CHAPTER 14 | 1910s – Nationhood Pain
extend its cellars to increase champagne production. Cool and even temperatures were an important requirement for the maturation and storage of bottle-fermented sparkling wine. The Adelaide Observer (14 July 1914) reported ‘At the rear of the main wine cellars a huge excavation has been made into the hillside, and five tunnels lead off from this into the soft country rock. From these storage chambers, 500 square yards of hillside have been removed in arched formations, and within this space it is estimated there will be storage accommodation for 500,000 dozen bottles of sparkling wine.’ . . . On Christmas Eve 1910, Mount Gambier’s Border Watch recorded proceedings in note form of the Penola District Council that Yallum’s Manager Ivor T Williams had given notification of sale of ‘part section 150 hundred of Comaum, 70 ½ acres from the trustees Late John Riddoch’ to Château Tanunda Co. This included Coonawarra Cellars, which was progressively converted to brandy production, including bond storage. Fallow land around the winery was planted extensively with doradillo, a neutral-flavoured grape favoured for distillation, illustrating the move away from table wine production. (Pedro ximenez, a notable sherry grape variety, was also planted around this time, possibly in 1907 or 1917, although records are not clear.) Significant labour shortages and the increasing demand for hospital brandy further distanced Coonawarra from John Riddoch’s dream. . . .
‘At Coonawarra, in the South East of South Australia, the Company [Château Tanunda] have another fine property. It is here that the finest Brandy in the Commonwealth is being produced. The rich wine of this district produces a Brandy carrying all the delicate ethers and medicinal properties which render Château Tanunda such a valuable Spirit in the Australian Hospitals. Ninety-six thousand (96,000) gallons of wine were produced at Coonawarra this year, all of which will be distilled for Brandy, and with the advent of new planting and every energy to induce growers to plant larger areas of vines, a prosperous future seems assured for this charming district, which, for glorious exhilarating life amid the most healthy surroundings, is equal to the best in the Commonwealth.’ – Château Tanunda Limited South Australia, ‘A brief review of Australia’s greatest brandy distillery’, author Frank Smith, compiled by Donald Taylor, 1913
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