Faced with negative press and publicity over the ill-treatment of Indian indentured labourers on his Vreed-en-Hoop plantation, the rich and powerful British merchant behind the importation scheme quickly and quietly transferred the profitable estate to his sons.
The tough Scotsman, the Baronet, Sir John Gladstone, an influential politician and businessman would stealthily move in late 1839, to begin winding up his sugar producing operations in British Guiana mere months after the scandal broke, shifting into new railway investments. But the colonial authorities would not learn of the title changes until after his holdings were sold privately.
In anticipation of the August 1, 1838 full British emancipation of slaves-turned-apprentices, the permanent absentee planter and major slave owner had initiated the first two experimental shipments of East Indians who became known as the “Gladstone Coolies” with just over 400 having arrived on May 5, 1838 to work on several estates including his West Demerara farms at Vreed-en-Hoop, and Vredestein also called Vreedestein and Vriedestein.
