Those that promote the meme of Irish perpetual hereditary chattel slavery use a variety of images entirely unrelated to indentured servitude to accompany their anti-history. Liam Hogan examined a selection of them.
1. Sale of a Slave Girl in Rome by Jean-Léon Gérôme (1884)
The most popular image to accompany the spurious “Irish: the Forgotten White Slaves” articles. It is cropped from a painting by Jean-Léon Gérôme. In this work, Gérôme imagined a scene in a Roman slave market… about two thousand years ago.
‘A Roman Slave Market’, c. 1884, by Jean-Léon Gérôme
2. The “Redlegs” of Barbados (1908)
The “Irish slaves” meme has been embraced by racists and white nationalists. The meme below was shared by a Tea Party Leader in 2013. It accompanied her advice to African Americans to “move on” from slavery.
But this photograph is not from the U.S., nor does it depict “White Irish slaves.”
Historian Matthew C. Reilly has done extensive research on the “poor white” community of Barbados. This photo was taken in Barbados in 1908, none of those pictured have Irish surnames, and these families appear to have both African and European ancestry. Reilly writes about the “Photograph locally known as The ‘Redlegs’ of Barbados. Pictured are fishermen residents of Bath in the parish of St. John taken in 1908. Photo courtesy of Mr. Richard Goddard.” He continues:
“The photograph is widely known amongst island history buffs as well as those interested in family genealogy. On several occasions I encountered individuals who had traced their ancestry to one of the impoverished men pictured in the 1908 portrait of the “Redleg” fishermen. Until my conversation with Fred Watson… however, I had never heard it referred to as a “family photograph”. Represented are members of the Watson, Goddard, King, and Haynes families, surnames popular amongst the “Redleg” population for several generations and still present in St. John today. Fred was able to identify several of his father’s and mother’s brothers that were pictured in the photograph including his mother’s brother Simeon Goddard found on the lower left and his father’s brother Joe Watson found in center of the back row. The revelation that the photograph depicts an extended matrilineal kinship network was made more significant by the realization that phenotypes indicate that this network involved Afro-Barbadian as well as “poor white” genealogies.”
3. Photo of survivors of a Japanese POW camp during World War 2 (c. 1945)
4. Union Army soldier on his release from Andersonville Prison in May (1865)
Probably the most perverse co-option of all. Victims of the horror of the Confederate Andersonville prison appropriated by Neo-Confederates to support their racist meme. N.B. the Ferguson hashtag.
‘Union Army soldier on his release from Andersonville in May, 1865’
5. Child labourers on a Texan farm (1912)
This is another popular image. It is used here to promote an “Irish Slave Trade” movie idea.
This photo of child labourers was taken in 1912 by the great Lewis Hine. The children were working on H.M. Lane’s farm near Bells, Texas. Their father (and uncle for some of the children) was working the plough nearby. This photo is sometimes used on Stormfront when discussing “white slaves.”
‘Children cotton pickers’, c. 1912, Lewis Hine
6. The East India Company logo (c. 1600 – 1874)
The ongoing “we were slaves too!” appropriation of the Atlantic Slave Trade has led to this spectacular misfire.
The East India Company logo tattooed as an “Irish slave” branding. I asked this tattooist about the relevance of the tattoo. He referred me to an inactive (and since deleted) Facebook page named “We Were Irish and Slaves”. This Facebook page was the source and inspiration for the tattoo design. The featured branding irons (first and second images) are from the Wilberforce Museum. The third image, the one that the tattoo is based on, is a stamp of the East India Company, not a branding iron. It goes without saying that indentured servants were not branded like slaves on their arrival in the colonies.
7. Former Enslaved Children in New Orleans (c. 1864)
The comfort and ease at which some Irish and Irish-Americans appropriate the history of black chattel slavery is remarkable and disturbing. Guilty of the appropriation below is the “Ireland Long Held in Chains” Facebook page. They shared this photo of former “white” slave children in New Orleans and labelled it “Irish Slavery — Three Slaves”.
