IN this Black History Month, I looked last week at two cases in which slaves went to court in Scotland for their freedom in the 18th century, but neither case was finalised due to the death of participants.

A third case did go all the way to Scotland’s highest court and in a remarkable victory in 1778, a slave called Joseph Knight not only won his freedom but gained a ringing declaration that the enslavement of people was illegal in Scotland.

Why Joseph Knight is not more celebrated as a true hero of Scotland, never mind a hero of black history, is beyond me. Perhaps with the forthcoming play about Knight called Enough Of Him by the National Theatre of Scotland – you can see a trailer on YouTube – Knight will finally get the acclaim he richly deserves. And why not a statue to him or a street named after him? That should have happened after James Robertson’s excellent award-winning novel about Knight was published in 2003, but it’s never too late for this country to acknowledge the contribution made by someone who won such a historic victory for freedom.

It is testament to the iniquities of slavery that we do not know exactly where or when Joseph Knight was born. He himself said Guinea, but his birthplace, date of birth and birth name are unknown.

He was taken as a child to Jamaica where Scots were heavily involved in both the actual slave trade and the sugar plantations of the West Indies which relied on tens of thousands of slaves.

Given the name Joseph Knight, he was bought at the age of 12 or 13 by Sir John Wedderburn, a plantation owner. He was the 6th Baronet of Blackness, and his father, also John, was a Jacobite who was captured at Culloden and hanged, drawn and quartered for treason in 1746. The family’s estates were forfeited to the Crown and Wedderburn fled to Jamaica where in the space of 20 years he made himself the largest landowner on the island with a fortune made from the sugar trade.

Wedderburn decided to return to Scotland in 1769 and took Joseph Knight with him, the youth having been educated. Having a black servant was a status symbol in Scotland at that time and Knight was put to work in the family home at Ballindean in Perthshire. He was also baptised a Christian which was to prove crucial in his life.

In June 1772, the English Courts ruled in the case of Somersett v Stewart – a Scots-born American – that slavery was effectively illegal in England, and Knight appears to have learned of the case. He had also fallen in love with Ann Thompson, a servant of Wedderburn’s, and they got married and had a child.

In 1774, Knight asked Wedderburn for permission to go and live in Dundee to find work to support his family. Wedderburn refused and sacked Thompson, which prompted the slave to leave – a very brave thing for any slave to do, as many owners of runaway slaves had them caught and taken back to the harsh life of the plantations.

Wedderburn had Knight pursued and arrested but with the help of anti-slavery lawyers, he took his owner to court in Perth where the justices of the peace found in Wedderburn’s favour, finding that he was entitled to Knight’s service for life.

Knight then took the case to the Sheriff Court in Perth where his lawyers argued that slavery could not be legal in Scotland as there was no law making it legal. Wedderburn argued Knight was his property and he might want to sell him in Jamaica.

Sheriff John Swinton found for Knight, decreeing: “That the state of slavery is not recognised by the laws of this kingdom, and is inconsistent with the principles thereof: and found that the regulations in Jamaica, concerning slaves, do not extend to this kingdom.”

In 1777, Wedderburn appealed to the Court of Session where Knight was represented by, among others, Lord Advocate Henry Dundas, the much vilified Edinburgh lawyer who later delayed the abolition of the slave trade by the Westminster Parliament.

The case divided the country, with those involved in the slave trade and plantations backing Wedderburn while a large number of Church of Scotland members supported Knight as they were for the abolition of the slave trade. They were particularly incensed that a Christian should be enslaved.

Knight’s case contained the following pleading: “The means by which those who carried this child from his own country got him into their hands, cannot be known; because the law of Jamaica makes no inquiry into that circumstance. But, whether he was ensnared, or bought from his parents, the iniquity is the same.

“That a state of slavery has been admitted of in many nations, does not render it less unjust. Child-murder, and other crimes of a deep dye, have been authorised by the laws of different states. Tyranny, and all sorts of oppression, might be vindicated on the same grounds.

“Neither can the advantages procured to this country, by the slavery of the negroes, be hearkened to, as any argument in this question, as to the justice of it. Oppression and iniquity are not palliated by the gain and advantage acquired to the authors of them.”

After long and detailed arguments on both sides, the judge voted eight to four in favour of Knight, effectively making slavery illegal in Scotland – though not, it must be emphasised, elsewhere in the British Empire.

Judge Lord Auchinleck, father of the lawyer and writer James Boswell, stated: “Although, in the plantations, they have laid hold of the poor blacks, and made slaves of them, yet I do not think that that is agreeable to humanity, not to say to the Christian religion. Is a man a slave because he is black? No. He is our brother; and he is a man, although not our colour; he is in a land of liberty, with his wife and his child: let him remain there.”

The court’s decision was a huge step forward in the campaign against slavery and gained Joseph Knight his freedom. Sadly, we know nothing else of his life with Ann Thompson as a free man, so we can only hope that they found happiness together.