My personal Blood Tub collection as of July 2026.
Collector's archive
Remarkable whisky. Impossible to find.
In 2001 and 2002, Bruichladdich offered a small number of 32-litre casks, known as Blood Tubs. Most were filled with heavily peated Port Charlotte new make, while a few owners selected unpeated Bruichladdich spirit instead. Stored in the old Loch Indaal Distillery warehouse in Port Charlotte, their tiny size produced accelerated maturation, extremely small outturns and some extraordinary privately bottled whiskies.
This independent archive brings together the casks, bottles, owners, photographs and references I have been able to trace.
Bottle database
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Port Charlotte
Bruichladdich & Lochindaal
A smaller number of Blood Tubs were filled with unpeated Bruichladdich spirit, plus one documented Lochindaal cask.
Background
What is a Blood Tub?
As part of the reopening, Bruichladdich offered a special promotion in 2001 and 2002. For £195, buyers could acquire a 32-litre Blood Tub and have it filled with new make. Most chose Port Charlotte, while some opted for unpeated Bruichladdich spirit.
Their tiny size produced very rapid maturation and usually only two to four dozen bottles per cask.
Why are they special?
The casks were stored in the old Loch Indaal Distillery warehouse in Port Charlotte. Some began leaking, and by 2004 the first owners decided to bottle.
Several releases earned exceptional reviews. Whiskyfun awarded privately bottled Blood Tubs belonging to Gordon Homer and Alan Robinson 94 points—remarkable scores for such young whisky.
The original Port Charlotte / Lochindaal distillery. Image courtesy of Bruichladdich.
Historical context
The original Port Charlotte distillery was founded in 1829 and later renamed Lochindaal Distillery. It closed in 1929. A small number of old bottles have surfaced with Lochindaal branding, but no surviving bottles labelled Port Charlotte are known.
Bruichladdich revived Port Charlotte as its peated spirit and began distillation at 40 PPM in June 2001. The Blood Tub offer gave private owners access to some of that earliest new make.
A personal obsession
Port Charlotte captured my attention at Whiskyfair Nuremberg in 2016. I asked Peter from the Whisky Club of Austria for something exceptional I had not tried before. He poured a ten-year-old Port Charlotte from an Oloroso sherry cask, bottled by Meadowside Blending as Maltman cask 936. It was an eye-opening moment.
I have always gravitated towards bold, powerful whisky—particularly cask-strength, heavily peated spirit with significant cask influence. Port Charlotte quickly became the focus of my tastings and collection.
It took years before I was able to taste my first Blood Tub sample, and it lived up to the reputation. The tiny outturns, private labels and remarkable quality sent me on a hunt for further bottles and information.
As the collection grew, it became clear that the available information was scattered and incomplete. I created this page to bring those fragments together and, hopefully, uncover more missing casks.
There are documented casks 36, 37, 38 and 40—so somewhere out there, cask 39 may still be waiting to be found.
Contribute
If you own a Blood Tub, know the story behind one, or have photographs and references to share, I would greatly appreciate hearing from you.
I am also interested in buying or trading samples and bottles. I open one or two Blood Tubs most years, so I am always looking for new bottles, stories and leads.
Changelog