Before raiding Fort Ticonderoga at the beginning of the Revolutionary War in 1775, Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys went drinking at the Remington Tavern in Castleton, where they knocked back a mixture of rum and hard cider. Finding only a dozing guards, Allen stormed the officers’ quarters and demanded they surrender “in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress.” The English didn’t offer Allen much resistance and Fort Ticonderoga was successfully seized, thanks in part—we like to think—to the blood-warming Stone Fence.
In Allen’s day, rum and hard cider surely were the backbone of this drink, but as time went on, whiskey production outpaced rum. This version can be tweaked to include rum, brandy or whiskey, while the addition of mint and Angostura bitters are a tip from our friends at Southern Efficiency in Washington, D.C.