President Trump, famously, is teetotal. Though the owner of a vineyard, he not only abstains from wine but dislikes it. It’s not recorded if President-elect Biden enjoys a glass. George Washington, on the other hand, the first President of the United States, most definitely loved wine: so much so, that he tried, albeit unsuccessfully, to grow vines on his estate in Mount Vernon. Indigenous grapes made poor wine and European vines were prey to local disease and insect life.

Importing wine was the only solution; but that too was not without difficulty. Great Britain did all in its power to prevent the wine of its arch-enemy, France that is, from crossing the Atlantic. Whatever French wine made it was smuggled and hyper-expensive. Even wine from Britain’s oldest ally, Portugal, was heavily taxed in British harbours before export to North America: except for Madeira. And Madeira happened to be George Washington’s favourite tipple.

Washington was not alone in his love for Madeira, which he ordered from his supplier by the pipe, equivalent to 126 gallons or, roughly, 700 bottles. It was first imported in the 1640s and the only wine widely drunk in the American colonies. By the eighteenth century they were the largest Madeira market, taking over a quarter of the island’s production.