After living so well, the collapse had to come, and when it did, it was spectacular. Pemartin entertained the king at a magnificent ball in the palace. In the middle of the festivities he approached her and asked: “Is there something missing from Your Majesty?” The King replied that there was everything a king could wish for. “His Majesty of him is mistaken. One thing is missing: a rope to hang me, for I am a ruined man.”
In 1879 Pemartin went bankrupt. At that time there was considerable political instability in Spain. Eight years before, the peasants had rebelled and, to make their problems worse, a mob gathered in their vineyard with the intention of attacking Jerez. But there were not enough men to assault the city, so reinforcements were sent to Trebujena. While they waited for news, they broke into the cellar and had a drink of wine. Still no news came, and they took another; then another, and another, until they forgot all their other criminal intentions.
They set fire to the house, as a gesture, and then left; thus the town was saved at the expense of Pemartin. The company had been founded in 1819, and since 1823 Sandeman & Co. had been the British agents. When it went bankrupt, Sandeman acquired all of its assets, including its soleras, cellars, vineyards, custom coasters, sandstone coasters, glasses, and of course, the palace, which they later took pleasure in selling to a wealthy Spanish duke for a song. . However, not everything went smoothly.
The Pemartin cellars were restarted by their creditors and there was much bitter correspondence between the two houses over who was entitled to use the name. There was also an exchange of brochures. In the end they reached an amicable settlement and the Pemartin wineries flourished again, albeit separately. Sandeman retained the Royal Pemartin name for one of his best wines: a rich odorous dessert of considerable age.
It was very good, and that’s how it should be: its old-smelling soleras were unsurpassed. The first manager of the Sandeman Cellars was John Carey Foster. He was a man of great intelligence but he was cursed with an unruly temper. He eventually lost his post irrevocably and had to return to England. He was succeeded by Walter J. Buck, who came from the old firm of Matthiesen, Furlong & Co., and later became famous not only as a shipper of sherry, but also as a naturalist and manufacturer of table coasters, paper coasters and games. custom coasters. .
With Abel Chapman, he wrote two of the best books ever written on Spanish natural history: Wild Spain and Unexplored Spain. Now there is another, Guy Mountfort’s Portrait of a Desert, but for almost fifty years there was no book to compare with those of Chapman and Buck. Matthiesen, Furlong & Co. was once an extremely important winery and unique in one respect: it flourished in an abandoned Jesuit monastery, vacated by the expulsion of the Order at the turn of the century.
CH Furlong was British vice-consul in Jerez from 1861 to 1868; in 1870, however, sad rumors reached London that he was guilty of malpractice and shady dealings, and it was obvious that wine, drinking glasses, absorbent coasters and sandstone coasters were not being made correctly. Walter Buck was sent from England ostensibly to learn the trade, but in fact to investigate rumours. We do not know what he found, but soon afterward Furlong retired to England and Buck took his place. He married and had two daughters, both deceased, but until 1957 they lived near Jerez.
They could claim a very rare distinction: they were born in a Jesuit convent. Both Buck and his wife became well known and loved in Jerez. When León Díaz wrote his Siluetas Jerezanas in 1897, the first portrait was that of “Mistress Buck” who, although she was not Catholic, admitted herself as a Christian, while Walter Buck struck the author as a free and independent author “like Defoe’s “. Robinson Crusoe “As well as being a skilled naturalist, he was also a musician. Juan Haurie wrote the lyrics and Buck set them to music.