Africa Mauritius Under Governor
Adriaan van der Stel in 1642, the early Dutch settlers of the
Dutch East India Company brought 105 slaves from Madagascar and parts of Asia to work for them in
Dutch Mauritius. However, 50 of these first slaves, including women, escaped into the wilderness. Only 18 of these escapees were caught. On 18 June 1695, a gang of Maroons of Indonesian and Chinese origins, including Aaron d'Amboine, Antoni (Bamboes) and Paul de Batavia, as well as female escapees Anna du Bengale and Espérance, set fire to the Dutch settlers' Fort Frederick Hendryk (
Vieux Grand Port) in an attempt to take over control of the island. They were all caught and decapitated. In February 1706 another revolt was organised by the remaining Maroons as well as disgruntled slaves. When the Dutch abandoned Dutch Mauritius in 1710 the Maroons stayed behind. When representatives of the
French East India Company landed on the island in 1715 they also had to face attacks by the Mauritian Maroons. Significant events were the 1724 assault on a military outpost in Savannah district, as well as the attack on a military barrack in 1732 at Poste de Flacq. Several deaths resulted from such attacks. Soon after his arrival in 1735,
Mahé de La Bourdonnais assembled and equipped French militia groups made of both civilians and soldiers to fight against the Maroons. In 1739, Maroon leader Sans Souci was captured near
Flacq and was burnt alive by the French settlers. A few years later, a group of French settlers gave chase to Barbe Blanche, another Maroon leader, but lost track of him at
Le Morne. Other Maroons included Diamamouve and Madame Françoise.
Réunion The most important Maroons on
Réunion were Cimendef, Cotte, Dimitile and Maffate. In the 18th century, Dimitile rebelled and found asylum in
the region of the island to which he gave his name. In 1743 Dimitile and his companions are said to have freed Jeanneton, a slave from Mozambique, from the hands of her owner Pierre Hibon.
Sierra Leone A group of nearly 600 Jamaican Maroons from Cudjoe's Town, the largest of the five Jamaican Maroon towns, were deported by the
British authorities in Jamaica following the Second Maroon War in 1796, first to
Nova Scotia. In 1800 they were transported to
Sierra Leone. The
Sierra Leone Company had established the settlement of
Freetown and the
Colony of Sierra Leone in 1792 for the resettlement of the
African Americans who arrived via Nova Scotia after they had been evacuated as freedmen from the United States after the
American Revolutionary War. Some Jamaican Maroons eventually returned to Jamaica, but most became part of the larger
Sierra Leone Creole people and culture made up of freemen and liberated slaves who joined them in the first half-century of the colony.
North America Canada Nova Scotia In the 1790s, about 600 Jamaican Maroons were deported to British settlements in Nova Scotia, where
American slaves who had escaped from the United States were also resettled. Being unhappy with conditions, in 1800, a majority emigrated to
Freetown, West Africa where they identified as the Sierra Leone Creoles.
Caribbean Cuba In Cuba, there were Maroon communities in the mountains, where African refugees had escaped the brutality of slavery and joined Taínos. In 1538, runaways helped the French to sack
Havana. In 1797, one of the captured leaders of a
palenque near
Jaruco was an Indian from the
Yucatán.
Dominica, Saint Lucia, and Saint Vincent Similar Maroon communities developed on islands across the Caribbean, such as those of the
Garifuna people on
Saint Vincent. Many of the Garifuna were deported to the American mainland, where some eventually settled along the
Mosquito Coast or in
Belize. From their original landing place in
Roatan Island off the coast of
Honduras, the Maroons moved to
Trujillo. Gradually groups migrated south into the Miskito Kingdom and north into Belize. In
Dominica, escaped slaves joined indigenous
Kalinago in the island's densely forested interior to create Maroon communities, which were constantly in conflict with the British colonial authorities throughout the period of formal chattel slavery. In the French colony of
Saint Lucia, maroons and fugitive
white French regulars formed the so-called , which comprised about 6,000 men who fought the First Brigand War against the British, who had captured the island on 1 April 1794. Led by the French Commissioner, Gaspard Goyrand, they succeeded in taking back control of most of the island from the British, but on 26 May 1796, their forces defending the fort at
Morne Fortune, about 2,000 men surrendered to a British division under the command of General John Moore. After the capitulation, over 2,500 white and Black French prisoners of war as well as 99 women and children were transported from Saint Lucia to
Portchester Castle. They were eventually sent to France in a
prisoner exchange; some remained in Europe while others returned to France.
Anse Mamin was "the first maroon village" in the colony of Saint Lucia.
