I remember reading that GH was made by SG. So I’m wondering if GH Irish D and the SG Irish D Light are the same snuff? Or maybe it’s GH Irish D and SG Irish Original?
I think you might be getting mixed up. PhilipS revealed recently that Fribourg and Treyer used to resell Samuel Gawith’s Irish ‘D’ Light as their High Dry Toast. Gawith Hoggarth is a different company - their snuffs aren’t made by Samuel Gawith.
Yeah I think on one of their websites it tells the history. The two Gawiths parted ways something like 200 years ago. I also do remember PhillipS saying that F&Ts old HDT was the SG Irish D. That seems plausible. Sadly both of these are on my wish list still.
The reason I asked this question was that I remembered someone saying that a mix of SG Black Coffee and GH Tia Maria would produce Cafe Royal. So I assumed that SG made GH snuffs. @transylvaniagent: A member, PhillipS has written of SG making FT’s HDT. Look on Snuffreviews.com under SG Irish D, I think the story is under there.
I think that Phillip S said that SGs Irish D is identical to the old F&T HDT, I don’t know if that meant thay they made it for them. As far as Smith’s goes, I think that they contract with both Gawith companies. I’ve now had 8 Smith’s and some seem very much like a GH grind and others seem very much like a SG grind. I wouldn’t be suprised if they mix the two together themselves to create Cafe Royale. The problem is I don’t have enough SG or GHs on hand to make side by side comparisons.
I’m sure PhilipS will chime in at some point, but he definitely said that pre the Wilsons takeover of the recipes, Fribourg and Treyer sold Samuel Gawith’s Irish ‘D’ Light as their High Dry Toast. It was the only snuff not actually produced by F&T themselves. Smiths snuffs are made by both Samuel Gawith and Gawith Hoggarth, but having tried the concoction out I’m not convinced that their Cafe Royale is simply a 50/50 mixture of Black Coffee and Tia Maria.
I’m sure he will too. I’d look for his previous post, but it was probably lost in the crash. Again, speaking of Smiths, I have not had the coffee snuffs from any of those companies, so I can’t guess. I only go by what others have said.
To the best of my knowledge there were for many years only five mills in the UK: the two Sheffield mills of Sharrow and Westbrook (now closed), the two Gawiths and burned down Illingworth. Commercial snuff blenders had to rely on their services. G. Smith uses (or certainly used to use) the Kendal mills to which proprietary flavourings would be added. Fribourg & Treyer used Westbrook mill (J & H Wilson) and the Kendal mill of S.Gawith. The latter made Fribourg & Treyer’s ‘High Dry Toast’ for them keeping the rights in the process. Nothing was added or altered. It has been claimed that S. Gawith still make F&T HDT, but this is now done by Wilsons of Sharrow, and it is a different snuff. Rightly or wongly I recall that when S. Gawith started repackaging the snuff under their own name at a much reduced cost it was called ‘Irish Dry Light’ (or something very similar). Apparently the name, for some reason or another, caused friction with other companies and ‘Dry’ was consequently abbreviated to ‘D‘. The phonetic rendering of ‘D Light’ is apt in describing this very lovely natural snuff. Until relatively recently (25-30 years ago) there used to be dry light snuff manufactured in Ireland by groups such as Gallaher and Carroll. Apart from Gallaher’s ‘High Toast Well Scented’ these were delicately flavoured - much more caramel then toast, and with the consistency of talcum powder. The Dublin based P.J Carroll made ‘Irish ‘D’ Snuff’ that was surprisingly similar to S. Gawith ‘Irish D Light’ in all respects. This and the connection to the Dublin origin of Lundy Foot is the reason, one surmises, why Professor Phillips Griffiths declares Samuel Gawith’s ‘Irish D Light’ as “the genuine traditional Irish High Dry Toast”. However the Irish manufacturer Grant’s claimed a genuine Toast, but this was coarse in mill with a flavour like almonds. Unless I am mistaken, no one really knows what Irish Blackguard (Lundyfoot)was really like, and it might have been (and probably was) very different from what we know as Irish today. Today no snuff whatsoever is manufactured in Ireland.
Don’t forget the McCrystal’s mill, the Hegdes’s mill and also the JIP mill. I am no expert on this so add this to the conversation in the hope of further clarification…
Thank you for the clarification PhillipS. Thats very good information. Seemingly, Carroll’s and Gallaher’s are still in business as tobacconists, but not as snuff makers. I’m holding out hope that they will learn of the snuff rennaisance and begin producing again.
Very interesting and informative postings Gents. Well done, and Cheers to all contributors.
Still prefer the GH
Both totally different and unique. GH’s was a tad sourish, in a most pleasing way. I would say, moistest of all toasts, much denser than lightweight SG’s. Quite fine grind, but easy to take. Consistence/density-wise it was close to Cheeta, though not as fine. I wish GH still produced it.
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