Jamaica’s Maroons Win a Treaty with Britain

When English forces seized Jamaica from Spain in 1655, formerly enslaved Africans withdrew into the island's mountainous interior. Joining Amerindian survivors and earlier escapees, these communities established fortified settlements in the Blue Mountains and became known as the Windward Maroons. In subsequent decades, the demographic balance shifted as plantation agriculture expanded, leaving a growing majority of enslaved laborers held under the control of a shrinking settler minority. Later revolts, including an uprising in St. Ann Parish in 1673 and a major revolt at Sutton's plantation in Clarendon in 1690, fed the Leeward Maroons of the western interior.

For over seven decades, colonial forces mounted periodic expeditions into the rugged interior but failed to subjugate the settlements. Full-scale hostilities, known as the First Maroon War, intensified around 1728 following the deployment of fresh British regiments and the arrival of a new governor, Major-General Robert Hunter. Maroon leaders utilized familiarity with the island's terrain and guerrilla tactics to inflict heavy losses on colonial troops. In the east, Windward commanders Nanny and Quao repeatedly outmaneuvered British patrols, while Cudjoe and Accompong directed the defense of the Leeward territories.