White Gold: The Extraordinary Story of Thomas Pellow and Islam's One Million White Slaves

by Giles Milton

Book Overview

The true story of white European slaves in eighteenth century Algiers, Tunis, and Morocco In the summer of 1716, a Cornish cabin boy named Thomas Pellow and fifty-one of his comrades were captured at sea by the Barbary corsairs. Their captors--Ali Hakem and his network of Islamic slave traders--had declared war on the whole of Christendom. France, Spain, England and Italy had suffered a series of devastating attacks. Thousands of Europeans had been...

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0374289352
• ISBN13: 9780374289355
• Release Date: June 2005
• Publisher: Farrar Straus Giroux
• Length: 316 Pages
• Weight: 1.18 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.3" x 9.1"

Customer Reviews

Excellent book!

This book is VERY interesting. It tells the story of this young boy who is captured by the north Africa pirates and made a slave of the sultan in Morocco. I really recommend it!

Historical Account

Having heard of this book from friends, I checked it out before purchase as there are nowadays many examples of history being rewritten for what might be termed "politially correct" reasons. Indeed this book may soon be unavailable due to those reasons. It could be construed that this account of slavery might cause offense to Muslims, though none of the Muslims I know personally would be so offended. But one of the motivations for me to buy this book was the "review" by the (Islamic?) correspondent of the Washington Post, which you kindly reproduce. Viewing this distainful dismissal was for me most revealing and may (I hope) encourage others to make this purchase also. They will be rewarded by an account of a period of history which is being quietly swept under the carpet and out of sight.

First I ever heard of White Slavery from England

Did you know that Arab slave traders used to pluck villagrs and fishermen from the coast of Britain and take them off to serve in slavery in the Islamic world. I didn't even know that this trade existed, and in fact it continued into the eighteenth century - this little known fact has been turned into another compelling history by Giles milton He tells this story mostly from the records remaining about Thomas Pellow, an 11-year-old English child who was seized in 1716 and served for 23 years as a personal servant to Sultan Moulay Ismail of Morocco. However Pellow provides a background for the slave trade in general. It seems to be a very good choice of subject. He was young enough to assimilate to a greater extent with his new owners - learnign the language and customs quickly. He was also smart and plucky enough to get himself out of all kinds of situations which would have meant instant death for many. The value of life was not that great. For the rest of Pellow's crewmates there was little hope and many served in appalling circumstances and died there labouring on the immense palaces the Moulay wanted to build. Most extraodinary is the almost catch 22 the prisoners found themselves in, if they converted to Islam they would not be eligible for ransom by their government, however if they didn't convert they were almost sure to die in appalling conditions. Milton writes without turning this into a tabloid-style history - it is balanced and interesting, he doesn't linger on the horrors, keeping to the story. I think this makes it strongger, and I found this book a real page turner - following Pellow's captivity and eventual daring gives it structure and the research fills in the background - my highest recommendation

Never told

Islam enslaved the world. Muslims raided Ukrain for slaves for more than a thousand years. Muslim slave armies were made up of boys stolen from homes in Eastern Europe during the Ottoman colonization of Europe. Over 11 million African slaves were deported to Muslim nations. Millions of Rajput Hindu slaves were deported, enough that the Gypsies found their way to Europe in this manner. This book tells the story of the people enslaved by the Barbary pirates in the 17th-19th centuries until their evils were put asunder by the great U.S Navy when Jefferson declared that the world had had enough. This book is about barbarism, it is about slavery, and it is about opening the doors on the slave trade by Muslims of non-muslims, a trade which still goes on in the Gulf State and Saudi Arabia as well as Sudan and Niger. A slave trade aided, abbetted and covered up by western liberals. This book is a must read, if not for the harrowing account then to enlighten about a part of history that will never be taught in school, since it invovles daring to expose the 'religion of peace'. Seth J. Frantzman