A Family of Notorious Slavers: Slavery, Murder and Whitewash

By Sarah Cobham

Helen Reid's ordeal reveals how design, not chance, degraded trust into murder, theft, and communal prejudice across continents and generations.

What if history got everything wrong about you? Labeled an 'addict' when in truth, you were being slowly poisoned -- not by chance, but by design. Wealthy, widowed, and Black in 1820s Scotland, Helen Reid was an outsider, and a target. Manipulated by a trusted 'friend' who aimed to steal her fortune, Helen's life unravels in a chilling tale of murder, theft, and racial prejudice.

Spanning from the brutal plantations of British Guiana to an explosive court trial in Britain, this is the untold true story of the Edmonstone women - victims of greed, cruelty, and a society built on slavery. With gothic overtones and echoes of Jane Eyre, Rebecca, and White Debt, this gripping narrative blends real letters, trial transcripts, and newly uncovered documents with reimagined scenes to expose how far the legacy of slavery reached, and who paid the price.

A compelling blend of historical investigation and personal reckoning, A Family of Notorious Slavers explores the author's family link to the story and also exposes the glorified naturalist Charles Waterton as an enslaver, exploring how he and Charles Edmonstone, as slave owners, influenced Wakefield's landscape, both past and present.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1036114686
• ISBN13: 9781036114688
• Release Date: May 2026
• Publisher: Pen and Sword History
• Length: 232 Pages