Not all of Maine’s earliest European settlers came voluntarily. Carol Gardner’s talk, “Involuntary Americans: Scottish Prisoners in Early Colonial Maine,” will discuss the more than 400 prisoners of war who were brought to Maine, New Hampshire and Massachusetts against their will in 1650-1651. Dr. Gardner is the author of a recently published narrative history The Involuntary American: A Scottish Prisoner’s Journey to the New World. Her book chronicles the life and times of Scottish foot soldier Thomas Doughty, who was captured at the Battle of Dunbar, shipped to Boston, sold to a Puritan industrialist in New Hampshire, and eventually established his own milling operation on the Saco River in Maine.

Dr. Carol Gardner has more than 30 years of experience as a writer, journalist and communicator. She earned a Ph.D. in English from Johns Hopkins University, taught at Johns Hopkins, Wake Forest, and Florida State Universities, and has published both fiction and nonfiction pieces in a wide variety of books and periodicals, including the World of Baseball series, BluePlanet Quarterly, Northwest Review, Baltimore Review, Potomac Review, The Women’s Review of Books, Portland Press Herald, and The Washington Post. She was previously granted a Maryland Individual Artists Award. She lives in Alna, Maine.

This event will take place over Zoom. For a link to the Zoom event, please email elewis@rocklandmaine.gov by 4:00 p.m. on April 28 and identify the event you are interested in attending in the subject line. Limited seating will be available in the Community Room to watch the Zoom call on the monitor.