The Glenlivet
Type: Distillery
George Smith carried a pair of flintlock pistols after taking out his distilling licence, according to The Glenlivet’s own history. Local illicit distillers had threatened to burn him along with his distillery. The licence, granted in 1824, was the beginning of a business whose name would become a battleground of its own.
Today, The Glenlivet is a Speyside single malt Scotch whisky distillery near Ballindalloch in Moray, owned by Chivas Brothers, part of Pernod Ricard. Its history begins with Smith, but its present home is not his original site.
George Smith and the licence
Smith rode to Elgin to obtain his licence in 1824, following the Excise Act of 1823. The producer describes it as the first legal distilling licence in the parish of Glenlivet: a local distinction, rather than a claim to precedence across Scotland. [1][2]
The accounts do not all agree. Wikipedia calls Smith the first person in Scotland to obtain a licence, while the producer specifies the parish of Glenlivet. The parish claim is used here. Even the founding date has competing versions: the producer gives 1824, whereas Maltspedia gives 1818.
Royal interest forms an earlier, more elusive chapter. According to the producer, King George IV is said to have asked for Glenlivet whisky during his state visit in August 1822, when it was still illegal. The story belongs to the distillery’s legend rather than its firmly established history.
The producer calls Smith “The Smuggler of Smugglers”. Its account of the threats from illicit distillers, and the flintlock pistols he carried for protection, gives a sharper picture of what taking out a licence could mean locally. [3]
Who supplied those pistols remains disputed. Wikipedia names the Duke of Gordon, while also noting that there is no historical record of the Duke’s role in the 1823 legislation. The producer records Smith carrying the weapons, but does not resolve the question of their supplier.
From Upper Drumin to Minmore
At Upper Drumin farm, Smith’s original distillery produced just 50 gallons, or 227 litres, a week in 1824, according to the National Trust for Scotland. It operated there from 1824 to 1859. Weekly production reached 100 gallons by 1826 and 200 gallons by 1839. [4]
These were the figures for the farm operation, not today’s distillery. They trace a brisk early expansion: output doubled between 1824 and 1826, then doubled again by 1839. Smith went on to establish a second distillery, Cairngorm-Delnabo, in 1849.
Fire destroyed the Upper Drumin distillery in 1858. Production began at the new Minmore distillery in 1859, at 600 gallons per week. The move carried something tangible of the old operation into the new one: its stills and grain drying kiln were taken from Upper Drumin and put back to work at Minmore.
Access to more streams and springs drew the distillery to Minmore. Water shaped the choice, while the move created the distinction that still matters to its history. Upper Drumin was Smith’s original home of production; the distillery established at Minmore began producing in 1859. The present distillery does not stand on the founding site.
The first Ordnance Survey map of Glenlivet, dated 1864, captures what was left behind. At Upper Drumin, it shows two reservoirs labelled “old mill dams”. By the time the survey recorded the site, those remnants had replaced the working distillery on the map.
Protecting “The Glenlivet”
The name was worth defending. Around 1859, the company George & J.G. Smith Ltd was formed, and in the same year George Smith and John Gordon Smith filed the name Glenlivet at Stationers’ Hall in London. [10] Protecting that identity became a defining part of the business’s history.
George Smith died in 1871. His youngest son, John Gordon Smith, took over, inheriting the continuing struggle over the name as well as the distillery. The producer describes a 60 year fight by George and John Gordon Smith, ending with an Indenture in 1884. [5]
A High Court ruling in 1884 gave the Smith distillery sole use of the definite article in “The Glenlivet”. The small word carried real weight. It distinguished the protected name from the wider use of Glenlivet, rather than establishing that every whisky bearing Glenlivet on its label came from the Smith distillery.
Meanwhile, legislation was changing what whisky businesses could make and blend. An Act of 1853 allowed vatting under bond. The Spirit Act of 1860 then allowed whiskies from different distilleries to be blended without payment of duty. The producer says Andrew Usher & Co. is believed to have introduced “Old Vatted Glenlivet Whisky” during this period.
That attribution remains a belief in the producer’s account, rather than a settled introduction date or claim. The legislation opened possibilities for blending, while the defence of “The Glenlivet” concerned the name itself. Both belong to this chapter of whisky history, but they were separate developments, not the outcome of a single ruling.
The twentieth century
The distillery stayed open through the Great Depression. Its only closure came during the Second World War: a break in production within an otherwise enduring operation.
A George Smith took over production in 1921. The fact sheet does not identify his relationship to the founder, so the familiar name cannot be assigned a particular place in the family story.
In 1953, the business merged with J. & J. Grant of Glen Grant to form The Glenlivet and Glen Grant Distillers Ltd. Another merger followed in 1970, this time with the Longmorn-Glenlivet Distilleries Company and Hill Thomson & Co. Ltd. The resulting business was named The Glenlivet Distillers Ltd.
Today, ownership rests with Chivas Brothers, part of Pernod Ricard. The year and route of the transfer from The Glenlivet Distillers Ltd, formed in 1970, to Chivas Brothers are not reliably established by the available evidence. The present ownership is clear, even though that intervening business history remains unresolved.
Copper, equipment and expansion
Fourteen copper pot stills form the heart of The Glenlivet’s equipment: seven wash stills, each with a capacity of 15,000 litres, and seven spirit stills, each holding 10,000 litres. Trade sources describe their shape as lantern shaped. Alongside them are 32 washbacks, divided between Oregon pine and stainless steel. [8]
On 5 June 2010, the Prince of Wales opened an extension that added one mash tun, eight washbacks and six stills. [6] These were the additions made in 2010, rather than the distillery’s full complement. The fact sheet’s totals are 14 stills and 32 washbacks.
Annual production capacity is less clear than the equipment count. Available estimates include 10.5 million litres of pure alcohol and more than 21 million litres a year. The sources do not reliably resolve those competing figures, so neither can be given as the distillery’s established capacity.
Marking the bicentenary
The Glenlivet marked the bicentenary of Smith’s first licence in 2024 with The Glenlivet 55 Year Old. Limited to 100 bottles, it was the first edition of The Glenlivet Eternal Collection. A 12 Year Old limited edition was also released in 2024.
The anniversary celebrated the 1824 licence, not the opening of Minmore in 1859. Those two dates frame the distillery’s beginnings: the licensed operation at Upper Drumin, followed by the fire, the move and the start of production at the later site. The business continued, but its setting changed.
A trade source describes The Glenlivet as the biggest selling single malt Scotch in the United States. Behind that standing lies a history with several distinct strands: an early legal licence, a growing farm distillery, the move to Minmore, the fight for a name and successive changes in the business. The name connects them all, from Smith’s licensed venture to the distillery of today.
Sources
- The Glenlivet, The Story Behind The Glenlivet. Checked November 2026.
- The Glenlivet, Frequently Asked Questions. Checked November 2026.
- The Glenlivet, Our History. Checked November 2026.
- National Trust for Scotland, Exploring the archaeology and history of Glenlivet whisky. Checked November 2026.
- Chivas Brothers Archive, Our story: The Glenlivet Story. Checked November 2026.
- Wikipedia, The Glenlivet distillery. Checked November 2026.
- Whisky.com, Glenlivet Distillery. Checked November 2026.
- Maltspedia, Glenlivet Distillery. Checked November 2026.
- WhiskeyAtlas, The Glenlivet Distillery. Checked November 2026.
- Whisky Clan, The Glenlivet Distillery: History, Owner, Range. Checked November 2026.