How rail kept the burgeoning whisky industry on track

Today, the lion’s share of whisky transport – be it barley, malt, oil, yeast or new spirit – goes by road, but for more than a century, whisky depended on rail. More than that, throughout the Victorian era, the railways helped the whisky industry to grow. As the rail network spread across Scotland, distilleries were increasingly built beside railway lines – Dalwhinnie and Ardmore, to name but two – or pre-existing distilleries built sidings and branch lines linking them to the nearest main line.

Spotting a good source of freight revenue, some rail lines – Keith to Craigellachie and Aviemore to Elgin, for instance – were mainly laid to service the industry.

Back then, the top distillery-bound cargo would have been coal, as almost all boilers and stills were coal-fired, followed by barley, shipped in sided wagons in sacks hoisted into the distillery by crane. However, certain rural distilleries took most or all their barley from local farms, brought in by cart.

It was a sought-after moment of the year – not only would the farmer get payment for the barley, but usually a hefty rewarding dram at the distillery. Back then, there was no breathalyser and, let’s face it, the horse knew its way back to the farm anyway…

The big difference in the transport patterns would have been when the spirit was shipped. Today, new spirit is road-tankered away, often within hours of distillation, to the vast casking centres and warehouses in the central belt.

Back then, spirit sat for years in distillery warehouses and was only sent to the brokers, blenders and bottlers once ordered or when it reached the three-year maturity mark. It was then rail-shipped in casks loaded into roofed two-axle vans.

Once filled, the van door was closed and sealed with a big iron bar held by two padlocks – one belonging to the supplier, one to customs and excise. At the destination, these could only be jointly unlocked by the receiving firm and customs and excise.

For all its shortcomings, the system worked well. At a time when distillery fires were frequent – many distilleries suffered more than one – there seems to be no recorded instance of a fire on a whisky train.

With countless casks sitting for hours in a jolting train, some of them could leak, and sparks from the engine streaming back could ignite the spillage, yet it never seems to have happened.