Stolen Lives: The Story of the Barbary Corsair Raid on Heimaey in 1627 - Paperback

by Karl Smári Hreinsson (Author), Adam Nichols (Author)

In the summer of 1627, Barbary corsairs from Algiers raided Iceland. They first attacked the East Fjords, in southeast Iceland. They then sailed to the island of Heimaey, one of the Westman Islands off Iceland's south coast, where they took nearly 250 people captive. After this, their ships crammed with captives, they sailed back to Algiers.

In Algiers, many of the captive Icelanders quickly succumbed to disease and shock. Those who survived were auctioned off into slavery and forced to endure hard servitude until a ransom expedition was finally organized to liberate them, almost a decade after their initial capture. In the end, only twenty-seven made it back to Iceland.

The full story of the Algerine corsair raid on Heimaey has never before been told. Drawing on a wide variety of contemporary sources, this book recounts for the first time not only the details of the raid itself, but also the experience of being a slave in Algiers, the process by which the enslaved Icelanders were ransomed, and the journey home for the lucky ones.

Stolen Lives is a story of brutality and suffering, but also of the resiliency of the human spirit in the face of bitter adversity.