This piece of anti-slavery propaganda during the American Civil War was aimed at a Northern white audience. These enslaved children were “the offspring of white fathers through two or three generations.” The fact that many slave owners in Louisiana were of Irish descent only makes this appropriation more reprehensible. In my review of Irish surnames and slave-ownership I found that 159 different Irish surnames were represented among slave owners in Louisiana in 1850. These included Brady, Burke, Carroll, Connolly, Collins, Cullen, Crowley, Darcy, Devane, Hickey, Hogan, Keane, Lynch, Mahoney, McCormack, and Murphy. You can read about the history of these photographs in Mary Niall Mitchell’s article in the New York Times.
“Rebecca, Charley & Rosa, slave children from New Orleans”, c. 1864, by Charles Paxson
8. Group portrait of child labourers in Port Royal, South Carolina (1911)
This “white slavery” meme (which appropriates the Zong Massacre) uses one of Lewis Hine’s photographs. Its caption reads “Group portrait of young girls working as oyster shuckers at the canning company at Port Royal, SC, 1911. From left to right: Josie, six years old, Bertha, six years old, and Sophie, 10 years old.”
Here is the original photograph.
“Group portrait of young girls working as oyster shuckers at the canning company at Port Royal, SC, 1911. From left to right: Josie, six years old, Bertha, six years old, and Sophie, 10 years old.”, by Lewis Hine, 1911
9. The HMS Owen Glendower, an anti-slave trade frigate (1808)
Irish Central decided to use a painting of the HMS Glendower to accompany their article about “forgotten white slaves”.
It states that this ship was used to bring “human cargo to South American[sic] and the Indies.” This article repeats the absurd claim that an “Irish slave trade” ended in 1839. But the HMS Glendower was not a slave ship. In fact it was used from 1821 to 1824 to suppress the slave trade.
‘HMS Owen Glendower’, 1808, painter unknown
10. The Putumayo Atrocities(c. 1913)
The Ancient Order of Hibernians in Florida (State Board) appropriated an image of heavily chained Putumayo Indians, implying that they are “Irish slaves”.
The Putumayo, c. 1913, by Walter Hardenburg
11. Timucua men cultivating a field and Timucua women planting corn or beans, Florida (c. 1560)
This image of the Timucua people planting their fields appears on some “Irish slaves” and “white slaves” blogs. The Neo-Confederate Save Your Heritage website frames it as “white slaves” working in South Carolina.
‘Florida Indians planting seeds of beans or maize’, c. 1560 by Theodor de Bry, Engraved by Jacques Le Moyne de Morgues
12. An illustration of Elizabeth Brownrigg, a torturer and murderer who was executed in England in 1767.
This “Irish slaves” meme uses an illustration of the infamous Elizabeth Brownrigg taken from The New Newgate Calendar, a sensationalist periodical which was published in England in the 1860s. The text of the meme is ridiculous; the values are apparently an invention, and it almost goes without saying that slaves were generally more expensive than servants because they were slaves. Lifetime ownership vs. 4–7 years indentures and slave-owners also claimed their children as their property. Although rare, in times of shortage (when labour demand/wages were high in Britain and thus migration unattractive) white servants’ contracts could be more expensive than slaves. It was a crime to murder a servant, but whipping was allowed as long as it was “moderate correction.” The claim that “African slaves were treated much better in Colonial America” is racist propaganda.
Here is the original image.
13. ‘Mulatto’ slave being whipped in an anti-slavery novel (1852)
This illustration is appropriated from the 19th century anti-slavery novel The White Slave; or, Memoirs of a Fugitive by Richard Hildreth. The protagonist being whipped is a ‘mulatto’ slave. His mother was enslaved and his father the enslaver.
‘The Trial of Affection’, from the 1852 edition of ‘The White Slave; or, Memoirs of a Fugitive’, Published by Boston: Tappan and Whittemore, illustrator unknown
14. Breaker boys working in Ewen Breaker of Pennsylvania Coal Co. (1910)
This is the newest version of the racist meme. It appeared online during Black History Month 2016 and has been shared 102,000 times so far.
