A Brief History of Rum

Where we find rum, we find action, sometimes cruel, sometimes heroic, sometimes humorous, but always vigorous and interesting."
Charles William Taussig

By Hollyanna McCollom

My first experience with rum did not exactly set me up for a lifetime of loving it. After all, when you are a budding drinker, you sometimes agree to drink things that should never have been manufactured, let alone consumed.

As I have grown older, I have developed an esteem for rum. Frankly, I didn't have much of a choice. When you are a part-time pirate, a fondness for rum is practically a job requirement. Of course, real pirates couldn’t be too choosy about what went in their mug, but these days, options abound.

I should say at the outset, that I tend to favor the richer, darker rums over their lighter counterparts. I have learned to appreciate the deep, caramel color, but even without it, the evocative smell of a mug of Hot Buttered Rum on Christmas Eve or a tropical cocktail laden with umbrellas and plastic monkeys will turn my head.

So, in honor of all things piratical, here is a brief history of the stuff every swashbuckling cliche is built upon. As it turns out, there’s a reason pirates share a long and saucy history with the stuff. As early harbingers of (ahem) trade, pirates and privateers played a huge role in introducing it to the world. Truth be told, rum was the oil of its time, tying together a world of otherwise disconnected countries in a web of warfare, trade, and capitalism. Forbes magazine said, "Rum is the bad boy of booze. The pirates of the Caribbean weren't drinking vodka. The British navy wasn't run on "amaretto, sodomy and the lash." The smugglers who risked death to bring in illegal alcohol to the thirsty citizens of the U.S. during Prohibition weren't called "spritzer runners."

Breaking down the types of rum into simple categories can be a bit of a conundrum since standards, requirements, and preferences differ from nation to nation. In the U.S., most rums available will clock in between 80 and 100 proof (40 to 50 percent alcohol by volume). This is about mid-range on the scale. Some South American rums can be as low as 40 proof but some rums weigh in as high as 190 proof. You won’t find those in the U.S., of course, as distilled spirits regulations in most states prevent anything over 155 proof from being sold. And frankly, past that point, it’s really a bit of a chemistry lesson, because, with a spirit that is past 190 proof, the alcohol would be converted into an azeotrope with water.

The basic types:

White Rum: Usually known as white or silver rum, it has no color and is typically the sort of thing you will see in most bar wells. White rums are distilled and filtered to remove impurities and typically only age for about six months to a year. Popular ones include Appleton White Estate, Bacardi Silver, Cruzan, Mount Gay Premium White, etc.

Gold Rum:

Much like a Tawney Port, Gold Rum is slightly amber in color thanks to the time it spends aging in wood barrels. But occasionally, the color is a result of the addition of congeners or caramel. Popular ones include Bacardi Gold, Appleton Estate XV, Gosling's Bermuda Gold, Sea Wynde, Mount Gay Eclipse, and 10 Cane.

Dark Rum:

Sometimes referred to as black rum, this is the deep, dark member of the rum family. A dark rum is made from molasses, most likely blackstrap molasses. It often spends a lot of time in barrels, and frankly, the longer you age a rum (well) the smoother it gets. These rums have a deep molasses flavor that makes them really great for cooking if you can stand to spare it. Popular ones include Angostura Dark 5 year, Cruzan Estate Dark 2 year, Trader Vic's, Whaler's Dark, Pyrate XO Reserve, Rogue Dark, Myer's Dark, Gosling's Black Seal, and Pampero Rum Aniversario.

Spiced Rum:

There is a touch of pirate history in this type (at least if you believe the labels, but pirates and the British Navy were known for doctoring up their rum, so perhaps it makes sense.) Spiced rum is usually a dark rum that is left to sweeten or is sweetened with caramel and given a kick by adding spices such as cinnamon, anise, pepper, clove, and rosemary. Popular brands: Sailor Jerry's, Kraken, Captain Morgan, Kilo Kai, Trader Vic's, Voodoo, Castillo, Admiral Nelson, and Lieutenant Dan

Over-proof Rum:

This is the stuff you will often see used as a component in flaming cocktails like Spanish Coffee. It can be consumed as a mixer, but can often be a bit harsh on the tongue. Popular brands: Bacardi 151, Cruzan 151, El Dorado 151, Gosling's 151, and Jamaica’s Wray.
There are other types of rum such as Rhum Agricole (a cane spirit found mostly in the French Caribbean islands), cachaça (a Brazilian sugar cane spirit), and Aquardiente (an un-aged spirit fermented from fruit), but the list above is a good enough start.

What'll We Do With This Goo?

The discovery of rum was a bit of an accident. As early as 325 B.C., there are references to drinks or elixirs made from sugar cane. When left to ferment, the by-product from the cane will turn to alcohol, and if the early reports are in any way reliable, it did not make for a tasty beverage. When you process sugar cane to make sugar, the by-product you have left over is molasses, which early producers didn't really know what to do with. They used it as fertilizer, they dumped it into rivers, never knowing that it would soon become a valuable commodity.

