The Treaty County has one of the strongest and oldest connections to the making of Irish Whiskey. The first distillery in Limerick goes back as far as 1809 which was owned and operated by Robert Ryans out of Newton wherer they had a 606-gallon still. Soon after, there were two more distilleries in Limerick registered by John Bourke of Newport & White and McSweeney both operating with 200 and 514 gallon stills respectively with all three distilleries ceasing operations by 1807.
From 1818 two new distilleries opened, John Browns and George Connel, whom both were listed to be operating from the city. by 1822 both distilleries ceased and the only registered distillery in the county was Josh Stiens which had an operation of around 500 gallons. Some corresponding records suggested Browns also had a release of around 501 gallons in 1823.
With Stien's Distillery being the only operational distillery of the mid-19th century, records show that from 1848 it was named "Thomond Gate Distillery".
