Jun 182011
 

With thanks to Mike Shepherd.

Peter Williamson was kidnapped as a child in Aberdeen harbour and taken to the American Colonies where he was sold as a slave.

On gaining his freedom, he was kidnapped by the Indians, living with them and eventually escaping from them. He then spent three years in the British Army fighting against the French and the Indians, only to be captured again, this time by the French.

As part of a prisoner exchange he was repatriated to Britain in 1757.

In Plymouth he was released from the army with a purse of six shillings.  This was enough to get to him to York, by which time he was penniless.

He managed to persuade some local businessmen to publish his book, titled  The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave. This sold very well and gave him enough money to return to Aberdeen in June 1758, fifteen years after being kidnapped.

He had several hundred copies of his book with him, some of which he managed to sell on the streets of Aberdeen. The book eventually came to the notice of Councillors and merchantmen in the city, and although nobody was named, they did not like what they read. The Procurator Fiscal lodged a complaint with the Provost and Magistrates, stating:

“that by this scurrilous and infamous libel … the corporation of the City of Aberdeen, and whole members whereof, were highly hurt and prejudged; and therefore that the Pursuer (Peter Williamson) ought to be exemplary punished in his person and goods; and that the said pamphlet, and whole copies thereof, ought to be seized and publicly burnt.”

A warrant was issued for his arrest. He was taken from his lodgings and brought before a Magistrate at the courthouse. Peter was asked to repudiate publicly everything he had said concerning the merchants of Aberdeen. Until he agreed, he was to be imprisoned and his books seized. After a short time in the Tolbooth (a jail in the Aberdeen Town House), he was bailed and stood for trial. On being found guilty, he was told to lodge a document with the court confessing to the falsity of the book and to pay a ten shilling fine, otherwise he would be imprisoned. This he reluctantly agreed to, leaving Aberdeen and moving to Edinburgh.

In a ceremony watched by the Dean of the Guild, the Town Clerk, the Procurator Fiscal and the Baillies, the offending pages were sliced from 350 of Williamson’s books and publicly burnt at the Mercat Cross by the town hangman.  The remaining pages were never returned.

In Edinburgh, Peter contacted a lawyer and started planning for a legal challenge. He opened a coffee shop which became frequented by the Edinburgh legal fraternity and he started to teach himself Scots law. The year 1760 saw the  start  of an extended phase of courtroom battles against his persecutors in Aberdeen. In 1762, he was successful in getting the result of the Aberdeen trial reversed and was awarded costs and a £100 in damages.

The results of his investigations had revealed the names of the businessmen behind his kidnapping. These were Captain Robert Ragg, Walter Cochrane (the Aberdeen Town Clerk Depute), Baillie William Fordyce, Baillie William Smith, Baillie Alexander Mitchell, and Alexander Gordon, all local merchants with a share in the ship, Planter.

Further litigation ensued. Witnesses were found and they were mainly men who as boys had managed to escape kidnapping. The father of a boy who had sailed with Peter Williamson to the Americas testified. He said that while the Planter had been moored at Torry, his son had returned to him and refused to go back. He claimed that Captain Ragg and others involved had spoken again and again with him in the street, warning him that he would be sent to the Tolbooth if he didn’t send his son back to the ship. The boy went back.

The main incriminating evidence was the so-called “kidnapping book”. This was a ledger detailing all the expenses of the slave-ship venture. It mentioned Peter Williamson by name and included entries such as:

“To one pair of stockings to Peter Williamson, six pence; To five days of diet, one shilling and three pence.”

One entry read:

“To the man who brought Peter Williamson, one shilling and six pence.”

Eventually in 1768 the case was proved. Peter was awarded damages of £200 plus 100 guineas costs.

Child slavery was endemic in Aberdeen and elsewhere in the 1700s. The plantations in the American colonies were desperate for labour. The Book of Bon Accord (Robertson 1839) records that:

“The inhabitants of the neighbourhood dared not send their children into town, and even trembled lest they should be snatched away from their homes. For in all parts of the country emissaries were abroad, in the dead of night children were taken by force from the beds where they slept; and the remote valleys of the Highlands, fifty miles distant from the city, were infested by ruffians who hunted their prey as beasts of the chase.”

