JDAW, in a PM to AHB, wrote:To recap, in a form that we might choose to quote on
, AHB and JDAW have agreed to share a lot of twelve bottles of port, described as being unlabelled mixed shippers, believed 1955. I have sorted these bottles into fill order, and labelled them 1 to 12, best being 1 and worst being 12, are have notes as follows. (All level measurements were done by eye and guess, without a rule: imprecision is guaranteed.)
Propose a split of:
1. Capsule unbranded black, perhaps same as 5 or 7 or both. Skirt of capsule removed, but glass too dark to see branding, if there be any. Level about +10mm above bottom neck.
2. Green glass; level BN+8mm. Cork says Taylor 1955.
3. Unique capsule with decorative circular pattern of dots. Brown glass. Capsule was to cut to show Taylor, and 19?5, the missing digit being hidden by a fold in the glass. BN+7mm.
4. Unique red capsule marked with ‟J H & ? Brooke Ltd”. BN+3mm. A little capsule cutting suggests an unbranded cork.
5. Capsule metallic with black at sides, perhaps the same as 1 and 7. Black glass too dark to see branding. BN+2mm.
6. No capsule. BN+2mm. Top half of cork appears reflectively silver; bottom half either not branded or not branded clearly. There might be runes or something written horizontally.
7. Capsule grey metal with patches of black. Maybe same as 1 and 5. Like those two, glass too dark to see cork.
8. BN+0. Remains of seemingly-unique capsule says ‟Adam's 1955”, though bits of some letters are missing.
9. An interesting bottle. Brown glass, with a line around the bottom of the shoulder. On cork I can read ‟Vint!”, which doesn't help, and the patches either side of the cork appear burnt -- maybe port has seeped around branding. Beige capsule might say 1900, or 19?00 though the latter would make no sense. If 1900 level not so bad at 1mm below base of neck.
10. Remains of sides of black wax capsule. BN-9mm. Green glass; no visible branding.
11. Green glass. BN-11mm. No visible brand. Capsule ‟!BRAEY AB!” who is probably a bottler.
12. Bottle shorter than others, with squarer shoulders and a line around bottom shoulder. Green glass. Mid shoulder, something like BN-14mm. No branding visible.