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Physical Organization of Maroon Communities
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the government interrogator) the tortuous process by which newcomers were
taken to his settlement near Lead Mountain. They were taken to this remote
settlement by numerous detours, so that once they arrived there they were
unable to find their way back. Escape from it would be a matter of pure
chance, and any escapees risked dying of hunger before reaching a place
where they could receive assistance.
Military Strategies
Many contemporary stories were told about fleet-footed Maroons who
“appeared to be like ghosts of the landscape” (Brathwaite 1994, 123). Maroon
communities, regardless of the nature of the terrain, were adept at hit-andrun,
surprise and other such tactics (Dallas 1803, 1:29). Sometimes the
Suriname Maroons attacked their enemies by firing at them from the tops of
palm trees, descending and fleeing so rapidly that their antagonists were
unable to hit them. They also generally ran in zigzag fashion, making it more
difficult for the enemy to take careful aim at them (Stedman 1988, 402, 414,
561). They attacked and killed several soldiers when the latter were traversing
swamps. The soldiers were particularly vulnerable at that point, since the
water often reached up to their armpits, forcing them to lift their guns above
their shoulders to keep the weapons dry. This prevented the soldiers from firing
more than once or reloading their weapons without wetting the locks
(Stedman 1988, 107, 402).
The Jamaican Maroons also worked out highly clever and unusual strategies
(Dallas 1803, 1:42; Campbell 1990, 74). Long (1774, 2:348–49) declared,
“Their manner of engaging with an enemy has something too singular in it
to be passed over.” In referring to an exercise that the pacified Leeward
Maroons demonstrated before the governor in 1764, Long commented on
their speed and “amazing agility”: they discharged their firearms “stooping
almost to the very ground”, and immediately threw themselves “into a thousand
antic gestures, and tumble over and over, so as to be continually shifting
their place”, thus making it very difficult for their adversaries to get a good
aim at them. At first he classified their manoeuvres as an “evolution” of tactics
with which the regular soldiers were unacquainted. Unfortunately, in his
usual deprecatory manner, he concluded his observations by stating that “In
short, throughout their whole manoeuvres, they skip about like so many