Glasgow Herald - on reparations and reconciliation
My family had slaves. Scotland must make amends
4 June 2021. By Alex Renton
Seven years ago Caricom, the body that represents 10 Caribbean nations and 18 million people – most of them of African heritage – asked European nations to start talks about the legacies of transatlantic slavery. In Britain, the headlines mis-reported this as a demand for £4.7 trillion in compensation. The comment was generally derisory. What cheek! Hadn’t we done our bit when we gave them their freedom and then, even more generously, their independence?
Visiting Jamaica as Prime Minister in 2015, David Cameron ruled out talks about reparations. He said people in the Caribbean should ‘move on’. But he did hand over money for Jamaica’s decrepit penal system, then so terrible that the British Government’s plan to deport Jamaica-born offenders had run into trouble on human rights grounds. Since then British development aid to the region has, again, been cut.
‘Moving on’ is not a lifestyle choice. The legacies of slavery’s brutality and racism, of the decades of neglect that followed emancipation, all remain powerful brakes on development as they are on the human spirit. That’s what I heard when I visited Jamaica and Tobago and the plantations where my Scottish ancestors owned and bred enslaved people.
READ MORE: How slavery made the modern Scotland
Meanwhile, Britain and North America still greedily exploit Caribbean people. Teachers, doctors and nurses are lured away by the promise of salaries five times what they can earn at home. Visiting schools in Jamaica, I was told that maths and science teachers are almost impossible to recruit. This is a legacy of negligent colonialism.
Why should any of this matter to Scots today? Well, Britain was more deeply involved in plantation slavery than any other European nation, and, per capita, the Scots more than the English. Visit Jamaica, Tobago or Guyana and you find Scots names and places everywhere: genetic research reveals that 70% of people in Jamaica have some Scottish DNA.
It wasn’t just posh Scots, like my ancestors, who benefited from slavery. Ordinary men travelled in their thousands to work in this boom industry – Robert Burns nearly went to Jamaica. Scottish weavers made the clothes the enslaved people wore, salted Scots herrings fed them. Glasgow bankers were financing the slave trade and the plantation economy. By 1800, slavery-related industries accounted for 12% of British GDP.
When slavery came to an end in 1834, the British government compensated all owners, per head of enslaved person. The Gladstone family, from Leith, pocketed £127 million in today’s money for the 2,508 people they owned in Guyana and Jamaica. My family, who co-owned 198 people, received £1.5m. The enslaved received nothing.
“Was anything good done with the money?” I was asked more than once in the Caribbean. Depends on your point of view. The Gladstones bought Fasque Castle (with a lot of change left over). The Dick family set up a scholarship fund – for children in Aberdeenshire, not the Caribbean – that still exists today. Other Scots bought railway shares.
My three-times grandfather Sir Charles Dalrymple Fergusson, who lived at Newhailes House in Musselburgh, did build schools and churches for the poor of East Lothian. But he did nothing for the newly-liberated poor of St Thomas parish in Jamaica who had neither education nor land.
Since I published my book on this, I’ve heard from people who find themselves in circumstances similar to my family’s: not necessarily wealthy because of slavery, but aware that their privilege today is linked to that time. None of us feel guilt – that is useless. But we do feel shame, not least at our ignorance about what happened. That’s coupled with a realisation that our propagandising education, which saw the British empire as a benevolent enterprise, taught us to deny the real effects that the racist systems of colonialism still have now.
READ MORE: Frederick Douglass: the slave who became a Scot. Ian Houston's Letter from America
I am ashamed that four times as many black people as white in Britain have died of Covid-19, and that most of our former Caribbean colonies are still so poor. I am disgusted that the London government has refused even to discuss the legacies of slavery with the Caribbean nations who were once our colonies, while decrying re-examination of the history.
So how about Scotland? Why don’t we open talks with Caricom? We see ourselves a progressive, outward-looking nation. Reparative justice is not just about money: it is a plan for greater friendship and cooperation through reconciliation. These are good. As Richard Holloway has said of the task of healing the damage done by slavery “We should do it joyfully, because it is the right thing to do.”
Alex Renton and Sir Geoff Palmer will be discussing the legacies of British slavery at the Boswell Book Festival on 12 June (online only). Blood Legacy: reckoning with a family’s slavery past is published by Canongate. www.bloodlegacybook.com @axrenton
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James Cadden4th June 12:09 pm
User ID: 1011048 15This collective punishment scenario is completely one way, only one section of the demographic has these demands made of it, meanwhile modern day slavery is taking place but we're to keep quiet about that because of feelings.
