Below, a letter, written to the Dumfries Courier in response to an article, A Day of Protests. For whatever reason, the letter was  not printed in the succeeding edition in which coverage of the protests was included. The themes of the letter have relevance to similar protest events around the country. 

Dear Editor,

I write with reference to your article “A Day of Protests” which noted the plan “to host a ‘silent peaceful protest’ amid  concerns about groups of young male refugees around the town.” Later in your article it is said, by the organisers of this protest “that residents are looking for answers to what is actually happening  regarding immigration.”  

The concerns and objectives of this protest seem vague. I too have recently seen young migrants about the town, often in transit from the hotel where they are currently accommodated, awaiting some decision as regards their claim for asylum and  the possibility of citizenship in this country. 

I have not observed any behaviour in this group of young men which might constitute a problem, though occasionally have heard comments suggesting their presence was making some people uneasy. Needless to say, any hard evidence of poor conduct on their part will not help their claim for asylum. 

Migrant communities are always the object of suspicion and mistrust and that is to be expected, but here in Scotland this should be tempered  with an awareness of the recent history of emigration. This was a particularly traumatic phenomenon in previous centuries when poverty, famine and other upheavals were commonplace, resulting in many Scottish people leaving for America in the hope of a better life.  Like the many thousands of Irish people who made a similar journey, these migrants were not always made welcome in their new home. 

The recent Sandstone Steps exhibition in Kirkcudbright’s Mitchell Gallery touched upon the theme, and included poetry the following example being particularly to the point of this letter.

Emigrant

Fallow Wheat our farm was called

And we were harvested

one by one:

Esther two months and six days

Henrietta eight years

Lovely Jesse twelve,

their mother at thirty nine.

These beautiful sick hills!

The minister says the righteous

have a place at God’s side:

for the rest of us there’s America.

With thanks to Hugh McMillan for permission to use his poem Emigrant  in this context.  https://www.hughmcmillanwriter.co.uk/