White Gold

You could call this "book review month" for my blog. I just finished yet another Giles Milton book, White Gold: the Extraordinary Story of Thomas Pellow and Islam's One Million White Slaves. It was honestly one of the best books I have ever read! I consider myself a tough judge of a book's quality, so I guess that says something about White Gold.

White Gold is based on the true experiences of a Cornish boy named Thomas Pellow who was a Christian slave in Morocco. In 1715, the eleven year old Thomas Pellow was on a trading voyage with his uncle in the Mediterranean when their ship was ambushed by Barbary pirates. The pirates kidnapped Pellow, his uncle, and the crew and took them to Morocco, where they were auctioned off as slaves. They were bought by the Sultan of Morocco, Moulay Ismail. The slaves were forced to march to the imperial capital of Meknes, where Moulay Ismail personally inspected them. The sultan saw potential in the young Thomas Pellow, so he was one of a handful of new slaves that were set aside for special treatment, the rest were sent immediately to the horrific slave pens. White Gold is an account of Thomas Pellow's 23 years in captivity, his rise from a slave to being influential in the sultan's court, and his eventual escape back to his home in Cornwall.

White Gold is a great book in part because Thomas Pellow's story is so remarkable. It is also helped by the fact that the two main characters (for lack of a better word), Thomas Pellow and Moulay Ismail, are both interesting in their own way, which makes the book very entertaining as the events unfold.

Moulay Ismail had a reputation for doing things according to his split-second, at times even psychotic, whims. He was a rigid disciplinarian who required excellence and absolute obedience from his closest advisors down to his slaves, who he saw as one in the same. Under the surface, Moulay Ismail was clever, ambitious, and calculating. Using exclusively Christian slave labor, he planned to build an immense palace that would surpass any in Europe both in size and grandeur. Moulay Ismail was in his sixties by the time Thomas Pellow came into the picture, but remained as formidable as ever. If a servant displeased him enough, he would often carry out the execution himself, as was the case on the day that Pellow first met him. It is estimated that the imperial harem, strictly for the sultan's private use, was home to 2000 women. Moulay Ismail was rumored to have been the father of 900 children over the course of his lifetime.

Thomas Pellow was smart and quick-thinking, which won him favor with the sultan. After arriving in Meknes, Moulay Ismail selected him for some alternative duties as a slave. At first, Pellow was a gift to one of the sultan's sons. During the day, Pellow worked on building the huge new palace, while at night was brutally tortured by his owner in hopes of forcibly converting him to Islam. Under pressure, Pellow gave in and apostatized, which allowed him a more comfortable life while in captivity. At different points he was a guard of Moulay Ismail's harem, learned fluent Arabic and became a translator for the sultan, and led imperial armies in battles against rebel forces. Unfortunately, The European ambassadors who came to Meknes in order to negotiate the release of Christian slaves regarded him as a traitor for becoming a Muslim and made no attempts to free him. Pellow was extraordinarily still able to make it through more than two decades of enslavement before his escape.

I was surprised to find that prior to reading White Gold, I had never heard of white slavery. It seems to be an event that has nearly vanished from history books. Giles Milton's deeper message with the book is clearly one that is against any intolerance and slavery regardless of who is the victim. Have we understood it, or must we still learn that lesson today?