Skelton (2004) mentions that it was estimated that 600 boys and girls were abducted and sold for slavery between 1740 and 1760 in Aberdeen and the North-east. On the voyage alone that took Peter Williamson, there were 69 youngsters on board.

A BBC website accompanying a radio series on the history of the British Empire fills in some background from the period:

“Most accounts of British slaving date from the 16th century with the shipping of Africans to the Spanish Main. But less discussed is what happened to English and Scots eight, nine and ten year-olds in places like Aberdeen, London and Bristol. Many from those places were sold for forced labour in the colonies.

London gangs would capture youngsters, put them in the hold of a ship moored in the Thames and when the hold was full, set sail for America. Many authorities encouraged the trade. In the early 17th century authorities wanted rid of the waifs, strays, young thieves and vandals in their towns and cities. The British were starting to settle in Virginia. So that’s where the children went.

This was a time when it was common enough in Britain to have small children as cheap, or unpaid labour. In 1618 one hundred children were officially transported to Virginia. So pleased were the planters with the young labour that the then Lord Mayor, Sir William Cockayne, received an immediate order from the colony “to send another ship load.”
See: http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/history/empire/episodes/episode_36.shtml

Sources:

*Joseph Robertson: “The Book of Bon Accord”. Aberdeen 1839.
*Douglas Skelton: “Indian Peter. The extraordinary life and adventures of Peter Williamson”. Edinburgh, 2004.
*Peter Williamson “The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave”. York, 1757.

Read the full story here: The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson

Jun 102011
 

With thanks to Mike Shepherd.

Peter Williamson was kidnapped from Aberdeen harbour in 1743 and shipped as a child slave to the American colonies. Following the death of his master, he married into a wealthy family and set up a farmstead on the frontiers of the province of Pennsylvania.

On the 2nd of October 1754 his farm was raided by Indians, set ablaze and Peter was captured and used as a slave by the Indians to help carry booty from their raiding expeditions.

After two months in the winter camp, the Indians set off with Peter on a new raiding campaign.

“I began to meditate on my escape; and though I knew the country round extremely well, having been often thereabouts with my companions, hunting deer and other beasts, yet was I very cautious of giving the least suspicion of such my intention. However, my keepers thought proper to visit the mountains in search of game for their sustenance, leaving me bound in such a manner that I could not escape.  At night, when they returned, having unbound me, we all sat down together to supper on two polecats, being what they had killed, and soon after (being greatly fatigued with their day’s excursion) they composed themselves to rest as usual.

Observing them to be in that somniferous state, I tried various ways to see whether it was a scheme to prove my intentions or not; but after making a noise and walking about, sometimes touching them with my feet, I found there was no fallacy. My heart then exulted with joy at seeing a time come that I might in all probability be delivered from my captivity, but the joy was soon damped by the dread of being discovered by them, or taken by any straggling parties. To prevent which, I resolved, if possible to get one of their guns, and if discovered die in my defence rather than be taken. For that purpose, I made various efforts to get one from under their heads (where they usually secured them) but in vain.

Frustrated in this my first essay regarding liberty, I dreaded the thoughts of carrying my new design into execution; yet after a little consideration, and trusting myself to divine protection, I set forward, naked and defenceless as I was. A rash and dangerous enterprise!

Such was my terror, however, that in going from them I halted and paused every four or five yards, looking fearfully towards the spot where I had left them, lest they should awake and miss me; but when I was about two hundred yards  from them I mended my pace, and made as much haste as I could to the foot of the mountains, when on a sudden I was struck with the greatest terror and amaze at hearing the wood-cry, as it is called, and may be expressed – Jo hau! Jo hau! – which  the savages I had left were making, accompanied with the most hideous cries and howling they could utter.

The bellowing of lions, the shrieks of hyenas, or the roarings of tigers, would have been music to my ears in comparison to the sounds that then saluted them.

