One of the local guys brought his new cd to my local in hackney and one of his tunes was lickingout against the maroons as sell outs!!

It brought a favourable response from some of the Jamaicans present as they said it was about time people revealed the truth about the maroons....

Whilst many on this site for instance praise their existance I would be interested to hear the view points from all perspectives.

For instance were they heroes or traitors!!!!!

Pre Treaty with the British - Heroes

Post Treaty - Traitors.

But its not that clear cut. After all who were in the 'Blackshot ' regiments that went hunting for Maroons and escapees if not Africans from the plantations..

Dont forget people like Captain Sambo and other enslaved Africans were only too happy to hunt down maroon settlements or inform on them. In the17th century the Maroons would have had reason for alot of greivances with other Africans who the British used to hunt them down. They equallyplotted with those in the planataions for rebeliion also pre-treaty. So for all the righteous indignation shown by Jamaicans when it comes to the Maroons/ the Maroons were being sold out continually by weak hearts/ traitors and outright collarboraters or people forced to under duress/on the plantations for at least 60-80 years before the First Maroon war around the 1730s. Poeple like to conviently forget this.

Nanny was definately not happy about signing the treaty and it led to a split with her brother and other leaders.

Perhaps it was bad feeling on the part ofplayed by some on the plantations (as every rebellion without fail had its informers) that led to Cudjoe and his supporters signing the treaty and accepting the terms of being a extension of the British army. There was alot of deception on the part of Maroons also who would pretend to kill runaways initially or use already dead rebels body parts to "prove" they had tacked future runaways. A whole heap of ginnallship on both sides.

In fact its my personal view why "informing" is held as such a taboo punished by death in jamaica today. Aside from the crinimal aspects.

In their early formation, they are a perfect example of our resistence to slavery; That is to say we should not ignore them or the part they played in OUR history. But most definately they sold out(lead by their leaders).

Somewhere on this site I have posted a link to archives related to that sell out.

Tahliba

What Ive been trying to find out is if any other islands which respectiveMaroon populations signed treaties with similar conditions. Im yet to find evidence of such. Have you?

Just before the British took over the island in the 1600s there were what the Spanish called Palenques/ which were free communities of escaped Africans. A certain leader signed terms with the English similar to Cudjoe's treaty. He was promptly killed by the rest of his community. Although at that time the island was alot less blighted by planatations. What do you reckon changed?