Last Updated: 7th June 06:55 pm
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marion lamont4th June 01:31 pm
User ID: 1813938 3The kids ditched by Patel that should have been taken to the UK are very likely to be in the sex trade or tarmac crew living in someones garage.
Last Updated: 4th June 11:23 pm
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Edward MacDonald4th June 12:29 pm
User ID: 1828840 8It's all so ridiculous, happened long ago, before any of us were even thought of. The past is past, there's no changing that. Learn and move on. Carrying someone else's guilt is completely unnecessary and simply makes you weak.
As for the modern day enticement of money, that is part and parcel of the capitalist system. No one has to go along with it, the exploitation is voluntary. However, people are shallow and think more money is the answer, not realising that more becomes more and more.
As for reparative action, maybe all the families who benefitted from the slave trade ought to ease their guilt by giving away the fortunes made. It's certainly not a Scottish issue, it's a few folks who knew they were doing wrong but did it anyway. Slavery was always practiced, but so many knew it was wrong, especially those enslaved... the Scots, Irish, Welsh, English, Africans, Europeans, etc.
Money replaced direct kidnapping and became the new enslavement. I'm all for giving up money, but we'd need to take a leap forward and find that within our self which is actual co-operation. Meaning, simply being together, living with one another for one another.
Money is a bad form of enslavement, not as bad as taking someone by force, but consider a world without money, without the need to profit from the actions of others. All obstacles would suddenly be gone, all false scarcity would be gone. Technology would develop unhindered by the limitations imposed by money and the need for short term profit. Houses would all be hi-tech very efficient and durable. Travel would be leisurely. Work would be a pleasure not a chore, and would only be required to do what has to be done. Money limits our choice, our development as a species. Money is the final form of enslavement we have to free ourselves from... but obviously that takes everyone to act together for one another.
Last Updated: 5th June 02:26 pm
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Colin Laird4th June 12:43 pm
User ID: 1429749 11What a crazy idea! We can all find someone else to blame for our present position in life. The romans and Vikings plundered Scotland as did the English but with hard work and education our society recovered without asking for reparations. Many of our former colonies have prospered in the same way meanwhile the ones who have not should look at what they need to do to emulate the others in other words get on your bike embrace capitalism and parliamentary democracy and stop this millennial victim hood nonsense . we owe you nothing c
Last Updated: 7th June 06:55 pm
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Paul Richards4th June 01:23 pm
User ID: 1449290 5If you look at the media today its full of wealthy people or celebrities in 100 years time will people look back and say in the 2020s all the people in Europe and the USA went to university and would no longer do menial jobs but were importing people from the third world to work on minimum wages, would young people of today agree with this statement.
Last Updated: 7th June 06:58 pm
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marion lamont4th June 01:30 pm
User ID: 1813938 4Slavery is an abomination. Lets not forget the Jacobites got sent out as slaves. The only reason that did not take off was they died too easily in the hot sun. Pesky pale Scots, forcing those hard working jailers to hang them instead.
Last Updated: 4th June 11:24 pm
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lisa zack4th June 01:58 pm
User ID: 1564867 2What's 1745 got to do with today? Absolutely nothing!
Last Updated: 5th June 02:27 pm
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Edward MacDonald4th June 02:20 pm
User ID: 1828840 1
lisa zackwrote: What's 1745 got to do with today? Absolutely nothing!
The mindset... so everything.
Last Updated: 5th June 02:27 pm
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lisa zack4th June 02:31 pm
User ID: 1564867 1Even a spineless arthropod sheds what's no longer useful and leaves it behind.
Last Updated: 5th June 02:27 pm
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John F Crawford4th June 02:47 pm
User ID: 1025214 7Marion,
where do you draw a line with all this?
Should reparation and apologies be demanded from the Southern Irish because Dublin held one of the biggest slave markets in Europe when the Vikings were running riot round the UK and the continent?
Last Updated: 7th June 06:58 pm
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andrew53224th June 02:52 pm
User ID: 1671848 2Your comments are completely devoid of any relevant historical evidence or analysis, and are a creation from the Scottish school of pseudo-historiograph
ical victimology.
Last Updated: 5th June 02:27 pm
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Ruth Bennett4th June 08:33 pm
User ID: 643532 23/4 of 18th century slave overseers in the Caribbean were Scots and 1/2 of the tea planters in India etc. Rabbie Burns accepted a job as a slave overseer - he only passed up the job as his poetry took off.
Last Updated: 5th June 02:27 pm
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Donnie Pollock5th June 03:21 am
User ID: 1027591 0Marion, I can't understand why so many 'Scots' think slavery to be acceptable.
