![]() ![]() Brinton was tasked with collecting body parts from dead soldiers for medical research, often digging them out of pits full of amputated limbs and preserving them using whiskey.īrinton’s tale of one unconventional use of whiskey gave me a compelling narrative I could use to explore more pertinent issues related to how America’s whiskey industry tells the story of American capitalism in miniature: the quality of whiskey during the war (bad), peoples’ access to it (sporadic), the drinking habits of soldiers (you can probably imagine), other alternative uses of whiskey (medicine, currency), and how the economic and political impacts of the war influenced the spirits industry (drastically). Mitenbuler applied the “ Test” to Bourbon Empire: The Past and Future of America's Whiskey, his first book, and reported the following: From page 99: “Many and many a putrid heap have I had dug out of trenches where they had been buried in the supposition of an everlasting rest, and ghoul-like work have I done, amid surrounding gatherings of wondering surgeons.”This first sentence from page 99 of my book is a quote from Major John Brinton, a Union Army surgeon during the Civil War. He lives with his wife in Brooklyn, New York. ![]() ![]() Reid Mitenbuler’s writing has appeared in The Atlantic, Slate, Saveur, Whisky Advocate, and other publications. ![]()
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