Last updated 15:09, Thursday, 03 July 2008

LETTERS, which have been in the possession of a Langholm family for more than 200 years, are now providing a unique insight into part of Scotland’s history and even wider British history.

Suzanne Schwarz, Professor of History at Liverpool Hope University, while researching her first book about slave ships, learned that the Irving family, who live at Townhead, had letters relevant to her subject.

They had been handed down and carefully preserved over several generations, having been written by their forebears, two cousins both named James Irving.

Professor Schwarz has previously spoken to young David about the cousins and now that she is writing a second book named Slave Captains, she returned to Langholm to learn more about the 18th century Irving brothers.

Born in Langholm, they both rose to the rank of ship’s surgeon before they turned to the lucrative trade in slavery, sailing out of Liverpool bound for Africa and eventually across the Atlantic to the American colonies where they sold their human cargo.

Their first-hand hand-written accounts of their experiences and their thoughts were sent back to their family in Langholm.

Never intended for publication, they are of great value as they give an unselfconscious judgement by those involved in this shameful episode in our history when one-fifth of all the slave ships were captained by Scots.

The letters reveal the mind-set of these slave traders as they wrote down their thoughts on the practice.

One cousin describes walking among his 500 to 600 “black cattle”.

The irony is that the cousins were captured and enslaved by natives when their ship was wrecked off the coast of Africa.

One of them writes of their cruel treatment at the hands of these “savage and barbaric people”. When released, they both returned to slaving but eventually they died at sea.

One of the cousins is buried in the old kirkyard next to the Kirk Wynd where you can see the family gravestone.

One cousin bought the Buck Hotel for his innkeeper father.

If the Irving family hadn’t preserved this correspondence, we wouldn’t have this revelation on the slave trade and a small part of Langholm’s history would be missing.

As we embark on the month that culminates in our Common Riding, thoughts are already turning towards Langholm's great day.

I realised with a shock that the Benty ride-out is only just over a week away. So thistles will be under scrutiny as the decision looms on which will be the chosen one.

From my window overlooking the former Ford Mill and the wilderness which once was lovingly-tended gardens, I see a reasonable specimen of this “mony-brainchin’ candelabra”.

The thistle is a recurring image in MacDiarmid’s poetry. He describes it in various ways. He even writes whole poems on the subject. From The Form and Purpose of the Thistle comes this verse:

“The craft that hit upon the reishlin’ stalk,

wi’ts gausty leaves and a’its datchie jags,

and spired it syne in seely flooers to brak

like sudden lauchter owre its fousome rags

Jouks me, sardonic lover, in the routh

O’ contrairies that jostle in this dumfoondrin’ growth.”

Well, the flooers on the Ford Mill thistle are about to brak. There’s even a smaller plant close by which might do a boys’ Common Riding.