They now having missed their charge, I concluded that they would soon separate themselves and hie in quest of me. The more my terror increased, the faster did I push on; and scarce knowing where I trod, drove through the woods with the utmost precipitation, sometimes falling and bruising myself, cutting my feet and legs against the stones in a miserable manner, but though faint and maimed, I continued my flight until break of day, when, without having anything to sustain nature but a little corn, I crept into a hollow tree, in which I lay very snug and made thanks to the Divine Being.

But my repose was in a few hours destroyed at hearing the voices of savages near the place where I was hid, threatening how they would use me if they got me again. However, they at last left the spot where I had heard them, and I remained in my circular asylum all that day without further molestation.

At night I ventured forward again, frightened and trembling at every bush I passed, thinking each twig that touched me to be a savage.”

After three days on the run he spotted what looked to be a white plantation.

“In the morning, as soon as I awoke, I continued my journey towards the nearest cleared lands I had seen the day before, and about four o’clock in the afternoon arrived at the house of John Bell, an old acquaintance, where knocking at the door, his wife who opened it, seeing me in such a frightful condition, flew from me like lightning, screaming into the house.

This alarmed the whole family, who immediately fled to their arms, and I was soon accosted by the master with his gun in his hand. But on my assuring him of my innocence as to any wicked intentions, and making myself known (for he took me to be an Indian), he immediately caressed me, as did all his family, with a deal of friendship, at finding me alive, they having all informed of my being murdered by the savages some months before.

They for two or three nights very affectionately supplied me with all necessaries, and carefully attended me until my spirits and limbs were pretty well recruited, and I thought myself able to ride, when I borrowed of these good people a horse and some clothes, and set forward for my father-in-law’s house in Chester county, about 140 miles from thence, where I arrived on the fourth day of January, 1755.

Now returned, and once more at liberty to pursue my own inclinations, I was persuaded by my father-in-law and friends to follow some employment or other; but the plantation from whence I was taken, though an exceeding good one,  could not tempt me to settle on it again. And their being at this time a necessity for raising men to check those barbarians in their ravaging depredations, I enlisted myself as one, with the greatest alacrity and most determined resolution to exert the utmost of my power in being revenged on the hellish authors of my ruin.

General Shirley, governor of New England, and commander-in-chief of his Majesty’s land forces in North America, was pitched upon to direct the operations of war in that part of the world.

Into a regiment immediately under the command of this general, was it my lot to be placed for three years. The regiment was intended for the frontiers, to destroy the forts erected by the French.”

From: Peter Williamson “The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave”. York, 1757.

To be continued.

 

Jun 032011
 

The Roe Buck – A Short Story By Alan Gatt.

He’d just been congratulating himself – it was quite early in the season to feel as fit as he did.

During the appalling winter, his saddle-fitness had declined, but since the spring had come early and bright he’d managed to improve on that.
Climbing the steepest hill he knew in the town; he’d managed it that day with less distress, in a higher gear, quicker and with better form than he’d done so far that year.

Half way up he’d even felt good enough to kick, to dig down into reserves of strength he didn’t know he had – to spin the pedals faster and actually accelerate up the hill.

That hill at the very edge of the parish boundary of his town – quite rural really – up a forestry trail to a summit with an Ordnance Survey concrete pillar trig-point on top and such a view! The hill that gathers the rain that feeds the springs that become the burn that gave his town its name and gave the town the green estuarine littoral to found itself upon all those centuries ago.

Cresting the summit and now on a plateau the cyclist knuckle-flicks the paddle to slip up a gear and relaxes, pleased with himself. Now travelling at about walking pace on the loose gravel path, heading slightly down and dead straight, increasing speed; faster now – jogging pace, faster now – running speed faster again – faster than a runner –  gravel chips pinging poing, boing from beneath chunky, nobbly tyres.

To think: the loose-ish glacially deposited aggregate sand and gravel of this kame hill were water-borne – carried by that burn water; speck by speck, stone by stone down the valley to form that estuary, now reclaimed beneath shopping mall and car park and railway station and road: a perfect flatland for development alongside the harbour – that harbour itself once the shifting sand estuary of a much mightier-yet watercourse, now granite pier and concrete pile contained, dredger-tamed.