The photo does not depict “Irish slaves”, but breaker boys working in Ewen Breaker of Pennsylvania Coal Co., South Pittston, Pennsylvania. The original photograph was taken by Lewis Hine in January 1911. Hine was the principle investigative photographer for National Child Labor Committee (NCLC).
‘Breaker Boys’, 1910, by Lewis Hine
15. A promotional photograph for a performance of Dion Boucicault’s play “The Octoroon” in London (c. 1862)
This satirical image was intended to challenge the audience by reversing racial stereotypes and it was used to promote the play during it’s run at the Adelphi theatre in London. Dion Boucicault is one of Ireland’s most famous playwrights and The Octoroon was his anti-slavery production based on Thomas Mayne Reid’s novel The Quadroon.
16. Edwardian Servants, Byfield, Northamptonshire (c. 1896 – 1920)
Some of these websites take the term ‘indentured servants’ literally. They turned this image of two maids photographed in a house in Byfield, Northamptonshire, sometime between 1896 and 1920….
from Irish Slave Trade, Ancient Order of Hibernians (Florida)
…and made it into a catastrophically awful “white slavery” meme.
17. The Damm family, Los Angeles, (1987)
The “Irish slaves” meme is also used to deny the existence of white privilege.
It is often accompanied by an image of the Damm family taken by the photographer Mary Ellen Mark in Los Angeles in 1987.
‘The Damm Family in Their Car’, 1987, by Mary Ellen Mark
18. An advert for two runaway Irish servants
“Make a toast to all the Irish Slaves who died making America great.”
“It says indented servants?”
“Shut up.”
A listing for runaway indentured servants, probably from the Georgia Gazette in 1775.
19. An image from a Human Trafficking website and a photograph of President Obama’s visit to Moneygall, Ireland
This meme was created by conservative artist JP Hawkins in 2o13.
The caption reads “Obama visits Ireland, but fails to point out that the Irish were 1st slaves! Why?” The background image is a stock image taken from the Shutter Stock website and is tagged ‘Domestic Violence’.
Liam Hogan is a librarian and historian, researching: Slavery – Memory – Power. Follow him on Twitter: @limerick1914
This is part one of his series debunking the meme. Please see Part Two, Part Three, Part Four and Part Five.
Allegedly Dave says
14/01/2018 at 13:31Thanks for this, although one major important point was missed. The fact is THE IRISH WERE THE FIRST SLAVES!!
The original Irish (and Scottish) were BLACK people, descended from Hebrew Israelites, who called themselves the Iber (Hiber/Heber vowels did not exist in their language) after their Patriarch Eber from where the word Hebrew comes from (same as the Ibos or Igbo in sub-saharan Africa), and first settled in Spain/Portugal which they called the Iberian Peninsular after themselves. After being chased out by red haired barbarians they founded a new country across the sea which they also named after themselves, Hibernia (Which in Paleo Hebrew means Land of the Hebrews) and some went on to found what became Scotland via the HEBRIDES)
Irish is actually Iber-ish (Paleo Hebrew for ‘Hebrew Man’) but these details have been hidden by revisionist history with names like Celt-Iberians or just Celts. (Find a book called ‘Whence the Black Irish of Jamaica?’ and/or ‘The Secret Services of John Macky Esq’ for proof of their identity)
When the last Black king of the Stewart line (Charles II, the Black Boy) was executed, a Germanic false royalty was placed on the throne and immediately they set about exterminating the Black people of Ireland killing or transporting the males to the West indies and raping the women who remained until the population in Ireland began to resemble their red haired conquerers but since anyone with one drop of negro blood is considered a negro, the Irish were regarded as such until 1940 when they were finally accepted into the white race after 300 years of breeding out. (For more details, find a video on youTube called ‘Black Man Do You Know Who You Are?’)