Just after the Seven Year War, in 1764, the Sugar Act (American Revenue Act/American Duties Act) was passed by the British Parliament, as a follow-up to the failed Molasses Act of 1733. Back then, the Colonies were using a lot of sugar (or more specifically, Molasses) to make (you guessed it) rum. So, plantation owners in the West Indies demanded the British government impose higher taxes on the sugar imported to the colonies. Had it worked, we would all probably be drinking vodka right now...um...wait.

Technically, it didn't work. Instead of sucking it up and forking over the cash, Americans decided to bribe, smuggle and intimidate their way around the Molasses Act. The slightly gentler Sugar Act still impacted the production and trade of rum in the Colonies, and the resulting protests were a precursor to or rehearsal for the discord that would later arise with the Stamp Act.

Allow me to take a little detour into the etymology of the word "rum". There is some dispute over the origin of the word, but many accounts note that the word most likely stems from the word West Indian "rumbullion", which denoted uproar. Since most of the rum being produced at the time was being produced in the colonies, there are some historians who like to draw a pretty comparison to the "rumbullion" of drinking a spirit that you have to fight to create and the civil liberties that the colonists were seeking in the New Country. They must have been pretty amped up because it is estimated that the early colonists consumed almost 12 million gallons of rum a year.

Of course, after the Revolutionary War, sugar cane became much harder to get and the fledgling Americans started making spirits out of the things they could find in their own backyard--thus the uprising of bourbon, scotch, and whiskey producers in the 18th century.

But rum production was still going strong in other parts of the country, and it was developing quite a name for itself, assuming you could keep track of them all. Rum has been known as Nelson's Blood, Kill-Devil, Demon Water, Pirate's Drink, Navy Neaters, Barbados Water, and occasionally Grog, but that last one is a little bit off. You can blame that fallacy on the pirates, or better yet, the King's Navy. Yeah. They probably have it coming.

Navy Grog and the Pirates Plight

It is true that pirates have a long history with rum, but the association really began with the British Navy when their fleet captured Jamaica in 1655. Fresh water was scarce aboard long sea journeys and the threat of scurvy was imminent. Alcohol was considered safer to drink because the alcohol could at least stave off some of the bacteria that grew green in the water barrels. Sailors aboard ship were given rum (and before that brandy) with lime juice as rations. The lime juice battled against scurvy and the rum...well, the rum kept the crew happy. Rations were usually given out three times a day. Around the 1740s, however, the practice of watering down the rum became regular. And, it makes sense, right? No one wants a drunken crew and if you water it down a bit, it lasts a little longer. Well, this on-ship concoction is known as grog (pirates often called it Bumbo) and to this day, most recipes include a little bit of water and citrus fruit.

The name Nelson's Blood also comes from rum's maritime history. As legend goes, Admiral Horatio Nelson--who was killed in the Battle of Trafalgar--was sealed in a cask of rum to be transported back to England for burial. Upon arrival, however, it was discovered that the cask was empty (save the body), having been drained of its spirits (and to a certain degree, its occupant) by the sailors aboard ship.

Now, with or without the bodily fluids of a fallen admiral, the rum of the early days was not the stuff we are used to today. At best it was rough. The addition of water and lime made it somewhat more palatable, and as the demand for it grew, the production of it was perfected. Whether the improvement in rum or the increase in consumption came first, is up for debate. Rum was tasting much better around the early 1700s, and there are a number of tales of pirate crews falling victims to their taste for it which illustrate that. "Calico" Jack Rackham and his crew were well into a recent capture of rum when they were set upon by a band of British soldiers led by pirate hunter Jonathan Barnet. Rackham's crew (with the exception of Anne Bonney and Mary Read) were too drunk to do little else than surrender.

Bartholomew Roberts (known in legend as Black Bart) was killed in a battle off the coast of Gabon, West Africa when he was set upon by the crew of the H.M.S Swallow in the early morning of February 5, 1722. His crew was well into the celebration of capturing a ship called The Neptune and most of them were quite too busy enjoying the spoils of war to take up arms. Roberts himself was well known for being a teetotaler who preferred tea to rum, but without a worthy helmsman, he was unable to escape the grapeshot that eventually ended his career in piracy.

The notorious pirate Edward Teach (a.ka. Blackbeard) also fell victim to drunkenness and a false sense of security when he was set upon by Lieutenant Robert Maynard and the crew of the H.M.S Pearl, a ship dispatched to kill the (then supposedly retired) pirate. Maynard’s crew waited until sunrise and watched as Blackbeard’s crew drank the night away. Upon morning they struck and it is said that Maynard recalled of the encounter, “At our first salutation, he drank Damnation to me and my Men, whom he stil’d Cowardly Puppies, saying, He would neither give nor take Quarter”. A restless battle ensued, at the end of which, Blackbeard was dead. The details of his death are steeped in pirate history, with claims of him being shot five times, stabbed 25 times, and claims of his headless corpse swimming around the ship seven times before sinking to a watery grave.

So, there you have it. A (in retrospect, not-so-brief) history of rum that really only scratches the surface of the spirit’s long and lusty history. Rum has been a part of naval and piratical lore as well as one of the major instigators to warfare, commerce, and American independence. More so than many of its distilled brothers, rum has been a symbol of a rebellious spirit. It is--and probably always will be--the drink of naysayers, rapscallions, and pleasure-seekers.