Now speeding about as fast as he’d like to go for comfort and safety on the unmetalled surface – any more and his suspension-forks wouldn’t plushly absorb the bumps of the boulder-studded gravel and sand surface – he realises in the quiet of his outreaching thoughts that he’s not alone – something impinges on his consciousness, matching speed and direction – a flicker in the trees: the path now a fully enclosed avenue high contrast light and shadow strobe pulsing through the tree fronds hiding the sky above. Shafts of coppergold light here briefly blinding him through the slatted louvres of the pines – there illuminating the quiet dust of the still forest, suspended in the air, a moment holding its breath.

That flicker in the trees, it’s real, it’s alive, it’s a deer!

On a parallel route, he can see small antlers – a buck! Matching movement through the forest. But the cyclist is a noisy fuss on a forestry road and the roe buck is effortless amongst moss and fern and boulder and  trees, jinking and sidewinding – maintaining smooth forward momentum, muzzle high on this slender neck and with this jet black moist eye regarding and shadowing the cyclist’s progress, the roe buck stays with him – steady.

And then, the path gradient turns positive again, robbing both of speed, but still they shadow one another slowing to the crest, slowing, slowing together, stopping – stopped.

Unclipping one foot from a pedal, the mountain biker stands as still and quiet as he can on the upward-sloping path, and the roe stops too as if somehow robbed of the impetus which earlier made him run. A living-room’s width away, the deer is just inside the margin of the trees; this body parallel to the path, this head turning to the man. A moment of complete silence. A moment of complete stillness.

compared to the roe buck, he was just a conceited dilettante, with all this weird equipment and preparations

This moment – not enough for the man to see too deeply into these deep moist reflective big black eyes. Not enough to make a true mutual connection, not enough. But enough to for him to see that in these black moist eyes here is no human emotion – no way to ever connect.

And suddenly silently these eyes are away! Turning at right angles, the parallel shadowing over, finished – the buck springs with no noise and these slenderest of neat legs over a stone dyke into a grassy field and away swift and down towards the broad valley of the ancient burn. The two part, their paths brought together by coincidence, by providence, now their routes bifurcated and branching away from each other forever.

Standing now alone, the cyclist felt a little ashamed that he should have thought himself fit, that his meaty-thigh-powered steel and aluminium contrivance should have filled him with self-congratulatory regard. For all he prided himself on being an outdoor type; of connecting with the good earth, of living the life of the world – rather than just inhabiting it; now the man realised that, compared to the roe buck, he was just a conceited dilettante, with all this weird equipment and preparations and clothes and planning. A fussy amateur, only playing at being real – only pretending to be outside.

By contrast the deer was the very essence of a self-contained life without superfluity. Lean, slender, light, swift, efficient. Fit and fitting. Truly free.

For, now freed from his brief alien contact with the man, centred wholly and still within his body’s own movement, the buck’s desire line down into the valley is primordial. He is moving without moving, as water flows within itself; the buck cannot be anything other than what he is; he is integral.

Just as without the water there is no watercourse, the deer is self-contained in his looping graceful curved route down across open fields following a path of least resistance with no artifice, no construction, no meaning, no implication. Nothing is wasted and nothing is superfluous. He has neither capacity for understanding any distinction between himself and the landscape through which he moves, nor way of understanding the passing of one moment to the next. For by his existence that understanding would be redundant: he is that landscape; he is that movement; he is that moment – there can be no distinction for all are one.

as these thoughts wandered across his mind, the cyclist realised that he’d lost sight of the buck

Flashing across the field and vaulting… up, hey! Over another dyke at speed the buck somehow remains that silently moving pool of stillness, motionless in his body; moving without moving – completely fit for his surroundings and fitting them seamlessly and essentially.

Providence he is, and he is subject to providence. Here is no human emotion. Here is only motionless motion.

The cyclist stood watching as the buck receded to a speck, proceeding into the depths of the valley and from this high vantage the man’s eyes flickered to the prominences which he noticed stood, seeming sentinels, either side of the valley as it descended meandering eastwards towards the town’s urban centre.

