Not Just Milk Stout - The Mackeson Family and their Hythe Brewery

This is the story of how the Mackeson brothers of Deal bought a brewery in the small town of Hythe and eventually transformed it into the manufacturer of one of the biggest brewing success stories of the twentieth century - Milk Stout. The drink was a favourite in pubs and shops across the country and famously found its way into the snug in Coronation Street’s ‘Rover’s Return’.

But the family’s journey was not a smooth one. Four generations from 1801 struggled with economic depression and recession, war, suicide, bankruptcies, a law suit, wastrel and importunate relatives, and premature deaths. There were triumphs, too: delivering the Koh-I-Nor diamond to Queen Victoria, discovering a new dinosaur and finally, in the person of Harry Ripley Mackeson, producing a Lord of the Treasury and a baronet.