It is a bit of a shame that so many are using this thread to try to imply that "other people" were worse slavers than the writer of tuhe post. All of the nations of Britain, and Ireland, have a strong historic connection with slavery, as has probably every other nation in the world. My own ancesteors(chielfy Cornish, Devon and Cumbrrian) come from areas particularly associated with the maritime industries in the 1500-1800 period, and of course at that timeslaving was a huge part of that indistry. Now, whether my ancestors were personally involved I have no means of finding out, but I imagine it is perfectly likely. In fact, it is a statistival virtual certainty that all posters to this thread are (a) descended from slavers and (b) descended from slave.
    The question is, what might we do about it it? And trying to imply that certain nations or ethnic groups weren't implicated is ludicrous. In the old days, every natiom)however you care to derfine that term) was guilty.
    And to Divis Sweeney: the quote from the Flying Cloud, as I should thought was blindingly obvious, was to give a harrowing immediate and chilling account of what was commonplace then throughout England, Wales, Scotland and Ireland. Folksong, as is often the cae, can give us a closer look at history than many books of scholarship.