On a hill to the north of the valley, a civic water supply reservoir. Looking for all the world like a truncated pyramid built by an ancient civilisation, the reservoir’s sepulchral forms devised an appropriate reflection to the modernist-style city crematorium which occupied the mirror-slope hill to the south. To the north, life-giving cool water – to the south, death and disposal in flames.

As he regarded the buildings on these slopes, and as these thoughts wandered across his mind, the cyclist realised that he’d lost sight of the buck. Try as he might, he couldn’t pick him out any more amongst the fields and dykes, hedges and copses as they spread out below him in the valley. He couldn’t see whether the roe buck would travel on the north or the south side. He couldn’t see what choice providence had made for the bifurcating future. On one branch, nurture and a plan for the future – on the other, consuming searing erasure; an end to a future.

He re-clipped his foot into the pedal, sighed deeply and pedalled on.

Jun 032011
 

With thanks to Mike Shepherd.

Peter Williamson was kidnapped from Aberdeen harbour in 1743 and shipped as a child slave to the American colonies. Following the death of his master, he married into a wealthy family and set up a farmstead on the frontiers of the province of Pennsylvania.
On the 2nd of October 1754 his farm was raided by Indians, set ablaze and Peter was captured.

This was never going to be the cross-culture-bonding-with-the-native-Americans epic beloved of modern Hollywood films, but something more prosaic. Peter was captured as a slave to help carry booty for the Indians from their raiding parties on frontier farms. His experiences during this time were brutal. Once the summer raiding season had ended, the Indians returned to their winter camp.

“A great snow now falling, the barbarians were a little fearful lest the white people should, by their traces, find out their skulking retreats, which obliged them to make the best of their way to their winter quarters, about two hundred miles farther from any plantations or inhabitants; where, after a long and tedious journey, being almost starved, I arrived with the infernal crew.

The place where we were to rest, in their tongue, is called Alamingo. There were found a number of wigwams full of their women and children. Dancing, shooting and shouting were their general amusements; and in all their festivals and dances they relate what successes they have had, and what damages they have sustained in their expeditions, in which I came part of the theme. The severity of the cold increasing, they stripped me of my clothes for their own use, and gave me such as they usually wore themselves, being a piece of blanket, a pair of moccasins, with a yard of coarse cloth to put round me instead of breeches.

They in general wear a white blanket, which in war time, they paint with various figures, but particularly the leaves of trees, in order to deceive their enemies in the woods. Their moccasins are made of deer skins, and the best sort have them bound round the edges with little beads and ribbons.

On their legs they wear pieces of blue cloth for their stockings, they reach higher than the knee, but not lower than their ankles. They esteem them easy to run in. Breeches they never wear, but instead thereof, two pieces of linen, one before and one behind. They are very proud, and take great delight in wearing trinkets, such as silver plates round their wrists and necks, with several strings of wampum (which is made of cotton, interwoven with pebbles, cockle-shells, etc) down to their breasts; and from their ears and noses they have rings and beads which hang dangling an inch or two.

The females are very chaste and constant to their husbands, and if any young maiden should happen to have a child before marriage, she is never esteemed afterwards. As for their food they get it chiefly by hunting and shooting, and boil or roast all the meat they can eat. Their standing dish consists of Indian corn soaked, then bruised and boiled over a gentle fire for ten or twelve hours. Their bread is likewise made of wild oats or sunflower seeds.

Scalping knife, powder and shot, are all they have to carry with them in time of war – bows and arrows are seldom used. They generally in war decline open engagements; bush fighting or skulking is their discipline; and they are brave when engaged, having great fortitude in enduring tortures or death. No people have a greater love of liberty or affection for their neighbours; but are the most implacably vindictive people upon the earth; for they revenge the death of any relation, or any great affront, whenever occasion presents, let the distance or time be so remote. To all which I may add they are inhumanly cruel.

At Alamingo I was kept for near two months until the snow was off the ground. A long time to be amongst such creatures and naked as I almost was. Whatever thoughts I might have of making my escape, to carry them into execution was impractical, being so far from any plantations or white people and the severe weather rendering my limbs in a manner quite stiff and motionless. However, I contrived to defend myself against the weather as well as I could by making a wigwam, with the bark of the trees, covering the same with earth, which made it resemble a cave, and keeping a good fire near the door.

