Educate and highlight all sides of story
Dear Editor
While the Melville Monument in Perthshire may not be as well-known as Edinburgh’s controversial statue, it nevertheless raises questions in Comrie and surrounding communities.
As your recent article reported, local author Felicity Martin suggests that “some form of plaque should be erected to put people in the full picture in terms of Dundas’s links to the slave trade”.
The 72-foot high obelisk commands one of the most magnificent views in Perthshire, but let not the disgraced Henry Dundas cast a shadow of shame over that community.
The parish of Comrie was the birthplace of and home to one of the most influential anti-slavery activists in history: James Drummond MacGregor.
The son of Janet and Jacob Drummond, he was born in 1759 on the Drummond Estate, part of which (Dunira) was sold in 1784 to Henry Dundas.
The family were estate workers, originally MacGregors, whose people adopted the estate owner’s name when their own was outlawed.
Supplementing their earnings with hand-loom weaving and selling produce to cattle drovers, they were able to pay for schooling, and, latterly, James boarded in Dunblane to study Gaelic and Hebrew.
He enrolled at Glasgow University, studying Moral Philosophy and Classics, and during the summer earned the fees teaching in Glen Lednock.
In 1784, with the repeal of the Act outlawing the MacGregors, James reclaimed his family name, ever after using the name MacGregor.
He went on to study Theology, hoping to become a minister in a Gaelicspeaking Highland parish.
Instead, he was called to serve a community of Highland immigrants in Pictou County, Nova Scotia, and in 1786 he set sail from Greenock.
Seven weeks later he disembarked in Halifax and was met by a guide who accompanied him as far as Truro, where they rested for a few days in the home of an elderly clergyman.
During the visit, MacGregor was horrified to discover that the minister was a slave owner, as were some of his fellow clergy.
Furthermore, they bought and sold slaves, and MacGregor’s plea for the freedom of a slave girl was met with the response that her freedom would have to be purchased.
Ahead of him was a perilous journey and the enormous challenge of preaching outdoors until a log church could be built.
To begin with, he had to live in spartan conditions, but MacGregor was determined to do all in his power for the emancipation of slaves.
On receiving his year’s stipend of £27, he gave £20 towards the freedom of one of the Truro slaves, and pledged the remainder to pay the price in full.
In a long letter published in Halifax and later in Scotland, Rev Dr MacGregor confronted fellow Christians about the immorality of “enslaving God’s children”.
He also composed and published anti-slavery poems, helped pay for the release of other slaves, and spent the rest of his life devoted to anti-slavery.
James MacGregor never saw Scotland again, and died in Nova Scotia in 1830 at the age of 71.
His own country may have forgotten him, but Rev Dr MacGregor is remembered as Canada’s leading abolitionist and activist.
As historian Barry Cahill notes, the letters, poems and tracts of James MacGregor are “the earliest and most outstanding production of white anti-slavery literature in Canada”.
The monument overlooking MacGregor’s native soil is a reminder of a man whose political manoeuvres delayed the abolition of slavery by 15 years.
Local folk in Comrie are familiar with Dundas Street, Melville Square and Melville Lane, but I wonder who has heard of James MacGregor?
As Professor Sir Geoff Palmer recently stated: “We need to make sure any steps we take serve to educate and highlight all sides of the story.”
Prof Margaret Bennett