I FOUND Michael Fry’s comment that “Edinburgh’s part in the Caribbean slave trade was minimal” quite bizarre (August 25).
While there has been much discussion in recent years about Glasgow’s role in this horrific trade in human flesh, we need to acknowledge that many of Edinburgh’s most notable citizens owned and exploited tens of thousands of enslaved people.
As a nation, Scotland benefited disproportionately from the slave trade and the New Town was in part funded by profits derived from enslavement. Edinburgh also played a major role in financing this barbaric practice.
Research from the Centre for the Study of the Legacies of British Slave Ownership indicates that the economic transformation experienced by Edinburgh towards the end of the 18th century came at a heavy price.
READ MORE: Michael Fry: Henry Dundas stood against the slave trade, this proves it
Scots owned more slaves, more plantations and had a higher share of the transatlantic trade in plantation goods such as tobacco and sugar than England or most other European countries. By 1817, 32 percent of Jamaican plantations were owned by Scots.
Our glorious New Town, seen by many as the physical embodiment of the Scottish Enlightenment, was, sadly, partly funded by the enormous profits derived from the enslavement of Africans.
Indeed, many wealthy residents were handsomely compensated by the British government for the loss of their slaves, described as “property”, in the years following the abolition of slavery in 1833.
The government paid 3000 slaveholders £20 million in compensation for the emancipation of slaves, the equivalent of around £17 billion today. James Lindsay, 7th Earl of Balcarres, was one New Town resident who received a large compensation payment from the government. One of the biggest compensation payments went to Peter McClagan of Great King Street, who received £21,480 for the “407 enslaved” at a plantation in British Guiana, about £1.7m in today’s money.
John Blackburn, a slave owner and Queen Street resident, submitted three claims for 638 slaves in Jamaica.
William Alexander, Lord Provost of Edinburgh in 1753, owned four ships which often returned from colonies with rum, muscovado sugar, rice and mahogany.
Links to the vile trade in human flesh can be seen across the city with statues, schools and streets named after those who profited through misery and servitude.
We should never forget this, and the role of our capital city in this cruel trade must be acknowledged.
Alex Orr
Edinburgh
EVERY year, 23 million girls are married before the age of 18, particularly in Islamic countries and areas. Many of them have no choice, and many suffer abuse. Soneeya experienced forced marriage, but now she is a paralegal helping protect other girls trapped in forced marriages. This is her story: “When I was 15, my parents and relatives arranged my marriage. I had never even met the man I was to marry. They introduced me to the him one night, and the next day we got married. He was 13 years older than me. They forced the decision on me.
“For five days everything was fine. The next night he came home. He tied my arms and legs like an animal. Then he raped me. After that he used to come home drunk every night, beat me and rape me.
“When I got pregnant at 16, I was really scared. My husband threw 3000 rupees at me and told me to get an abortion. I went to the hospital, but I couldn’t go through with it. When I went home, my husband beat me with a belt until I was rescued by his brother.
“My son is 11 years old now and I am proud of him.”
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