At length the time arrived when they were preparing themselves for another expedition against the planters and white people; but before they set out they were joined by many other Indians from Fort Du Quesne, well stored with powder and ball they had received from the French.

We arrived at the Blue Hills where we encamped for three days. A council of war was held, when it was agreed to divide themselves into companies of about twenty men each; I was left behind with ten Indians. Here being left I began to meditate on my escape. “

From: Peter Williamson “The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave”. York, 1757. To be continued.

May 262011
 

With Thanks to Mike Shepherd.

Peter Williamson was kidnapped from Aberdeen harbour in 1743 and shipped as a child slave to the American colonies.

Last week’s article gave Peter’s own account of his kidnapping; this week describes what happened next.

Peter was bought for $16 by a fellow scot Hugh Wilson and indentured to serve him for seven years. Hugh was humane and looked after Peter well providing him with an education.

“With this good master I continued till I was seventeen years old, when he died, and as a reward for my faithful service, he left me $200 currency, his best horse, saddle and all his wearing apparel.

Being now my own master, having money in my pocket, and all other necessaries, I employed myself in jobbing around the country, working for anyone that would employ me, for near seven years.  When thinking that I had money sufficient to follow some better way of life, I resolved to settle, but thought one step necessary to follow some better way of life. Thereto was to be married, for which purpose I applied to the daughter of a substantial planter, and found my suit was not unacceptable to her or her father, so that matters were soon concluded upon, and we were married.

My father-in-law, in order to establish us in the world in an easy, if not affluent manner, made me a deed of gift of a track of land that lay on the frontiers of the province of Pennsylvania containing about 200 acres, 30 of which were cleared, and fit for immediate use, whereon was a good house and barn. The place pleased me well, and happy as I was in a good wife, yet did my felicity last me not long.  About the year 1754, the Indians began to be very troublesome on the frontiers of our province, where they generally appeared in small skulking parties, with yellings, shoutings and antic postures, committing great devastations. “

The fateful 2nd of October 1754, my wife went from home to visit some of her relations. As I stayed up later than usual, expecting her return, how great was my surprise, terror and affright, when about eleven o’clock at night I heard the dismal war-cry or war-whoop of the savages and to my inexpressible grief soon found my house was being attacked by them.

I flew to my chamber window and perceived them to be about twelve in number. They making several attempts to get in, I asked them what they wanted. They gave me no answer, but continued beating, and trying to get the door open. Having my gun loaded in my hand, I threatened them with death if they should not desist. One of them that could speak a little English, threatened me in return, “That if I did not come out, they would burn me alive in the house. If I would come out and surrender myself prisoner, they would not kill me”. Little could I depend on the promises of such creatures, and yet if I did not, inevitable death by being burnt alive must be my lot.

Distracted as I was in such deplorable circumstances, I chose to rely on the uncertainty of their fallacious promises, rather than meet with certain death by rejecting them; and accordingly went out of my house with my gun in my hand, not knowing what I did, or that I had it. Immediately on my approach, they rushed on me like so many tigers, and instantly disarmed me. Having me thus in their power the merciless villains bound me to a tree near the door; then they went into the house, and plundered and destroyed everything there was in it, carrying off what movables they could; the rest together with the house they set fire to.

Having thus finished the execrable business about which they came, one of the monsters came to me with a tomahawk in his hand, threatening me with the worst of deaths if I would not willingly go with them, and be contented with their way of living.”

From: Peter Williamson “The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave”. York, 1757. To be continued…

May 202011
 

By Bob Smith.

