George Rainy (6 June 1790—9 June 1863) was a Scottish merchant, slave owner and land owner. In the early 1800s, Rainy became involved in sugar plantations in the Caribbean which were worked by African slaves in Demerara in Guiana. Due to extensive family connections he eventually became a full partner in Sandbach, Tinne & Company, a Scottish-run company which dealt in trade in the same field and was prominent in British Guiana, to the extent that the men who ran it were called the "Rothschilds of Demerara" on account of their wealth and influence. After the abolition of the Atlantic slave trade in the British Empire in the 1830s, Rainy became involved in the Highland Clearances. Using monies from the payout to former slave-owners following the Slavery Abolition Act 1833, he purchased the islands of Raasay, Rona and Fladda from Clan MacLeod in 1846: he removed from the land twelve townships of ninety-four Gaelic Highlander families to make way for sheep farming, causing mass depopulation and displacement on the islands.
Biography
Background
George Rainy was born to Rev. George Rainy (1734—1810), a Presbyterian Church of Scotland minister in Creich, Sutherland, Scotland and his wife Ann Robertson. His grandfather had been John Rennie, a farmer in Turriff, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. Among George's siblings were Margaret Rainy (1774—1844), who married to Charles Parker (1771–1828), from a Scottish family in the Colony of Virginia and a major player in Sandbach, Tinne & Company, which ran sugarcane plantations in Demerara, Guiana. In addition to this, there was a brother Gilbert Rainy (1782—1808) who had gone to Berbice, Guiana to engage in the same trade. Harry Rainy, the noted pathologist and Professor of Forensic Medicine at the University of Glasgow was another brother, making George Rainy the uncle of Robert Rainy a Scottish Presbyterian divine for whom Rainy Hall in New College, Edinburgh is named.
Plantations in Guiana
George Rainy followed his brother, Gilbert Rainy, into the sugar trade in Guiana. He became associated with the Scottish-dominated, Liverpool-based company Sandbach, Tinne & Company. This company had been founded in 1790 when his uncle George Robertson, who had been trading in Grenada and his future brother-in-law Charles Parker joined with Samuel Sandbach and the Demerara merchant James McInroy (1759–1825) to create what was originally known as McInroy, Sandbach & Company. This business had been described as the "Rothschilds of Demerara" in the 1820s. It would become one of the most successful trading companies in the Caribbean, dealing with sugar plantations in the Caribbean which were worked by African slaves. These families created strong connections to each other through marriage. By the time that George Rainy joined the company as a partner in Liverpool it had become Sandbach, Tinne & Company.
According to the journal of J.C. Cheveley, who visited in 1821, the estates in Demerara containing the slave-worked sugar plantations, were heavily mortgaged to Sandbach, Tinne & Company. He stated that many estates which were mortgaged out had to rely on the company for shipping out sugar on ships owned by them, through their agents in Guiana and Britain. According to the Legacies of British Slave-Ownership at the University College London, Rainy was awarded a payment as a slave trader in the aftermath of the Slavery Abolition Act 1833 with the Slave Compensation Act 1837. The British Government took out a £15 million loan (worth £ in ) with interest from Nathan Mayer Rothschild and Moses Montefiore which was subsequently paid off by the British taxpayers (ending in 2015). Rainy had a large number of primary and secondary claims, thirty in total. Rainy owned 2793 slaves in Guiana and received a £146,295 payment at the time (worth £ in ). Some Scottish newspapers such as The Sunday Post have claimed that Rainy received the largest payout of all the slave owners. The largest plantations which Rainy owned in Guiana were Leonora, Zeelandia, La Jalousie & Fellowship, among others.