Dominican Republic American
marronage began in Spain's colony on
Hispaniola. Governor
Nicolás de Ovando was already complaining of escaped slaves and their interactions with the Taíno by 1503. The first slave rebellion occurred in Hispaniola on the sugar plantations owned by Admiral
Diego Columbus, on 26 December 1522, and was brutally crushed by Columbus, although many slaves were able to escape. Maroons joined the natives in their wars against the Spanish and hid with the rebel chieftain Enriquillo in the
Bahoruco Mountains. Dominican Maroons would be present throughout the island until the mid 17th century.
Haiti The French encountered many forms of slave resistance during the 17th and 18th centuries in
Saint Domingue, which later came to be called
Haiti. Formerly enslaved Africans who fled to remote mountainous areas were called
marron (
French) or
mawon (
Haitian Creole), meaning 'escaped slave'. The Maroons formed close-knit communities that practised small-scale agriculture and hunting. They were known to return to plantations to free family members and friends. On a few occasions, they also joined Taíno settlements, who had escaped the Spanish in the 17th century. In 1776–1777, a joint French–Spanish expedition ventured into the Bahoruco Mountains, with the intention of destroying the Maroon settlements there. However, the Maroons had been alerted of their coming and had abandoned their villages and caves, retreating further into the mountainous forests where they could not be found. The detachment eventually returned, unsuccessful and having lost many soldiers to illness and desertion. In the years that followed, the Maroons attacked a number of settlements, including Fond-Parisien, for food, weapons, gunpowder and women. It was on one of these excursions that one of the Maroon leaders, Kebinda, who had been born in freedom in the mountains, was captured. He later died in captivity. Mackandal led a movement to poison the drinking water of the plantation owners in the 1750s.
Boukman declared war on the French plantation owners in 1791, setting off the Haitian Revolution. A statue called the
Le Nègre Marron or the
Nèg Mawon is an iconic bronze bust that was erected in the heart of
Port-au-Prince to commemorate the role of Maroons in Haitian independence.
Jamaica People who escaped from slavery during the Spanish occupation of Jamaica fled to the interior and joined the Taíno, forming refugee communities. Later, many of them gained freedom during the confusion surrounding the 1655 English
Invasion of Jamaica. Some refugee slaves continued to join them through the decades until the abolition of slavery in 1838, but in the main, after the signing of the treaties of 1739 and 1740, the Maroons hunted runaway slaves in return for payment from the British colonial authorities. sometimes negotiating their independence in exchange for helping to hunt down other slaves who escaped. Due to tensions and repeated conflicts with Maroons from Trelawny Town, the Second Maroon War erupted in 1795. After the governor tricked the Trelawny Maroons into surrendering, the colonial government deported approximately 600 captive Maroons to Nova Scotia. Due to their difficulties and those of
Black Loyalists settled at Nova Scotia and England after the American Revolution, Great Britain established a colony in Sierra Leone. It offered ethnic Africans a chance to set up their community there, beginning in 1792. Around 1800, several hundred Jamaican Maroons were transported to Freetown, the first settlement of Sierra Leone. In the 1840s, about 200 Trelawny Maroons returned to Jamaica, and settled in the village of Flagstaff in the
parish of St James, not far from Trelawny Town, which is now named
Maroon Town, Jamaica. The only Leeward Maroon settlement that retained formal autonomy in Jamaica after the Second Maroon War was Accompong, in Saint Elizabeth Parish, whose people had abided by their 1739 treaty with the British. A Windward Maroon community is also located at
Charles Town, Jamaica, on
Buff Bay River in
Portland Parish. Another is at
Moore Town (formerly Nanny Town), also in the parish of Portland. In 2005, the music of the Moore Town Maroons was declared by
UNESCO as a 'Masterpiece of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.' A fourth community is at
Scott's Hall, Jamaica, in the parish of St Mary. Accompong's autonomy was ratified by the government of Jamaica when the island gained independence in 1962. The government has tried to encourage the survival of the other Maroon settlements. The Jamaican government and the Maroon communities organised the annual International Maroon Conference, initially to be held at rotating communities around the island, but the conference has been held at Charles Town since 2009. Maroons from other Caribbean, Central, and South America nations are invited. In 2016, Accompong's colonel and a delegation traveled to the
Kingdom of Ashanti in
Ghana to renew ties with the
Akan and Asante people of their ancestors.
Puerto Rico In
Puerto Rico, Taíno families from
Utuado moved into the southwestern mountain ranges, along with escaped African slaves who intermarried with them. Before roads were built into the mountains, heavy brush kept many escaped Maroons hidden in the southwestern hills. Escaped slaves sought refuge away from the coastal plantations of
Ponce.
