Enslavers from the North East
Most North-East enslavers were absentee landowners who had migrated to the Caribbean to make their fortunes, then returned home to manage the enslaved people at a distance through estate managers so that profits flowed back to Scotland.
For example, on the Georgia Estate in Jamaica which was owned by the Gordon family, the profits from growing and processing sugar cane enabled them to lavishly re-design Cairness House in the 1790s. Others were doctors, church ministers and administrators who maintained the infrastructure of slavery, while others became the direct – and brutal – overseers of enslaved people.
The impact of North-East Scotland can be seen in the use of names. In 1834 there are records of six places in the Caribbean which were called ‘Aberdeen’, while enslavers even named people after Scottish towns.
Papers of some local families that included enslavers are in the care of the University, such as the Gordons of Buthlaw and Cairness, the Earls of Fife, the Leslies of Warthill, and the Shands of the Burn at Edzell. However, we do not have archives that directly record the voices of enslaved people themselves.