I hope you’ll agree that this puts a whole different slant on the whole “Irish were the first slaves” narrative.
admin says
02/02/2018 at 00:14What an extraordinary account! But, and it is a big but, your argument only proposes an alternative lineage to the Irish, not an alternative to the trans Atlantic slave trade of Africans and ensuing chattel slavery from approximately 1440 – 1860.
Timothy L. Smith says
14/02/2019 at 16:43Please give me some references to your assertions, because this was an educated guess on my side as well. I just don’t have the sources, or even know where to look for such info. Thanks!
Kemi Magee says
24/08/2020 at 03:22Bwhahahahaha…..Man I do not know what drugs you are taking but you are soooooooooooo far off it is laughable…. Hebrew Israelite’s are another made up bullshit anti white hate crew……Please keep your delusions to yourself Mr special needs Dave hahahahahaha
Beth says
09/03/2020 at 23:24Stupid to argue about such things. The Irish were starved to death in the hundreds of thousands by the British. At least people fed their slaves because they were valuable property. My ancestors were Scotch Irish coal miners and sharecroppers. Many white people became rich by working my ancestors to death. They also starved them. And why do we never talk about reparations for Native Indians? Black people were not the only ones who suffered. I am not a bigot but I despise people trying to minimize the suffering of other races.
admin says
01/04/2020 at 14:14“Black people were not the only ones who suffered” is not up for debate. This article is addresses those deliberately fueling racial tension based on lies and the manipulation of images.
Kemi Magee says
24/08/2020 at 03:25Those hate crews are irrelevant and not looked upon fondly by the majority of white people world wide…..There are pictures of white slaves FYI……
Rebecca says
08/07/2020 at 13:49The so-called Irish slaves were not Scotch-Irish Protestants, but Irish Catholics. The Irish Catholics were starving during the potato famine, and were helped out by mass immigration to America. The Irish Catholics were fighting the Irish Protestants continually, and also were known for leading marginal lives which the English were expected to not only put up with, but support with money. They had a type of welfare in old England. What really ticked off the English and later the Americans, is the Irish would take the side of Catholic Spain over the English every time they were at war. They helped the enemies of England out. Many Scotch-Irish in America made out really well, but they didn’t choose to go or stay where your ancestors did.
EyeRoll says
29/11/2021 at 09:18American Indians have received three types of reparations: (1) cash payments, through the operation of the Indian Claims Commission and the U.S. Court of Claims; (2) land, through an occasional action of Congress to return control over land to particular tribes; and (3) tribal recognition, by either Congress or the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
trevor says
09/06/2020 at 22:45Slavery was common in Africa, done to Africans by Africans, and not something devised by Whites. Ireland was a centre of slavery before the Eleventh Century. According to Wikipedia Dublin was the biggest slave market in Europe. Thousands upon thousands were captured from England and enslaved by the Irish clans. Most famous of whom is St. Patrick.
So you Blacks and Irish can stop your Opression Olympics duel.
admin says
15/06/2020 at 23:11Off topic. The article focuses on the misuse of visual information to perpetuate misinformation about the Trans-Atlantic Slave trade and the treatment of slaves in the Americas.
Tom says
07/07/2020 at 12:59You seem to forget slavery was introduced to Africa after Muhammad’s death When Muslims conquered major areas of Northern and central Africa around 600AD. Western Europeans didn’t even show up on the scene until approximately the 17th century when Portugal arrived to trade. Africans had almost 1000 years of practice where kings and tribal warlords sold their own people all over the world. So I don’t know what your point is here but the Irish And Scott’s suffered extensively at the hands of Britain. The abolishment of slavery only occurred because Western Europeans moved to the Americas and Christianity flourished emancipating Africans after they literally destroyed their own people for a millennia. How dare you belittle the Scotts And Irish slaves by pointing to So called fake images when their pain and suffering through slavery was a real thing historically. You should be ashamed of yourself. You are nothing but a liberal historical revisionist.
admin says
09/10/2020 at 17:18The point is pretty clear throughout the article, please take a deep breath and re-read. The article debunks the misuse of images, paintings, photos that have been used as ‘proof’ in demonstrating the Irish were treated the same or worse than Africans in the slave trade (1619–1865). All examples shown here are all of course fictional and therefore misleading. We are well aware of Irish history and the injustices inflicted on the Irish over time, including the treatment of women and indentured servitude. Again, as you can see that is not the point of the article nor does it deny the existence of other forms of cruelty and dehumanisation.
