Short answer, mostly yes. Horse Soldier's core bourbon is sourced from MGP in Indiana, even though the brand is bottled in Florida by the former Green Berets who founded it. But this is one sourced brand whose backstory is not marketing fiction: the founders are the real Task Force Dagger soldiers who rode into Afghanistan on horseback after 9/11. Pour one and let me walk you through where the whiskey comes from, what they do with it, and whether the wheated profile belongs in your glass.
Most bourbon origin stories are marketing. This one is not. Horse Soldier is made by American Freedom Distillery, founded by a group of former U.S. Army Special Forces Green Berets, the actual men of Task Force Dagger who rode into Afghanistan on horseback days after 9/11. That mission inspired the book and the movie 12 Strong, and there is a monument to it at Ground Zero in New York. When a brand’s founders are memorialized in bronze at the 9/11 Memorial, you do not have to wonder whether the heritage is invented.
After their service, founders including Scott Neil, Mark Nutsch, Bob Pennington, and John Koko traded saddles for stills and set up shop in St. Petersburg, Florida. The detail that tells you how seriously they take the symbolism: every Horse Soldier bottle is pressed in a mold made from steel recovered from the World Trade Center, with a horseshoe nail cast into the glass. So the story is real, the question for us is just where the whiskey inside comes from.
Horse Soldier is, at its base, sourced whiskey, which makes American Freedom a non-distiller producer for most of what is on shelves today. The core distillate comes from MGP in Lawrenceburg, Indiana, the same Indiana powerhouse behind a huge share of America’s craft whiskey. What sets Horse Soldier apart on the recipe side is that it is wheated, using wheat rather than rye as the secondary grain for a softer, sweeter profile.
The founders have never tried to hide this, and they have always intended to make more of their own. They distill on small stills in Florida, have used a contract facility in the Midwest to scale up using their proprietary mash, and are now building Horse Soldier Farms in Kentucky, a roughly 200 million dollar distillery and destination on Lake Cumberland that points at a much bigger in-house future. For now, though, the bottle in your hand is built on MGP stock, which is why the chart below shows a single confirmed source.
Source Split
Horse Soldier’s core bourbon is sourced from a single distillery. The founders also distill small volumes themselves and are building their own Kentucky distillery for the future. Tap the slice to read the full guide.
Let me be straight, since you wanted honesty. With Horse Soldier, the headline value-add is the story and the cause, and that is not a knock. The founders are open that the brand exists to honor service and fund veteran charities, with limited single-barrel bottles auctioning for thousands of dollars to support those efforts. You are buying something meaningful, not just liquid.
On the whiskey side, the work is in mashbill choice and barrel selection. Choosing a wheated recipe gives Horse Soldier a distinct, gentler lane than the rye-heavy MGP crowd, and the Commander’s Select single-barrel picks let them showcase standout casks. As their own Florida and future Kentucky distillate matures, expect that maker side of the story to grow. Today it is solid, well-chosen sourced wheated bourbon wrapped in the most authentic backstory in the category.
Horse Soldier’s range is organized in tiers, and a few are on OAKR.
Start with the Small Batch, the approachable, award-winning wheated bourbon that is the easiest entry to the brand. The straight bourbon is the everyday tier below it. When you want more punch, the Barrel Strength delivers the same wheated profile at full cask strength for the people who like it bold. The core generally runs from the high-thirties up past sixty dollars depending on tier, with the striking WTC-steel-molded bottle adding to the shelf presence.
The trophies here are the Commander’s Select single barrels and the older, extended-age releases, which are made in small numbers and tied closely to the brand’s charity work. The most exclusive Whiskey and War Stories single barrels have gone for jaw-dropping sums at charity auctions. None of the core lineup is hard to find, but the limited single barrels and any future Horse Soldier Farms releases are the ones worth keeping an eye out for.
I could give you tasting notes, but I will not, because the notes you read online are one person’s palate on one night, and a powerful backstory has a way of bending people’s judgment of what is in the glass. The story is real and worth supporting, but whether the wheated profile is right for your taste is a separate question.
You might ask, “Grady, how do you know that?” Welp, one, I have been doing this a long time, and two, we built OAKR to separate the liquid from the legend. Every bottle gets poured past a blind tasting panel and scored across more than a hundred flavor notes in ten big categories, no labels, no story in the room. Then the app reads your palate, the flavors you actually chase, and hands you a Spirit Match score for any bottle, the whole Horse Soldier range included. So you can support the mission and still know whether the bourbon fits your taste. That is the difference between buying a bottle for the story and buying one you will also love drinking.
Is Horse Soldier Bourbon sourced?
Yes, mostly. The core bourbon is sourced from MGP in Indiana. The founders also distill small volumes themselves and are building their own Kentucky distillery.
Who makes Horse Soldier Bourbon?
It is made by American Freedom Distillery, founded by former Green Berets of the post-9/11 Horse Soldiers mission. The base whiskey is distilled at MGP in Indiana and bottled by American Freedom in Florida.
Where is Horse Soldier distilled?
The sourced base is distilled at MGP in Lawrenceburg, Indiana. American Freedom also distills small amounts in St. Petersburg, Florida, and is constructing Horse Soldier Farms in Kentucky.
Is Horse Soldier worth the money?
It is a solid wheated bourbon with a genuine veteran-founded story and a charity mission, and the bottle itself is striking. Value is fair, and part of your money supports veteran causes.
What is the best Horse Soldier to start with?
The Small Batch for an easy intro to the wheated style, or the Barrel Strength if you want it bolder. Run either through OAKR first to see how it matches your taste.
Horse Soldier pairs the most authentic backstory in bourbon with well-chosen, wheated MGP whiskey and a future of its own making in Kentucky. The story is real; the only question left is whether the bourbon fits your taste, and that is exactly what OAKR was built to answer. Match your palate against Horse Soldier on OAKR before you spend a dime.
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Bourbon enthusiast, spirits industry analyst, and the voice behind OAKR's distillery guides, brand reviews, and bourbon education content. Visiting distilleries, dissecting mashbills, and translating the craft into data since 2024.
Horse Soldier is a wheated, sourced bourbon with a genuine backstory. OAKR’s blind-panel flavor data shows you whether it fits your taste.
