The wine that links Thomas Jefferson, Charles II and Samuel Pepys

It seemed a suitable topic for a bank holiday. We were discussing Haut-Brion, a bank-breaking wine. There is a question that is often asked. Which is the greatest claret, Haut-Brion, Lafite or Latour? I find that easy to answer: the one I have drunk most recently — not that I have tasted nearly enough of any of them. (I have heard at least one expert claim that post-war, there has been no greater claret than Haut-Brion ’59.)

Haut-Brion is a marvellous wine. Thomas Jefferson may have been the first to explain why. There is a good deal of gravel in the terroir, which seems to give the wine an intellectual depth: appropriate for Jefferson. Yet the initial impact on the nose is hardly an intellectual one. There are hints of an empty ash tray and the remains of a good cigar, plus sweaty leather. But it all adds up to a profound subtlety, and that is before the first sip.

Jefferson took some cases back to Virginia. These days, that might lead to the wine being cancelled or de-woked, or whatever. In substantial part, like his library, Jefferson’s cellar was purchased out of the profits from slave labour. The third president was a complex character. A squire from Virginia, he was uneasy about the growth of the great cities which were transforming America. But despite his ambivalence about Baltimore, Boston and New York, he turned out to be good at governing the new nation and winning elections. More-over, his dealings with France went far beyond wine. He was responsible for the Louisiana Purchase, crucial to the expansion of the United States.

Jefferson was not the first foreigner to note Haut-Brion’s merits. Charles II drank some as did John Locke, and Samuel Pepys extolled the virtues of Ho Bryen. But the palm should go to another American.