I've never met anybody in work, pubs, or the street who've come out with anything like what some people have posted on here.ReportGraham McKay5th June 08:12 amUser ID: 1028107 2
Donnie Pollockwrote: Marion, I can't understand why so many 'Scots' think slavery to be acceptable.
I've never met anybody in work, pubs, or the street who've come out with anything like what some people have posted on here.
Donnie, no one on here is saying that slavery is acceptable. Most are saying that you can't visit the sins of the father on the son. In this case it's more like visiting the sins of the great great great great great great great great grandfather on the great x 8 grandson.
Is there are to be amends made, there has to be some logic in apportioning blame. The Transatlantic Slave Trade was a triangular trade. African leaders have apologised for their part in that trade (though I don't know about the current trade) just as European leaders have apologised for their part in that Trade (though are doing very little to stop the current trade).
Do todays Scots have any more (or more likely less) responsibility for the Atlantic Slave Trade and the servitude that followed than today's West Africans? Today's Scots have, through taxes, paid Overseas Aid for years to make amends for what happened. Today's Scots have only recently finished paying for the freedom of slaves by paying off the government loans taken out to stop slavery (or at least our active part in slavery). How often should we pay for our part in a 3-Way trade? Would it be third time lucky?
Last Updated: 7th June 06:59 pm
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Dan Hardy4th June 02:00 pm
User ID: 2045560 7What is this insistence on a collective guilt?
Virtually every civilisation throughout history has taken slaves - Egyptian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Ottoman, Mayan. Native Americans took slaves as did African tribes, albeit on a smaller scale.
Last Updated: 7th June 06:56 pm
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Ruth Bennett4th June 08:42 pm
User ID: 643532 2Not to mention, China, Middle East, the Aztecs etc. The East African slave trade (to the Middle East) went on from 800 to 1890 AD. The 'white' slave trade from AD 700 to 1820. Both trades are under the radar as men were castrated and babies born to the women often killed - so little black or white visibility in the modern Middle East gene pool - unlike in the USA, South America and Caribbean where slaves were encouraged to have children.
Last Updated: 5th June 02:28 pm
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William Scullion4th June 02:53 pm
User ID: 1042008 7Sorry but I really couldn't care less about slaves. If Alex Renton's ancestors had slaves then presumably they were reasonably well off. On the other hand the vast majority of our ancestors were starving, living in what we today would see as abject poverty and living from day to day, and there were not many days as most died very young. This did not end with the end of the slave trade in the 19th century but went on right up until the fairly recent past and it is probably only in the past 50 years or so that most of us are living in reasonable homes and are starting to live comfortable lives which to even our grandparents would probably seem like luxury. As the oldest in my family my brothers and sister think I am having a laugh when I tell them about having to go to the next door neighbour to get the key for the outside toilet and also not having a bath and while we left that tenement in 1963 it was still standing with people living there right up until the mid 1970s. That was the way many of us lived not so long ago so pardon me for not actually caring about slaves from another country.
Last Updated: 7th June 06:57 pm
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Ruth Bennett4th June 08:49 pm
User ID: 643532 4Quite. If Alexa Renton feels guilty for his ancestors he is free to offer up his wealth as recompense. But I refuse to feel guilty or pay taxes for the 'sins' of my dirt poor, illiterate ancestors none of whom benefitted from the slave trade.
Last Updated: 7th June 06:57 pm
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Donnie Pollock5th June 03:29 am
User ID: 1027591 0Sharing an outside lavvy can't have been good, but to try to compare that with slavery is nothing short of crass.ReportGraham McKay6th June 08:31 amUser ID: 1028107 1
Donnie Pollockwrote: Sharing an outside lavvy can't have been good, but to try to compare that with slavery is nothing short of crass.
William is not comparing an outside lavvy with slavery. He is comparing the lavish life style of the slave owning barons with the lifestyle of Joe Public.
Last Updated: 7th June 06:57 pm
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Dallas Carter7th June 04:30 pm
User ID: 2145506 1I doubt if a 6 year old chimney sweep, mine worker or factory hand, working their 12 hour days, felt the benefit of 'white privilege'
Last Updated: 7th June 06:58 pm
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GRAHAM HANSON4th June 05:41 pm
User ID: 1017558 3I am not responsible for the actions of my ancestors. I refuse to pay for them or feel guilty. Should we send a bill to Rome for invasion compensation?
