The History of Cadenhead's
Founded in Aberdeen in 1842.
Scotland's oldest independent bottler, from a wine and spirit merchant's on Netherkirkgate to a household name based in Campbeltown.
The short version
Our History
Wm Cadenhead was founded in Aberdeen in 1842 and is Scotland’s oldest independent bottler. It was started by George Duncan, renamed by his brother-in-law William Cadenhead in 1858, and has been part of the Campbeltown firm J & A Mitchell & Co Ltd, since 1972.
Founded in 1842
In Netherkirkgate, Aberdeen, as William Cadenhead Limited, Wine and Spirit Merchants. The firm traded from the same premises for around 130 years.
Named after a poet
William Cadenhead took the business over in 1858 and put his name above the door. Aberdeen knew him better as a Victorian poet than as a vintner.
In Campbeltown since 1972
J & A Mitchell bought the firm after its entire stock went under the hammer at Christie’s. Everything is matured and bottled in Campbeltown now.
Independent, which is the point
We buy casks from distilleries we do not own, look after them ourselves, and bottle them under our own name.
The long version
From Netherkirkgate to Campbeltown
1842
A vintner sets up on Netherkirkgate
George Duncan establishes himself in Aberdeen as a wine and spirit merchant and a distillery agent. The business does well, and within about ten years he is joined by his brother-in-law, William Cadenhead.
1858
A new name above the door
Cadenhead acquires the business and, as was the custom, renames it after himself. Born in 1819, the son of a veneer sawyer, he had started work young in a thread factory, followed his employer to Liverpool, and come home to Aberdeen to run the yarn-sorting department at Maberley & Co. He joined the trade around 1853. What he was really known for was poetry: he wrote prolifically right through the Victorian era and became a leading citizen of the city.
1904
The Duthie era begins
William Cadenhead dies early on the morning of Sunday 11 December. His nephew, Robert W. Duthie, takes over at 47 Netherkirkgate and builds the firm’s name on the two things it became famous for: single malt Scotch whisky and Demerara rum. He advertises hard, on the backs of buses, on theatre curtains and in concert programmes, under the slogan By test the Best, and creates the house blends Putachieside and, less grandly, The Hielanman.
1931
A tram car on the way to the bank
With the business struggling in the depression, Duthie sets off to meet his bank manager and is knocked down and killed by a tram while crossing the road. A bachelor, he leaves two sisters who know nothing about the wine and spirit trade but are determined the name should survive. They hand the firm to a long-serving employee, Miss Ann Oliver.
The 1960s
Refusing to move with the times
Ann Oliver runs the business her own way and stubbornly ignores fashion, which works for years. By the early 1960s it stops working: the paperwork slips and a run of poor decisions takes hold.
October 1972
The largest spirits sale in Britain
Persuaded by the trustees to retire, Oliver sells up. The warehouse at number 47 is full from cellar to roof and nobody knows what any of it is worth, so Christie’s are called in. The catalogue runs to 167 pages. The two-day sale in London on 3 and 4 October is the largest sale of wines and spirits ever held in Great Britain to that date, and leaves the firm with a six-figure surplus.
1972
Campbeltown
J & A Mitchell & Co Ltd, the Campbeltown firm behind Springbank, buys what is left: the name, the goodwill and the premises. The modern Cadenhead’s starts here.
2023
Into trust
Hedley Wright, who led J & A Mitchell, dies, and ownership of the company passes into three trust funds. Cadenhead’s carries on from Campbeltown, with shops there and in Edinburgh and London.
The bit we cannot explain
Bought for the Bottles
There is a less romantic version of how Cadenhead’s ended up in Campbeltown. In the early 1970s there was a shortage of glass bottles. Hedley Wright, who owned J & A Mitchell, looked at what was left of the Cadenhead business after the Christie’s sale and saw a way of getting hold of some more.
The deal went through and Cadenhead’s became part of J & A Mitchell. The glass bottles never arrived. We never did find out what happened to them.
Nearly Two Centuries, One Cask at a Time
The name above the door changed four times. What goes in the bottle did not.