The MS Europa wis ower big
Ti berth in oor hairbour watters
We ACSEF chiels are already  thinkin
The toon’s reputation’s in tatters 

We canna lose future tourist fowk
So eence mair we’ll use a trick
We’ll get aa oor PR billies
Ti lay it on richt thick

Us ACSEF chiels are the lads
Ti organise things in the city
We’ll jist hae a bunch o CPOs
Gien ti the fowk faa bide in Fittie

We’ll knock doon aa their hoosies
Syne mak the hairbour fine an big
An great muckle cruise liners can sail
Past the golf course ower at Nigg

Ach we ken the fowk in Fittie
Wull be tearin oot their hair
It’s for the gweed o the toon
So we dinna bliddy care 

Noo there’ll be a lot o protest
So we’ll hae ti be richt fly
An git oor freens in the cooncil
Ti agree plans on the sly

Michty me we’re richt clivver
Eence mair we’ve worked a con
Noo fit aboot some ither plans
Fer a marina on the Don?

The Poetry Mannie’s used poetic licence
Fin writin iss poem’s verses
Bit shud iss fiction come ti pass
We’ll kick ACSEF fowk up their erses

©Bob Smith “The Poetry Mannie” 2011

May 202011
 

With Thanks to Mike Shepherd.

In 1743, thirteen year old Peter Williamson was kidnapped from Aberdeen harbour and shipped as a slave to the American colonies. He endured many experiences there, being captured by the Indians and held by them for three months, escaping to join the British army to fight against the French.

He eventually managed to return home to Aberdeen, where he declared that the local merchants and magistrates had been complicit in his kidnapping. They imprisoned him, only releasing Peter after he signed a declaration that his accusations were untrue.

He later sued a number of Aberdeen officials in the High Court, winning his case. It was revealed in court that as many as 600 local children had been kidnapped and sold into slavery between 1740 and 1746. He wrote an extraordinary book on his experiences, The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave.

This is how it starts:

“Know, therefore that I was born in Hirnlay, in the parish of Aboyne, and County of Aberdeen, North Britain, if not of rich, yet of reputable parents, who supported me in the best manner they could, as long as they had the happiness of me under their inspection; but fatally for me, and to their great grief, as it afterwards proved. I was sent to live with an aunt in Aberdeen.

When under the years of my pupillarity, playing on the quay, with others of my companions, being of a stout, robust constitution, I was taken notice of by two fellows belonging to a vessel in the harbour, employed (as the trade then was) by some of the worthy merchants of the town, in that villainous and execrable practice called Kidnapping; that is, stealing young children from their parents, and selling them as slaves in the plantations abroad.

Being marked out by these monsters of impiety as their prey, I was cajoled on board the ship by them, where I was no sooner got, than they conducted me between the decks to some others they had kidnapped in the same manner. At that time I had no sense of the fate that was destined for me, and spent the time in childish amusements with my fellow sufferers in the steerage, being never suffered to go upon deck whilst the vessel lay in the harbour, which was until such a time they had got in their loading, with a complement of unhappy youths for carrying on their wicked commerce.

In about a month’s time the ship set sail for America. I cannot forget that when we arrived on the coast, we were destined for, a hard gale of wind sprung up from the southeast, and, to the Captain’s great surprise (he not thinking he was near land) although having been eleven weeks on the passage, about twelve o’clock at night the ship struck on a sand-bank off Cape May, near the Capes of Delaware, and to the great terror and affright of the ship’s company, in a short time was almost full of water.

The boat was then hoisted out, into which the captain and his fellow villains – the crew – got with some difficulty, leaving me, and my deluded companions, to perish, as they then naturally concluded inevitable death to be our fate. The ship being on a sand-bank, which did not give way to let her deeper, we lay in the same deplorable condition until morning, when, though we saw the land of Cape May, at about a mile’s distance, we knew not what would be our fate.

The wind at length abated, and the captain (unwilling to lose all her cargo), about ten o’clock, sent some of his crew in a boat to the ship’s side to bring us onshore, where we lay in a sort of a camp, made of the sails of the vessel, and such other things as we could get. The provisions lasted until we were taken in by a vessel to Philadelphia, lying on this island, as well as I can recollect, near three weeks. Very little of the cargo was saved undamaged, and the vessel entirely lost.