Last Updated: 7th June 07:00 pm
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robert sandison4th June 05:58 pm
User ID: 1056055 4If Mr Renton is in possesion of illl gotten wealth then he should set an example and hand it over before he lectures the rest of us particularly the majority of us who had nothing to do with the slave trade
Last Updated: 7th June 06:59 pm
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Ruth Bennett4th June 08:30 pm
User ID: 643532 4My Scottish ancestors were agricultural laborers, hand loom weavers and shale oil miners. They were dirt poor and none benefited from slavery or the empire. I make no apology for what these ancestors did. On the other hand there are rich west Africans whose ancestors made a fortune out of the slave trade (what funded the Benin Bronzes?)
Historical guilt and reparations are a nonsense. Indeed most Afro Americans have more slave owning ancestry than I do so historically bear a greater guilt burden.
Let us worry more about modern slavery in North Africa, the middle east, China etc.
Last Updated: 7th June 07:00 pm
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[Deleted]4th June 08:44 pm
0[This comment has been deleted by the person who made it]
Last Updated: 4th June 08:46 pm
Ruth Bennett4th June 08:50 pm
User ID: 643532 2My Scottish ancestors were agricultural laborers, hand loom weavers and shale oil miners. They were dirt poor and none benefited from slavery or the empire. I make no apology for what these ancestors did. On the other hand there are rich west Africans whose ancestors made a fortune out of the slave trade (what funded the Benin Bronzes?)
Historical guilt and reparations are a nonsense. Indeed most Afro Americans have more slave owning ancestry than I do so historically bear a greater guilt burden.
Let us worry more about modern slavery in North Africa, the middle east, China etc.
Last Updated: 4th June 11:32 pm
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Robert Fallon5th June 02:16 am
User ID: 1042206 2Much as Mr Renton might want to share the guilt of slavery onto the current generation of Scots because of his discomfort with his ancestors involvement with this obscenity. I for one refuse to accept it it. By spreading the guilt about he diluting his own guilts. by lessening his own ancestor's responsibility. .Yip it's another society's all responsible argument.
I don't accept any of his guilt. I was born into this society as it it was already formed. There were injustices in it but they were not of my creation. I also know that my ancestors did not own any slaves, were extremely poor, probably not much further up the social scale than the slaves themselves.
Why does Mr Renton feel it pertinent that I have benefited from his ancestor's slaves legacy and must compensate those unjustly treated. I try to get by in the society as it exists, I ask for no compensation for the injustices perpetuated on my ancestors, surely the way forward is to live in the 21st century rather then consantly hark back to the 18th century.
Last Updated: 7th June 07:01 pm
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Gordon Hudson5th June 07:04 pm
User ID: 2107754 1Why should I share the reparations when my ancestors worked in jute mills in Dundee and made no money from slavery?
Last Updated: 7th June 07:01 pm
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Tom Fitzpatrick5th June 09:09 pm
User ID: 1052252 1
Gordon Hudsonwrote: Why should I share the reparations when my ancestors worked in jute mills in Dundee and made no money from slavery?
The biggest slave traders in history were muslims, they started enslaving people in such vast numbers it was impossible to put a number on how many slaves were in existence. The Romans seen slavery as a normal economic factor that made their empire function.
Vikings seen slaves as useful commodities, tokens of their plunder, albeit many of them married their slaves. Possibly why so many Scandinavian men are now egalitarian equals to their opposite sex.
The idea of reparation is stupid, it is idiotic, as is this author. If he is of a mind to offer what he has personally, to some poor souls anywhere, who claim to be descendants of slaves, he can freely hand over his bit and maybe feel forgiven. Good for him
As for four times as many black people dying of C19 than white people? I am pretty sure he is using this as a yardstick of sorts as if it means something racist? The DNA of Asians and Africans is just the same as all humans. However the level of addictions, of bad choices in life, such as smoking and eating to excess, are factors that truly reflect the differences in health stats. The diet of many Asian and black people is rich in fats and extremely saturated. Without being seen to be bigoted, it is true to say a great many Asian and black people are obese in comparison to white people. This may well be the true cause of the excess deaths? Fat white people die from C19 too.
Last Updated: 7th June 07:01 pm
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Graham McKay6th June 08:21 am
User ID: 1028107 0
Gordon Hudsonwrote: Why should I share the reparations when my ancestors worked in jute mills in Dundee and made no money from slavery?
Don't worry, Gordon, Les Wilson will, I'm sure, shortly do an article on how slave money was used to finance the jute mills (was it just coincidence that jute took off at the time our government were compensating slave owners for releasing slaves?) and remind you that the raw materials were "stolen" from the people of India.Report
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