Cameron Distillery (Site)

These coordinates mark the exact spot where the distillery used to be. No remains are visible here.

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Here follows a timeline for the Cameron Distillery:

In 1856 John Clemson and John C. Cookson formed a business named Clemson & Cookson to open a distillery in Fairfax County. The site they chose was a parcel of land on the Cameron Run where the Telegraph road crosses the run.

1856 Clemson and Cookson purchase seven acres of land about 1.5 miles from Alexandria near Cameron Mills from David A. Windsor for distillery for $2000.

1857 Clemson and Cookson begin distilling operations.

1861 On the 29th of January local leaders including J.C. Cookson meet at Liberty Hall in pursuance of a call for a meeting “of the Workingmen, Mechanics, and all who are in favor of exhausting all honorable means of settling our national difficulties before breaking up our glorious Union”. The largest gathering ever held. Ref:Alexandria Gazette, Volume 62, Number 24, 29 January 1861

1861 Soon after the killing of Colonel Ellsworth in the city of Alexandria, Va., a portion of the Army of the United States, consisting of a regiment of New York Zouaves under the command of Lieut. Col. Noah L. Farnham, took possession of the distillery and its contents.

1864 John Clemson addressed a letter to Major-General Meigs calling attention to the use of the distillery property by the United States troops for fortification and other purposes and requesting payment of rent.

1865 Clemson & Cookson are sued for unpaid debts.

1866 Distillery for Sale: This property is situated on the Orange and Alexandria Railroad, one mile from Alexandria, Va, contains nine and one eighth acres of land, which is in cultivation as a market garden. The building, three story, is of brick, substantially built, and of sufficient capacity to run 300 bush per day. Ther copper worm for said capacity is in good condition. The engine house is of brick and fire proof. The engine built by Poole & Hunt, of Baltimore, is of 30 horsepower, with two boilers, forty feet long each, with requisite shafting, fly-wheel, etc. Also, one pair of superior mill barrs.At the door is a well, ten feet. The distillery is sold for $3,398 to satisfy debts.

1868 J.C. Cookson who is working for several distilleries in Maryland filed for a patent for a novel distilling apparatus.

1870 Congressional records show Peter Fegan working with the Treasury department to find scientific ways of estimating distillery production from ingredients.

1870 Whiskey Seizure Case:An investigation of the late seizure of the Cameron Distillery for alleged infraction of the Internal Revenue laws was held to-day in theU. S. District Court room, before U. S. Commissioner Charles Whittlesey. S. F. Beach Esq appeared as counsel for the defendant, Supervisor Presbery, for the government. Mr. Peter Fegan was arrested and acquitted. IRS assigns Maj. Wigg as a storekeeper at the distillery. Wigg was soon replaced by Walter L. Penn. They had offices at 17 King St. in Alexandria and 466 Pennsylvania Ave in DC.

1871 March Case against Fegan: Cornelius Ryan fined $1000 by IRS. Case in Richmond by Judge Underwood. Defendants who were jailed twice for refusing to testify include J.T. Reddy,M. Rochford and John Moran.

1871 IRS Restores distillery to Peter Fegan.

1873 They are advertising as the “Old Cameron Distillery”. Brands include “Arlington Rye Whiskey”, Cameron Rye Whiskey”, “lone Star Rye Whiskey”, Magnolia Rye Whiskey” and “Mountain Rye Whiskey”. ...a large Copper Still, which enables me to produce the PUREST and BEST COPPER-DISTILLED RYE and BARLEY-MALT WHISKEYS made in the country…”

1873 In April of IRS shuts down the Cameron Distillery again. Peter Fegan takes a long sabbatical in Ireland. By december they are preparing to commence operations again.

1885 The survey just made by Deputy Collector of Revenue S. L. Monroe of Mr. Peter Fegan's distillery, near this city, shows that distillery to have a daily capacity of 871 gallons. Local papers refer to the distillery as “Arlington Distillery”

1886 A new warehouse with a capacity of 3500 barrels was completed. The building is put up on the rack system and is heated by steam. In September Peter Fegan passed away in Hot Springs, AK.

1887 The Arlington Distillery is for sale. By august an auction is held. Mr John Mahoney of Norfolk buys the distillery.

1888 Mr Edward Mahoney of Norfolk purchased Arlington Distillery. Renamed Mahoneyville Distilling Company. Products include: Arlington Pure Rye, Cameron Springs Whiskey,Belle of Virginia Blended Rye, Lake Drummond Rye, Monogram Whiskey and Hampton Roads Whiskey.

1888 Mahoney working to resume operations in March. S.N Garwood is the manager. The distillery is now called “Mahoneyville.”

1890 The 40 horsepower boiler was replaced with a 100 horsepower boiler.

1892 Mahoney sells the distillery to investors.

1900 Distillery shuts down for the summer and reopens in 1901. Appears that the operations routinely shut down for the fall and winter. W.E. Sisson is the manager by 1907.

1902 Court of Claims rules against Clensom and Cookson descendants: The claim was not presented to the Commissioners of Claims under the act of March 3,1871, and is consequently barred under the provisions of the act of June 15, 1878 (20 Stat. L., 550, sec. 5).No evidence has been offered by the claimant under the act of March 3, 1887 (24 Stat. L., 505, sec. 14), "bearing upon the question whether there has been delay or laches in presenting such claim or applying for such grant, gift, or bounty, and any facts bearing upon the question whether the bar of any statute of limitations should be removed or which shall be claimed to excuse the claimant for not having resorted to any established legal remedy."

