Virginia Gentleman is a brand of bourbon whiskey. This bourbon is distilled in Kentucky and re-distilled in the adjoining state of Virginia. This beverage has had something of a following typical of some smaller-brand alcoholic beverages. The brand’s motto was “The Aristocrat of Them All” (sometimes rendered as “The Aristocrats of Them All” when advertised with Smith Bowman Distilleries’ Fairfax County Bourbon).

In addition to the 80-proof (40 percent alcohol) presentation, the distillery also offers a 90-proof small batch whiskey. Both are triple-distilled.

Virginia Gentleman’s producer, A. Smith Bowman Distillery, was founded in 1934 by Abram Smith Bowman and his sons, Smith and DeLong. It was originally based on the Bowman family’s Sunset Hills Farm in Fairfax County, Virginia, in what later became the planned community of Reston. In 1988, it relocated to Spotsylvania County, near Fredericksburg, into the former FMC Corp. cellophane plant. The distillery previously was an independent family operation, but it has been owned since 2003 by the Buffalo Trace Distillery of Frankfort, Kentucky, which provides the unfinished distillate that becomes Virginia Gentleman. (Buffalo Trace is itself a unit of Sazerac Company, an international beverage corporation based in Metairie, Louisiana.) The company has since expanded its production into hot sauces and barbecue sauces under the Virginia Gentleman label.

Virginia Gentleman’s former label was a source of controversy[citation needed] as it depicted a Revolution-era scene of two white men being served by a black footman (presumably a slave), all three in aristocratic dress, standing in front of a plantation-style manor. By at least the 1970s the label was redesigned somewhat, the most obvious difference being the change of the black footman to a white one. Virginia Gentleman’s motto, “The Aristocrat of Them All,” was discontinued some time after, at least from appearing on the label. The current label (as of 2014) depicts three men in a similar arrangement, none of which are rendered as being black or being a servant.4 Year Old.
With Black Servant