Martinique In
Martinique, escaped African slaves had fled to the Maroon settlement in the northern woods to escape the French plantation system as well as the overseers along with white settlers, during the
French Revolution, the
Igbo slaves fought for freedom of which the
French National Convention abolished slavery in 1794. But it was not until 1848, where the last slave uprising was occurred, which became the first French overseas territory to abolish slavery along with other French colonies.
Central America Belize, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua Several different Maroon societies developed around the
Gulf of Honduras. Some were found in the interior of modern-day
Honduras, along the trade routes by which silver mined on the Pacific side of the isthmus was carried by slaves down to coastal towns such as
Trujillo or
Puerto Caballos to be shipped to Europe. When slaves escaped, they went to the mountains for safety. In 1548 in what is now Honduras, slaves in San Pedro rebelled, led by a self-freed slave named Miguel, who set up his own capital. The Spaniards had to send in reinforcements to put down the revolt. The
Garifuna are descendants of Maroon communities that developed on the island of
Saint Vincent. They were deported to the coast of Honduras in 1797. In 1609, Captain Pedro Gonzalo de Herrera lad an expedition against Yanga and his Maroons, but despite severe casualties on both sides, neither emerged the victor. Instead, Yanga negotiated with the Spanish colonists to establish a self-ruled Maroon settlement called San Lorenzo de los Negros (later renamed
Yanga). Yanga secured recognition of the freedom of his Maroons, and his
palenque was accorded the status of a free town. In return, Yanga was required to return any further runaways to the Spanish colonial authorities. Evidence of these communities can be found in the
Afro-Mexican population of the region. Other Afro-Mexican communities descended from people who escaped slavery are found in Veracruz and in Northern Mexico; some of the later communities were populated by people who escaped slavery in the United States via the
Southern Underground Railroad.
United States Florida Maroons who escaped from the
Thirteen Colonies and allied with
Seminole Indians were one of the largest and most successful Maroon communities in what is now Florida due to more rights and freedoms extracted from the Spanish Empire. Some intermarried and were culturally Seminole; others maintained a more African culture. Descendants of those who were removed with the Seminole to
Indian Territory in the 1830s are recognized as
Black Seminoles. Many were formerly part of the
Seminole Nation of Oklahoma, but have been excluded since the late 20th century by new membership rules that require proving Native American descent from historic documents.
Georgia In the late 18th century, two Maroon settlements were established on Abercorn Island (then called Belleisle), situated upriver from
Savannah along the
Savannah River, in modern-day
Effingham County. In 1787, these settlements were destroyed by a local militia.
Louisiana Until the mid-1760s, Maroon colonies lined the shores of
Lake Borgne, just downriver of
New Orleans. These escaped, enslaved people controlled many of the canals and back-country passages from
Lake Pontchartrain to
the Gulf, including the
Rigolets. The San Malo community was a long-thriving autonomous community. These colonies were eventually eradicated by militia from Spanish-controlled New Orleans led by
Francisco Bouligny.
Free people of color aided in their capture. People who escaped enslavement in ante-bellum America continued to find refuge and freedom in rural Louisiana, including in areas around New Orleans.
North Carolina and Virginia The
Great Dismal Swamp maroons inhabited the marshlands of the
Great Dismal Swamp in
Virginia and
North Carolina. Although conditions were harsh, research suggests that thousands lived there between about 1700 and the 1860s.
South America Brazil One of the best-known
quilombos (Maroon settlements) in Brazil was
Palmares (the Palm Nation) near
Recife, which was established around 1600.
Quilombo dos Palmares was a self-sustaining community of escaped slaves from the Portuguese settlements in Brazil, "a region perhaps the size of Portugal in the hinterland of Bahia". Part of the reason for the massive size of Palmares was due to its location at the median point between the Atlantic Ocean and Guinea, an important area of the
African slave trade. At its height, it had a population of over 30,000 free people and was ruled by King
Zumbi.
Zumbi and
Ganga Zumba were
Kongo slaves, best-known for their warrior-leadership of Palmares, and fending off the
Dutch first and then the
Portuguese colonial authorities. In 1612, the Portuguese tried in vain to take Palmares in an expedition that proved to be very costly. In 1640, a Dutch scouting mission found that the self-freed community of Palmares was spread over two settlements, with about 6,000 living in one location and another 5,000 in another. Dutch expeditions against Palmares in the 1640s were similarly unsuccessful. Between 1672 and 1694, Palmares withstood, on average, one Portuguese expedition nearly every year. After maintaining its independent existence for almost a hundred years, it was finally conquered by the Portuguese in 1694. One
quilombo in Minas Gerais lasted from 1712–1719. Another, the "Carlota" of Mato Grosso, was wiped out after existing for 25 years, from 1770–1795. There were also a number of smaller
quilombos. The first reported
quilombo was in 1575 in Bahia. Another
quilombo in Bahia was reported at the start of the 17th century. Between 1737 and 1787, a small
quilombo thrived in the vicinity of São Paulo. The region of Campo Grande and São Francisco was often populated with
quilombos. In 1741, Jean Ferreira organised an expedition against a
quilombo, but many runaways escaped capture. In 1746, a subsequent expedition captured 120 members of the
quilombo. In 1752, an expedition led by Pere Marcos was attacked by
quilombo fighters, resulting in significant loss of life.
