know today about the rums contained in this beautiful bottle?

We know that it is a world blend of rums. While the Royal Navy would try to buy rum mainly from British colonies like Barbados, Guyana, Trinidad, Australia, if there was not enough rum available there they would buy from other countries too. Matt Pietrek (Cocktailwonk.com) has done a lot of research into the history of Navy Rum, and found that rum was also purchased from places like Mauritius, Cuba, Egypt; countries that you would not typically expect to be found in Navy Rum. We have one flagon of rum that was bottled in Singapore, which led to us finding out that column still rum was being distilled there in the early 1800s as well. We know Jamaican rum was added to the blend at times, and not added at others – the sailors found it too pungent for their tastes. However, when there were rum shortages (like after World War II) Jamaican rum was added to the blend to ensure there was enough stock for the fleet. One thing is for certain – Navy Rum was incredibly complex, and an ever-evolving blend of multiple countries.

Another thing to consider is the types of casks these rums would have been transported in. Today we might use plastic containers to ship large volumes of rum – but back in the 1800s and early 1900s, everything was still shipped in cask. And while we think of Bourbon casks being the standard for the industry today, the ‘virgin barrel’ rule for Bourbon was not enacted until 1938, with Bourbon barrels not really becoming ubiquitous in our industry until post WWII. So for the first 150 years of the Navy Blend, you would have seen a much wider variety of cask types being used – port, sherry, wine barrels, with wood from around the world (not just American White Oak). So the flavours that would have been incorporated into the blend go beyond simply the rum itself, but the influence of all these different barrels as well.

And then there is the blending method itself. Open top wooden-vats in Deptford in London, all connected with pipes 1/3 of the way up, allowing for rum to blend from one vat to another over time. The annual angel’s share from these vats was 10% per year – that’s a number more associated with the Caribbean than UK. The blend was continuously ‘topped up’ for over 150 years, with various rums from around the world. Each year the flavour would have changed depending on the rums added to the mix. One of the main reasons we are unable to recreate this blend today, other than many of the distilleries being closed, is that we simply don’t have the same production methods available to us today as they would have used back then.

The Master Blender's Reserve 2022 edition was released on Black Tot Day last year. What is special about this bottling, compared to the 2021 edition?

For Master Blender’s Reserve 2022 (our third edition in this range) our blender Oliver Chilton did something very different compared to previous years. For 2020 & 2021, Oliver had selected his favourite single casks, and blended them together – a total of nine different components each year. For 2022 however, he first started by creating his perfect Jamaica blend for that year, with casks from Long Pond, Clarendon, and New Yarmouth. He then repeated this process with Barbados, Guyana, and Trinidad. Once he had these four ‘super blends’, each exceptional rums in their own right, he then blended these together to make the final blend. In addition to this, he added our perpetual reserve – the Master Blender’s Reserve from 2021 (but further aged in Sherry Casks for nine months) together with flagons of Black Tot Last Consignment.

We are incredibly proud of our Master Blender’s Reserve line, and this year’s edition was recently awarded the ‘Rum Trophy’ at the IWSC (International Wine & Spirits Competition).

Among the listed ingredients of your blend, it is written "perpetual reserve". What does that mean? What does this refer to?

Every year for Master Blender’s Reserve, after we have completed our bottling for that year, we put the remaining rum into Sherry casks for further maturation. We then use this rum as the base for the next year’s Master Blender’s Reserve blend, where we then add more casks, and repeat the process again. The idea is that each year adds further layers of flavour, depth and complexity to the blend, and in our mind is the closest recreation possible to the original Navy Rum blending style itself.

In the rum world, it is all too common to see the term ‘Solera’ used whenever there is a slightly complex or multi-age blending system in place like this. It is a term borrowed from the Sherry world, and while there are some authentic solera systems used in rum, quite often there is no actual solera system in place (at least not one that our friends in Jerez would recognise!).

After speaking to a good friend of mine, Dawn Davies (who is a sommelier and Master of Wine), she suggested the term ‘perpetual reserve’ would be a more accurate description of what we are doing with Master Blender’s Reserve. This term, borrowed from the Champagne world, describes the method of putting part of your blend aside each year to bring an element of consistency into next year’s blend. As we strive for transparency and authenticity with everything we do at Black Tot Rum, we felt this term was the best suited for our blending style, and helps separate our method from traditional Solera systems out there.

On our back labels and on our website (www.blacktot.com) you will find a full blend breakdown for each of our rums. There you will be able to see how each edition of Master Blender’s Reserve evolves, and the individual casks and blend percentages added to the blend. Keep an eye out for Black Tot Day on 31st July 2023, when we will be releasing our 4th edition of the Master Blender’s Reserve line – and a new country will be added to the blend…

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Interview by

Matthieu Lange
Matthieu Lange
Spirits Advisor