Rebecca says
12/07/2020 at 21:41There’s a book titled “How the Irish Became White,” by Noel Ignatiev, a Communist. And there’s a wiki bio on him. He is totally anti-white, even though he is white. He does not mind using old grudges between racial/tribal groups to keep them at each other’s throats- to put it mildly.
admin says
09/10/2020 at 17:19I don’t agree about your characterisation of Ignatiev, however I do think that ‘How the Irish Became White’ is one of the least read and most over referenced books in the last few years. It isn’t a great book and Ignatiev makes errors as a researcher imo.
Kemi Magee says
24/08/2020 at 03:13So you are one of those that do not believe White Irish people were ever kidnapped, stolen, sold into slavery? Let me guess, you believe all of that servitude to work off a loan for passage to America B.S. right? Guess who built the first slave ships and were also the first slaves in America under colonial rule? Certainly wasn’t Africans…The Irish were…Also a Black man could get a job before an Irishman in New Amsterdam….What history that has been sealed for many years would turn the whole of society 180 degrees, this is what one curator at the Smithsonian quoted when asked why the Smithsonian isn’t open for researchers….There is also a Archives building in Dublin off limits to anyone, except those who have been thoroughly checked and can show due cause to enter….Takes approximately six months. Poor whites and poor blacks both worked farms side by side that were not slaves, including picking cotton…Matter of fact the majority of child labor happened to be white….Sounds like you are racist…….Against whites……
serv•i•tude sûr′vĭ-too͞d″, -tyoo͞d″►
n.
A state of subjection to an owner or master.
n.
Lack of personal freedom, as to act as one chooses.
admin says
09/10/2020 at 17:22I will write the same to you as I did ‘Tom’ above:
The point is pretty clear throughout the article, please take a deep breath and re-read. The article debunks the misuse of images, paintings, photos that have been used as ‘proof’ in demonstrating the Irish were treated the same or worse than Africans in the slave trade (1619–1865). Indentured Servitude and sex trafficking, as horrendous as they are, are not the same as chattel slavery. We are well aware of Irish history and the injustices inflicted on the Irish over time. Again, as you can see that is not the point of the article nor does it deny the existence of other current or historical forms of cruelty and dehumanisation.
Ronnie says
21/04/2021 at 03:45The point of this article was missed by commentators
Propaganda is in wide use to misinform the people
This is not a new phenomena
I am an defendant of serfs from Scotland on my maternal side
I still understand how American’s used chattel slavery to enrich themselves
In Africa yes, there was slavery from debt and war
It was the U.S that based slavery on skin color and total dehumanization they were masters of propaganda and misinformation to prevent the poor and enslaved people from working together to make change
God forbid they give up any of the wealth they acquired from the backs of the enslaved people or the poor and this continues today
Debunking misinformation aimed at separating people is so important
just me says
20/02/2022 at 16:59Think you meant ‘descendant’? anyway, we were all slaves & have all been used and abused at one point or another….even today!
All I know is the elites of today are still abusing power & I don’t like it. Regardless of about what happened 1000 years ago….we have our own problems in the here & now, we ought to work on fixing the system because currently, it’s fixed to make the rich richer & the poor poorer….
Joe Shephard says
15/09/2022 at 16:04Sure, many pictures have false captions but we have ample evidence that there were white slaves in the New World. That is the word they used to describe their condition and status. President Andrew Johnson was an escaped slave and he kept the chains in his Oval Office desk.
admin says
21/10/2022 at 19:57No one is denying the existence of other forms of forced labour, they however remains distinctly different than the race based chattel slavery of the New World. What you write about Andrew Johnson is simply not true.