Black Watch role

Ivar Watson (Letters, 31 July) was ill-advised to use the former members of the Black Watch who fought Mau Mau as an example of Scots living outside Scotland who will not have a vote in the referendum.

To the eternal shame of the Black Watch, this regiment fought in support of over-
privileged whites in a campaign against African nationalists which resulted in the deaths of 10,000 Kikuyu and the judicial killing of another 1,000 people.

We should not forget the Hola camp massacre in 1959 which resulted in the deaths of 11 detainees on the day the camp opened.

Only 32 white people died in the entire emergency.

Winston Churchill even said: “Surely it cannot be necessary to go on killing these defenceless people on such an enormous scale.”

All right-thinking Scottish nationalists should be ashamed of the role this regiment played in 
the suppression of African 
nationalists.

Jim Stewart

Oxgangs Avenue

Edinburgh