When arrived and landed at Philadelphia, the capital of Pennsylvania, the captain had soon people enough who came to buy us. He, making the most of his villainous loading, after his disaster, sold us at about $16 per head.  What became of my unhappy companions I never knew; but it was my lot to be sold to one of my countrymen, whose name was Hugh Wilson, a North Briton, for the term of seven years, who had in his youth undergone the same fate as myself, having been kidnapped from St. Johnstown, in Scotland. “

From: Peter Williamson – The Life and Curious Adventures of Peter Williamson, Who was Carried off from Aberdeen and Sold for a Slave, York, 1757. To be continued…

Oct 012010
 

By Simon Gall.
A 72 metre former Russian Navy fire-fighting vessel set sail from Aberdeen Harbour last Monday where it replenished its stocks, collected new crew members and continued its tour of the world’s seas.

The Greenpeace ship the Esperanza currently on its ‘Go Beyond Oil’ Tour aims to “investigate, expose and confront environmental abuse by governments and corporations”(1) and raise awareness about the potential hazards of deepwater drilling, drilling in the Arctic and oil extraction from the Canadian Tar Sands.

The vessel had come to Aberdeen directly from an action against Edinburgh-based Company Cairn Energy in an Arctic region near Greenland known as ‘Iceberg Alley‘, where the company had been drilling two deepwater exploration wells at a depth of 300 to 500 metres (around 300 metres and above usually constitutes deepwater drilling).

Governments and citizens around the world have become very wary of deepwater drilling since the recent BP disaster but Cairn Energy claim they have “put procedures in place to give the highest possible priority to safety and environmental protection,”(2).However, a sceptical Greenpeace highlights that, “if a spill (were to occur) in this harsh and unpredictable Arctic environment the consequences would likely be disastrous. Little to no capacity exists to handle accidents in ice-filled seas. The techniques deployed in the Gulf which were fraught with failure would be useless in the Arctic.

Cold weather, thick ice cover and the slow development of plants and animals means that multiple generations of organisms would be exposed to contamination since the toxic oil would linger in the environment. Even without a major spill, the regular ongoing industry practices of exploration, seismic testing, and extraction of offshore oil reserves has the potential to disrupt seasonal migrations of whales, spawning run of salmon, and crucial reproductive periods of migrating birds”.(1)

First, they occupied the anchor chain and erected a ‘survival pod’ to stop the ship leaving the harbour

Greenpeace activists expressed their concerns about the Arctic project by climbing and occupying the company’s Stena Don oil rig effectively shutting it down, but after 40 hours extreme weather forced the protestors to abandon the action and give themselves up.

They were subsequently arrested, fined roughly $3,440(3) each and deported to their home countries. In the days after the departure of the Esperanza from the area, Cairn Energy announced it had found oil and that it was testing the first samples. The news delighted industry investors and many in Greenland.

Next, the ship travelled to the Shetland Islands (via Aberdeen) where the Chevron drilling ship the ‘Stena Carron’ was about to leave Lerwick Harbour to make it’s way to an exploratory deepwater drilling site to the north of the Islands in the Lagavulin oil field (at the time of writing the company still had not been granted permission by the Department of Energy and Climate Change).

There the touring activists spent a week preventing the ship from reaching its destination. First, they occupied the anchor chain and erected a ‘survival pod’ to stop the ship leaving the harbour but when Chevron’s lawyers won a court order demanding that the occupation be abandoned immediately the 100 hour action was called off and the ‘pod‘ was lowered.

Determined to stop the vessel from reaching its destination, the group changed its tactics and despatched a group of swimmers to block its path.

This controversial action, deemed by many as ‘dangerous’ and ‘reckless’, was brought to end after Chevron’s lawyers made a second trip to Edinburgh and won a second injunction against Greenpeace. On hearing the news, the activists again called off their 50 hour action.

The Stena Carron then continued on its way to the site and the activists returned to the Esperanza. There is currently a nationwide campaign underway to dissuade the Energy Secretary Chris Huhne from granting permission to Chevron to begin its deepwater drilling project in the Lagavulin oil field.

The tour goes on……

Sources.

(1) http://www.gobeyondoil.org

(2) http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/aug/31/greenpeace-oil-rig-arctic

(3) http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/press/releases/Activists-Deported-from-Greenland/