Slavery

Being a slave of a Muslim was not necessarily a good thing, many perhaps millions of Europeans were enslaved in North Africa, either captured in ships or taken in raids. There were slaver raids on the coast of England and a famous one in Baltimore Co Cork.

The idea that it was ‘good’ to be a Muslim slave comes from the idea that many did not wish to return when given the opportunity. You could be freed if a ransom was paid but that was out of reach of most people and communications were difficult, it could easily take years.

If you were lucky you became a slave of a ‘good’ Muslim who viewed it as his duty to look after you (try and convert you) and as the ‘slave’ was an economic asset to improve it so many learnt a trade. As a result when the offer of ‘freedom’ came if they had not converted over the decades they may have made a nice life for themselves, married raised families etc so refused to leave. Many of the ‘worst’ pirates or slavers were actually Christian converts.

However it depended on the ‘owner’ Matthew Pellow an English cabin boy converted and became a slave soldier in the Sultans army. However he converted (which meant he could not be ransomed) only because his master beat and raped him until he did so.

He eventually escaped and returned to Cornwall.

Arab slavers searched deep into Africa searching for slaves, many boys would be turned into eunuchs --- and operation that had a ‘50% survival rate’ if you want to put a positive spin on things.

For all that would prefer to be captured by Muslim pirates at least you had a 50-50 chance, the reverse did not apply.