The "Lost" Bottles of Thomas Jefferson

The film features the story of the "Lost" Bottles of Thomas Jefferson; a tantalizing cache of 18th Century - styled bottles with the initials Th.J. engraved on them. A particular bottle of 1784 Chateau Lafite has the honor of being the most expensive bottle of wine ever sold.

But was the most expensive bottle of wine in the world a fake? The bottle in question was part of a cache of late 18th century Bordeaux found in a cellar in Paris. (In addition to the Lafite, there were also bottles of Mouton, Margaux and Yquem, all dated either 1784 or 1787). What pushed the price of the wines into the stratosphere was the etching "Th. J." on the sides of the handmade bottles, which Michael Broadbent of Christie’s auctioneers was quick to proclaim proved the wine had once belonged to US president Thomas Jefferson.

The wine was formerly the property of a German collector and wine merchant Hardy Rodenstock who lost a court case over the authenticity of a bottle of the same wine sold to a (former) friend. Laboratory analysis showed that bottle to be at least half-full of 1962 vintage wine. Which corresponds with the tasting impressions of those who had the honour of tasting wine from the cache: it was just too rich and too youthful to be two centuries old.

Whether Forbes’ wine was the real thing or not will never be known as the billionaire put his bottle in a glass case equipped with halogen spotlights. The cork dried out and fell into the wine. Forbes’ comment? "I wish Jefferson had bloody drunk the thing."

Jim Gabler writes, "There are a number of compelling reasons why the "1787 Lafite wine bottle engraved with the initials "Th.J." and sold at auction by Christie's in London on December 5, 1985 for $156,450, amongst a cache of bottles found by Hardy Rodenstock "behind a bricked up wall in Paris," was not, in my opinion, ever owned or possessed by Thomas Jefferson. According to the Christie's catalog the cache of bottles included "a bottle of 1787 Chateau d'Yquem ... From the same bricked up paris cellar Mr. Rodenstock also acquired three bottles of 1787 Branne Mouton, (now Mouton Rothschild), Chateau Margau [sic],the Lafite and another bottle of Yquem."

First, an examination of Jefferson's records reveals that he never owned or ordered any Bordeaux wines of the 1787 vintage, and those records include his letters, his log of records written and received, whole parcels of his miscellaneous accounts, including the internal customs documents accompanying his wine shippments from Bordeaux to Paris, and, most importantly his daily financial memorandum books recording all his receipts and expenditures, in which Jefferson put so much faith that he said he would vouch in their accuracy and completeness 'on the bed of death.'

Second, Jefferson kept an accout of all expenses relating to his purchases of wines, and there are no references in Jefferson's records of having purchased Bordeaux wines engraved with his initials.

Third, Jefferson DID NOT arrange 'for his agent in Bordeaux to supply bottles engraved for identification , with vintage, name of chateau and his initials' as Michael Broadbent contends in his recent book. On the contrary, in his Bordeaux wine order of September 1790 for himself and President George Washington he instructed the vineyard owners to mark the outside packages G.W. and T.J. and told his Bordeaux agent, Joseph Fenwick, that Fenwick would receive the wines from the vineyards "ready packed." For Fenwick to have had the bottles engraved would have required the removal of bottles from their cases so each bottle could be engraved, an expensive undertaking not accounted for in Jefferson's records.

Jefferson's records are totally silent on the wine of "Branne Mouton," and there is only one mention of "Mouton" and that is in reference to a third catagory of wines. He never ordered Mouton. The wine Jefferson esteemed after the four first growths was Madame de Rozan's wine, now Rozan-Segla.

Also, the provence of everything is vital to its authenticity, and the fact that Mr. Rodenstock has refused to tell how and where he obtained the bottles, beyond saying that they were found in a "bricked-up Paris cellar," is troubling. If we knew where Mr. Rodenstock had obtained the bottles, their idenity could be established, and any possible connection to Jefferson, traced. Rodenstock's refusal to reveal how and where he got the bottles obscures that simple solution.

A more detailed account of the reasons why the "Th.J' bottles were not owned by Jefferson can be found in "An Evening with Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson: Dinner, Wine, and Conversation" at pages 124-131 and 313-317.