Quilombos continued to form in the 19th century. In 1810, a
quilombo was discovered at Linhares in the state of São Paulo. A decade later, another was found in Minas. In 1828, another
quilombo was discovered at Cahuca, near Recife, and a year later an expedition was mounted against yet another at
Corcovado, near Rio de Janeiro. In 1855, the Maravilha
quilombo in Amazonas was destroyed. Numerous descendants of Quilombo residents, or
Quilombolas, continue to live in historic quilombo settlements post-emancipation. Their status as a "
traditional people" was recognized in the
1988 Constitution of Brazil, although they continue to campaign for land rights and protections from violence.
Colombia In 1529, in what is now Colombia, rebel slaves destroyed
Santa Marta. In what is now the district of
Popayán, the
palenque of Castillo was successfully established by runaway slaves. In 1732, the Spanish authorities tried to secure peace terms with the Maroons of Castillo by inserting a clause requiring them to return runaways, but the rulers of Castillo rejected those terms. In 1745, the colonial authorities defeated Castillo, and over 200 African and Indian runaways surrendered. In the Guianas, escaped slaves, locally known as '
Bushinengues', fled to the interior and joined with Indigenous peoples and created several independent tribes, among them the
Saramaka, the
Paramaka, the
Ndyuka (Aukan), the
Kwinti, the
Aluku (Boni), and the
Matawai. In the plantation colony of Suriname, which England ceded to the Netherlands in the
Treaty of Breda (1667), escaped slaves revolted and started to build their villages from the end of the 17th century. As most of the plantations existed in the eastern part of the country, near the
Commewijne River and
Marowijne River, the marronage took place along the river borders and sometimes across the borders of
French Guiana. By 1740, the Maroons had formed clans and felt strong enough to challenge the Dutch colonists, forcing them to sign peace treaties. On 10 October 1760, the Ndyuka were the first to sign a peace treaty, drafted by former Jamaican slave Adyáko Benti Basiton of
Boston, offering them territorial autonomy in 1760. In the 1770s, the Aluku also desired a peace treaty, but the
Society of Suriname started a war against them, resulting in a flight into French Guiana. The other tribes signed peace treaties with the Surinamese government, the Kwinti being the last in 1887. On 25 May 1891 the Aluku officially became French citizens. After Suriname gained independence from the Netherlands, the old treaties with the Bushinengues were abrogated. By the 1980s the Bushinengues in Suriname had begun to fight for their land rights. Between 1986 and 1992, the
Surinamese Interior War was waged by the
Jungle Commando, a guerrilla group fighting for the rights of the Maroon minority, against the military dictatorship of
Dési Bouterse. In 2005, following a ruling by the
Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the Suriname government agreed to compensate survivors of the 1986
Moiwana village massacre, in which soldiers had slaughtered 39 unarmed Ndyuka people, mainly women and children. On 13 June 2020,
Ronnie Brunswijk was elected
Vice President of Suriname by acclamation in an
uncontested election. He was inaugurated on 16 July as the first Maroon in Suriname to serve as vice president. In modern-day
Guyana, Dutch officials in 1744 conducted an expedition against encampments of at least 300 Maroons in the Northwest district of
Essequibo. The Dutch nailed severed hands of Maroons killed in the expedition to posts in the colony as a warning to other slaves. In 1782, a French official in the region estimated there were more than 2,000 Maroons in the vicinity of
Berbice,
Demerara, and Essequibo.
Venezuela There were several rebellions of slaves throughout the history of what later became Venezuela. The
cumbe of Ocoyta was destroyed in 1771. A military expedition led by German de Aguilera destroyed the settlement, killing Guillermo, but only succeeded in capturing eight adults and two children. The rest of the runaways withdrew into the surrounding forests, where they remained at large. One of Guillermo's deputies, Ubaldo the Englishman, whose christened name was Jose Eduardo de la Luz Perera, was initially born a slave in London, sold to a ship captain, and took several trips before eventually being granted his freedom. He was one of a number of free black people who joined the community of Ocoyta. In 1772, he was captured by the Spanish authorities. There were many
cumbes in the interior of the colony. In 1810, when the
War of Independence began, many members of these
cumbes fought on the side of the rebels, and abandoned their villages. == See also ==