1904 Bill is passed in Congress to compensate Clemson & Cookson for damages and losses during the war.

1904 John Mahoney passed away. Mahoneyville was the largest whiskey distillery in Virginia. His firm was named “J & E Mahoney Distillers” and spirits made in Alexandra were sold under that label. They received a trademarks for ”J. Martin” and “Cameron Springs” whiskey in 1905. His son Edward Mahoney succeeds him as manager.

1910 Mahoney may have been operating as just a rectifier. There is little evidence of operations. In previous years they advertised opening in the Alexandria Gazette and offer slops to local farmers.

1916 Prohibition was enacted in Virginia. Mahoney closed down the distillery and moved operations to Maryland. Subsequent history points to Mahoney rectifying more than distilling.

1921 Fire insurance survey notes “buildings now vacant, man lives on premises, no regular watchman”.


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JOHN CLEMSON:
The first known Clemson in America was that of James Clemson I, a blacksmith who, records show, first located in Chichester Township, Chester County (just across the Delaware border) in 1699. This location is near city of Marcus Hook, Pennsylvania. He moved further west a couple of times and finally settled on a farm originally warranted to him by the Penns in 1714 (for 500 acres) and finally patented or deeded to him May 18, 1716 for a total of 636 acres. This land was in the Pequea Valley in what later became Salisbury Township of County.

The Clemson family continued on to Lancaster County, Pennsylvania by 1757. Sometime during the Revolutionary War, James Clemson's father, John Clemson, moved to Maryland and settled between the present-day communities of Unionville and Union Bridge in an area which became known as Clemsonville. Between 1793 and 1798 he accumulated seven tracts of land, totaling 472 acres, and a sawmill. By 1825 he had gathered together nearly 1,000 contiguous acres, of which 250 acres (the Hopewell tract) and the mill had been given to his son, James. The remaining land, as well as a house built during the war of 1812, was eventually inherited by James' brother in 1846 after his father's death. One Of Mr. Clemson's nephews was Col. Clemson, of the war of 1812. Another nephew, Thomas Clemson, married one of John C. Calhoun's daughters, and was at one-time chargé d'araires at Belgium. He also founded Clemson University in South Carolina.

John Clemson was born July 1826 in Libertytown, Frederick County, Maryland. He was raised on the Old Clemson estate known as Ashmead. John attended school in Baltimore, later at Bristol College, Philadelphia, and subsequently at a private school near Baltimore. His completed his schooling at Mount St. Mary's College, near Emmittsburg, where he graduated in 1846. He studied law but his father insisted he manage the family farm. Clemson, married one of John C. Calhoun's daughters, and was at one-time chargé d'araires at Belgium.


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JOHN C. COOKSON:
John C Cookson 1825-1879
Born in Frederick, Maryland, USA on 25 Jan 1825 to Joseph Cookson and Rachel Whitehill.
John C married Emily L Howard on Dec 9, 1856 in Fredrick County, Md.
He passed away on 31 May 1879 in Frederick, Maryland, USA.


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Here follows an excerpt from Donald Hakenson's "This Forgotten Land" tour guide:

WHISKEY AND HOGS AT THE OLD FAIRFAX FARM:
John A. Fairfax signed an affidavit in the Southern Claims records that in 1861 he and his wife and children were living on the farm, which he had purchased in 1850. He stated that he had permitted sick Union officers the use of his house until August 1865. The Union Army occupied some portion of his home for over four years.

The Southern Claims files further showed that in 1906, at age eighty-one, Mr. Fairfax then living in the District of Columbia said, "General Heintzelman's headquarters was between my house and Alexandria, right in sight." Fairfax had three to five hundred head of hogs at the Cameron Distillery, and about four hundred head on his farm. Union troops confiscated two hundred and eighty gallons of whiskey, and corn, oats, and grass. Lieutenant Colonel Farnum had ordered him to distill the two mashes left in the mash tubs, put it in barrels, and had it taken away for safekeeping. However, Union soldiers found the whiskey hidden in his barn and took that too.

The Zouaves were on Mr. Fairfax's farm, and then Colonel Orlando Bolivar Wilcox, Second Michigan Regiment, also camped in around the farm in 1861. Colonel Wilcox would go on to obtain the rank of Brigadier General in the Union Army. Unfortunately, Colonel Wilcox would be captured at First Manassas and would not be exchanged by the Confederacy until August 19, 1862.

Mr, Fairfax was the only one in the neighborhood who kept hogs. He also leased forty acres from the Fowle family and thirty acres from Anne and Elizabeth Frobel (Anne Frobel would keep a diary that would later be published that documented the Civil War history of her house and the surrounding families living in the Alexandria and Franconia areas).

George Auld, age fifty-eight also testified and said that in 1861 he lived at Cloud's Mill with his father. He had lived there since 1843. He further stated that the claimant's farm was "a general camping and drilling ground during nearly the whole war and everything was kept as bare as concrete streets in Washington. In fact, most of the camp streets were paved."

On March 7, 1908, Mr. Fairfax testified about the distillery adjoined his grounds. It was on Cameron Run just below the Little River Turnpike. It stood between Wheat's Mill and Robert's Mill. Mr. Fairfax had purchased the distillery from Archibald McFarland and the Fairfax House was three-quarters of a mile from the distillery.

On September 24, 1906, Redwood Vandergrift, age seventy testified "When Ellsworth's Zouaves came down, we were running the distillery and separating the whiskey from the grain and there was a portion of mash that was not distilled, and they stopped us and would not allow us to distill, and that was dumped out into the slop tubs and fed to the hogs and that made them drunk."

James W. Nalls testified on July 25, 1906 stating in defense of the Fairfax claim that he had known Mr. Fairfax for fifty years. In 1861 he said that he worked on the claimant's farm and stated that when the liquor was destroyed at the distillery the whiskey ran through the hog pens, and fifteen hogs died within a few minutes.