Letters II: As many as 100,000 Scots were sold into slavery
What is perhaps less well known are the large numbers of Scottish people, perhaps as many as 100,000, who were rounded up and transported to the West Indies and American colonies to be sold into slavery, a practice that occurred as early as 1630.
Descendants of the Scots forced into slavery are now beginning to realise that this is a part of our history that has been quietly swept under the carpet, and as we note our role in the African slave trade, it is only right that there should be a greater awareness of this practice.
Alex Orr
Edinburgh
Merchants were also known to put in special requests to the city council to fulfil specific wants, with young women often on the wish list. In addition to this practice, political prisoners were routinely sold into slavery. Oliver Cromwell, for example, was responsible for sending thousands of Scots to slavery in the Caribbean, with prisoners from the Jacobite Uprisings facing the same fate.