It is reputed that Churchill enjoyed
Armenian Brandy so much that he asked
for several cases of it to be sent to him each
year. It is calculated that up to 400 bottles
of Dvin were shipped to Sir Winston every
year.
During my research for this article I came
across a lovely article from Cigar Clan
which combines tasting Armenian Brandy
with three Cuban cigars; Punch Corona,
Hoyo de Monterrey Churchill and a
Montecristo No2 Torpedo.
At this point I have to acknowledge the
generous help of Edward Sahakian the
owner of the Davidoff cigar store in St
James’s street in London.
Edward, himself an Armenian, brought
this story to my attention and has
provided some great photographs and a
video from his own personal travels.
The history of Brandy making in Armenia
goes back to 1877 when a local Merchant
and Philanthropist Nerses Tairyants
started to produce wine and ten years later
he expanded his production to include
Brandy.
In 1898 Nerses Tairyants leased the factory
and in 1901 became confident enough
of his product to send samples to an
exhibition in Paris. But he didn’t reveal the
origin of his Brandy and the French tasters
unanimously gave the Brandy a Grand
Prize. In addition when the judges found
out the Brandy was from Armenia they
gave the distillery permission to use the
name Cognac rather than Brandy.
Following a period of exhaustive testing
Shustov’s brandy was honoured by
becoming a supplier to the Russian Court.
There are a number of stories about the
period of supply of Brandy to Sir Winston
Churchill. It is reported that on one
occasion Sir Winston noted a change in
the quality of the Brandy and this was
reported to Stalin. It turned out that the
chief blender in the distillery, Margar
Sedrakyan, had been exiled to the gulags.
On learning this Stalin had him reinstated
so that Churchill could continue to receive
brandy ‘of a suitable quality’. In fact, in
recognition of his work Margar later
received a medal as a ‘Hero of Socialist
Work’
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