Lett's Brewery (officially Mill Park Brewery) was a beer manufacturer based in

Enniscorthy Enniscorthy () is the second-largest town in County Wexford, Republic of Ireland, Ireland. At the 2016 census, the population of the town and environs was 11,381. The town is located on the picturesque River Slaney and in close proximity to the ...

County Wexford County Wexford ( ga, Contae Loch Garman) is a county in Ireland. It is in the province of Leinster and is part of the Southern Region. Named after the town of Wexford, it was based on the historic Gaelic territory of Hy Kinsella (''Uí Ceinns ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

. It opened in 1864. Owned by G.H. Lett & Co., Ltd. which still remains a wholesale beverage distributor in Ireland, the brewery halted beer production in 1956. It was the last small independent brewery in Ireland. However, since 1981 Lett's allowed its famous Enniscorthy Ruby Ale to be brewed under license by Coors of

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

, United States. It is now marketed as Killian's Irish Red. When first introduced by Coors, it was labeled as an "ale". After a year or two, it was re-branded (and by some accounts, reformulated) as a "lager". In France, a similar beer was marketed beginning in the 1960s by

Pelforth Heineken N.V. is a Dutch brewer which owns a worldwide portfolio of over 170 beer brands, mainly pale lager, though some other beer styles are produced. The two largest brands are Heineken and Tecate; though the portfolio includes Amstel, Fo ...

as George Killian's Biere Rousse.

Abbey

Lett's Brewery is located at a former

abbey An abbey is a type of monastery used by members of a religious order under the governance of an abbot or abbess. Abbeys provide a complex of buildings and land for religious activities, work, and housing of Christian monks and nuns. The conce ...

site, the original bell is said to remain today. The Enniscorthy friary site is located just off the present Abbey Square. It was founded in 1460 and suppressed in 1540. The last three

friar A friar is a member of one of the mendicant orders founded in the twelfth or thirteenth century; the term distinguishes the mendicants' itinerant apostolic character, exercised broadly under the jurisdiction of a superior general, from the ol ...

s were killed when the friary was plundered by

Sir Henry Wallop Sir Henry Wallop (c. 1540 – 14 April 1599) was an English statesman. Biography Henry Wallop was the eldest son of Sir Oliver Wallop (d. 1566) of Farleigh Wallop in Hampshire. Having inherited the estates of his father and of his uncle, Sir Joh ...

in 1582. Friars returned to the abbey between 1642 and 1650, and again from 1661 on then fades into obscurity around 1750.

References

G.H. Lett & Co. Ltd Killian Beer
Beer in Ireland {{Beer-stub