60199616-flight-to-freedom-african-runaways-and-maroons-in-the-americas

46 Flight to Freedom
enslaved persons after introduction into the plantation economy of Berbice
was about eight years. Extremely short lifespans were the common reality of
enslaved persons in all the plantation and mining areas in the Americas.
Thus, an important reason for becoming Maroons was that they expected
to enjoy a longer life of better quality in their own settlements. When those
expectations were dashed, it seems in most instances to have resulted from
military expeditions and bounty-hunting activities that killed and maimed a
lot of them. Though a single example does not prove the point, it is interesting
to note the deposition of Louis (1979, 314), a captive from the André settlement
in French Guiana in 1748, that none of its inhabitants had died in the
previous two years. But even for those Maroons or potential Maroons whose
lives were abridged shortly after, or in the very act of, desertion – some of
whom realized that they stood only the slimmest chance of reaching a safe
haven – their martyrdom testifies to their love of freedom.
Some enslavers (and others) viewed slavery as the only appropriate system
of government under which Blacks should live (Thompson 1995). More than
once, contemporary Spanish documents referred to Maroons as fugitives
from the “dominion of their natural masters” (Brito Figueroa 1985, 209). It
was the resurrection of the Aristotelian doctrine of natural slaves. Venezuelan
overlords complained bitterly that many of their servile charges were casting
off “the yoke of subordination” (ibid., 241), but they clearly did not appreciate
the burden of that yoke to the enslaved persons.
It is necessary here to draw a distinction between the primary and the
primitive desire for freedom. While the distinction may not be wholly relevant
today, it was very relevant during – and, indeed, for some years after –
the slavery period. The primary desire for freedom is inborn in all persons
(and indeed all living creatures). However, enslavers and other Europeans
saw marronage as a primitive (not primary) desire for freedom that linked the
Maroons to animals or, at best, wild men – as depicted, for instance, in Alejo
Carpentier’s Los fugitivos (Fleischmann 1993, 573; chapter 2). The fact that
there was a preponderance of African-born, as distinct from Creole, Maroons
– a view on which scholars are unanimous – reinforced their perception that
they were dealing with wild men or “savages”. Roberto de la Guardia (1977,
77) cites Armando Fortune who, writing in 1970, interpreted the quest of the
Maroons of Panama for freedom as an attempt to “resume their primitive
lifestyle”. Luis A. Díez Castillo (1981, 23), another Panamanian author, writes
in much the same vein that they lived a savage life in the bush. César de