Redleg's the Caribbean White Impressment / Indenture Servants... Slaves?

5fish

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I learn this that in the Caribbean islands poor whites were called Redlegs... Many of us know that the Kansas Jayhawks were call called Redlegs because they wore red pants. These island Redlegs were poor Irish sent to the Caribbean islands as forced indenture servants or forced impressment.

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Redleg is a term used to refer to poor whites that live or at one time lived on Barbados, St. Vincent, Grenada and a few other Caribbean islands. Their forebears came from Ireland, Scotland and Continental Europe. According to folk etymology, the name is derived from the effects of the tropical sun on the fair-skinned legs of white emigrants, now known as sunburn. However, the term "Redlegs" and its variants were also in use for Irish soldiers who were taken as prisoners of war in the Irish Confederate Wars and transported to Barbados as indentured servants.[3] The variant "Red-shankes" is recorded as early as the 16th century by Edmund Spenser in his dialogue on the current social condition of Ireland.[4] In addition to "Redlegs", the term underwent extensive progression in Barbados and the following terms were also used: "Redshanks", "Poor whites", "Poor Backra", "Backra Johnny", "Ecky-Becky", "Johnnies" or "Poor Backward Johnnies", "Poor whites from below the hill", "Edey white mice" or "Beck-e Neck" (Baked-neck). Historically everything besides "poor whites" was used as derogatory insults.

Here is Barbados today's Redlegs...


Oliver Cromwell, a political and military leader for England, led the invasion of Ireland in 1649 leading to his role in the transportation of the conquered Irish people to become the Redlegs of Barbados. It was his death that brought an end to the major transportation of Irish indentured servants and the start of the transportation of African slaves to Barbados.

“School absenteeism, poor health, the ill effects of inter-family marriage, large families, little ownership of land and lack of job opportunities have locked those remaining on the island into a poverty trap. Even today the red legs still stand out as anomalies and are hard-pressed for survival in a society that has no niche for them,” says Sheena Jolley, a photographer who has captured the living conditions of the Redlegs of Barbados. The Redlegs of Barbados have mostly married within their community. As a result, this caused a higher risk of birth defects, diseases and shorter life expectancy. Some integration with African descendants in Barbados has occurred, which has led to better health and education for some Redlegs. However, many still struggle with health problems. Lack of dental care and poor diet has also contributed towards Redlegs of Barbados having bad or even no teeth at all.


Here is the Irish take on Redlegs... slavery? @PatYoung


I WAS DELIGHTED that Caroline Walsh focused on the plight of Ireland's lost tribe, the Red Legs, in her article a couple of weeks ago on Barbados. This group, made up of the descendants of 50,000 Irish men and women who were sold into the white slave trade between 1652 and 1659, have been largely ignored, apart from in Seán O'Callaghan's wonderful To Hell or Barbados: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ireland, published almost 20 years ago. They were innocent Irish people who were rounded up from across the country by teams of Oliver Cromwell’s “man-catchers”, bound in chains and shipped to Barbados to work on sugar plantations.

In the meantime what we know is that Cromwell decreed that troublemakers – the poor, the hungry, clergy and Catholic landlords who refused to move to Connacht – be sent to Barbados. They were herded south into holding pens in Cork and Waterford, then crammed into African slave ships in chains. One in five died en route; those who survived were scrubbed in readiness for the slave mart. The women – nuns, soldiers’ wives, Catholic gentry and teenagers – were stripped and checked for virginity. Good breeders were sold to studs, to make future slaves and brothel girls. The men were checked for muscle tone and strength of teeth, then branded with their owners’ initials.
 

5fish

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Here is old @O' Be Joyful keeping another a Cincinnati secret from us once again... A Cincinnati ball team chose being associated with slavery , instead of being associated with communism. In the end they chose their association with communism over their slavery choice... It is truly a great story at the link about how the Cincinnati baseball team got their name...


This name stuck until 1953 when the association of the term “Reds” with communism caused the Reds to change their name to the “Redlegs” in order to avoid the social stigma. Further, for a four year stretch from 1956-1960, the name “Reds” was removed from the team’s logo and no longer appeared on the team’s uniforms. Despite the continued use of the changed logo, the name “Cincinnati Reds” was restored after the 1958 season.

If you’re wondering where the term “Redlegs” came from, this was once a derogatory term used to refer to a specific group of poor white people living on various islands in the Caribbean (generally originally from Ireland and Scotland). They were also commonly known as “white slaves”. Some were in fact actual white slaves, having been taken by press gangs and transported to Barbados to be sold. Others were simply indentured servants, agreeing to work more or less as slaves for a time in exchange for transportation. It’s estimated around 50,000 of these Redlegs were transported from Ireland alone during the mid-17th century.


Enjoy the read...
 

O' Be Joyful

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Here is old @O' Be Joyful keeping another a Cincinnati secret from us once again... A Cincinnati ball team chose being associated with slavery , instead of being associated with communism. In the end they chose their association with communism over their slavery choice... It is truly a great story at the link about how the Cincinnati baseball team got their name...


This name stuck until 1953 when the association of the term “Reds” with communism caused the Reds to change their name to the “Redlegs” in order to avoid the social stigma. Further, for a four year stretch from 1956-1960, the name “Reds” was removed from the team’s logo and no longer appeared on the team’s uniforms. Despite the continued use of the changed logo, the name “Cincinnati Reds” was restored after the 1958 season.

If you’re wondering where the term “Redlegs” came from, this was once a derogatory term used to refer to a specific group of poor white people living on various islands in the Caribbean (generally originally from Ireland and Scotland). They were also commonly known as “white slaves”. Some were in fact actual white slaves, having been taken by press gangs and transported to Barbados to be sold. Others were simply indentured servants, agreeing to work more or less as slaves for a time in exchange for transportation. It’s estimated around 50,000 of these Redlegs were transported from Ireland alone during the mid-17th century.


Enjoy the read...

They were a minor-league team in Kansas. All field/no hit.



IIRC Josey Wales tossed a few shutouts against 'em and sent 'em on a Missouri "boat-ride."

 

5fish

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Here some more on the Redlegs of the Caribbean... it a good read to learn more...

http://pancocojams.blogspot.com/2018/05/two-excerpts-about-bajan-barbados-red.html

Many of the Redlegs' ancestors were forcibly transported by Oliver Cromwell consequent to his Conquest of Ireland.[3] Others had originally arrived on Barbados in the early to mid-17th century as indentured servants.[citation needed] Small groups of Germans and Portuguese were also imported as plantation labourers.[citation needed]

By the 18th century, indentured servants became less common. African slaves were trained in all necessary trades, so there was no demand for paid white labour. The Redlegs,[which?] in turn, were unwilling to work alongside the freed slave population on the plantations.[citation needed] Therefore, most tried to emigrate to other British colonies whenever the opportunity arose, which reduced the white population to a small minority; and most of the white population that chose to stay eked out, at best, a subsistence living. The Redleg descendants of indentured servants today are extremely poor, almost all living in shacks in the countryside. Many Redlegs reside in St. John's Parish.[which?]

For the small Redleg community still living on Barbados, most live a poorer standard of life than the blacks, relying on farming or running small shops and brothels that serve the wealthier blacks
 
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