Jamaican Maroons descend from Africans who freed themselves from slavery in the Colony of Jamaica and established communities of free black people in the island's mountainous interior, primarily in the eastern parishes.

[14] Some Spanish Maroons created palenques, or stockaded mountain farms, first at Lluidas Vale, in modern-day Saint Catherine Parish, under Juan de Bolas (also known as Lubolo).

Faced with discovery and defeat in 1659, de Bolas allied with the English and guided their troops on a raid which resulted in the final expulsion of the Spanish in 1660.

In exchange, in 1663, Governor Sir Charles Lyttelton, 3rd Baronet, signed the first maroon treaty, granting de Bolas and his people land on the same terms as English settlers.

[17] The other Maroon groups remained independent in the mountainous interior of Jamaica, surviving by subsistence farming and periodic raids of plantations.

These initial Maroon groups faded from colonial history records, possibly migrating to more mountainous or remote regions of the interior.

[14] Over time, runaway slaves increased the Maroon population, which eventually came to control large areas of the Jamaican mountainous interior.

[18] In the 1670s and 1680s, in his capacity as an owner of a large slave plantation, former buccaneer and now lieutenant-governor of Jamaica Sir Henry Morgan led three campaigns against the Karmahaly Maroons of de Serras.

[19] Between 1673 and 1690 there were several major slave uprisings, mainly prompted by newly arrived, highly militaristic Akan groups called Coromantee that were captives in Cape Coast from the Ashanti Empire.

On 31 July 1690, a rebellion involving 500 slaves from the Sutton estate in Clarendon Parish led to the formation of Jamaica's most stable and best organized Maroon group.

[22] The Windward Maroons, in the wilder parts of eastern Jamaica, were always composed of separate highly mobile and culturally heterogeneous groups.

[27] Disturbed by plantation raiding, the colonial authorities of Jamaica wanted to eradicate the Maroon communities in order to promote British settlement.

In practice, the Maroon troops' command of the territory and skill in guerrilla warfare gave them a strong advantage over colonial forces.

[29] At this point, however, fighting shifted to Leeward, where the British troops had equally limited success against the well-trained and organized forces of Cudjoe.

[31] In 1739, the treaty signed under British governor Edward Trelawny granted Cudjoe's Maroons 1500 acres of land between their strongholds of Trelawny Town and Accompong in the Cockpit Country and a certain amount of political autonomy and economic freedoms, in return for which the Maroons were to provide military support in case of invasion or rebellion, and to return runaway slaves in exchange for a bounty of two dollars each.

[38] In April 1760, the Jamaican government called upon the Maroons to honour their treaties and come to their assistance during the major slave uprising led by the Fante leader, Tacky, in Saint Mary Parish, Jamaica.

However, the Maroon warriors were employing guerrilla warfare tactics, which contradicted the British military tradition of marching into the oncoming fire.

[40] In western Jamaica, Apongo led another slave rebellion, inspired by Tacky's Revolt, which lasted from April 1760 to October 1761.

[41] In the years that followed Tacky's rebellion, many Maroon officers such as Samuel Grant, allegedly the son of Davy, made a career out of hunting runaway slaves for the colonial authorities.

[42][43] In the 18th century, Maroons also hunted and killed notorious escaped slaves and their deputies, such as Ancoma, Three Fingered Jack, and Dagger.

[50] This new general suffered more setbacks, until he eventually opted to besiege the Cockpit Country on a massive scale, surrounding it with watchposts, firing in shells from a long distance, and intending to destroy or cut off all Maroon provision grounds.

[61] The Maroon towns grew in numbers at a time when the population of black slaves and white slave-holders alike declined from disease.

[62] When the colonial authorities deported the Maroons of Trelawny Town, they left a void which was filled by communities of runaway slaves.

The Maroons of the smaller town of Accompong were unable to cope with the growing numbers of runaways in western Jamaica, who found refuge elsewhere in the Cockpit Country.

[65] The Maroons played a significant role in helping the colonial authorities to suppress the Samuel Sharpe revolt in 1831–32, under the leadership of white superintendents such as Alexander Fyfe (Fyffe).

The Trelawny Maroons flourished in Sierra Leone at first, but their situation soon soured, and they submitted petitions to the British government, asking for permission to return to Jamaica.

Mary Brown and her family, which included her daughter Sarah McGale and a Spanish son-in-law, sold off their property in Sierra Leone, bought a schooner, and set sail for Jamaica.

[72] In 1865, poor free blacks, led by Baptist deacon Paul Bogle, rose in revolt against the colonial authorities in the Morant Bay Rebellion.

Fyfe was called up once more to lead a combination of Moore Town Maroons, including some who resided in Hayfield and Bath, and they committed a number of atrocities before they captured Bogle.

However, their cruelty in suppressing the uprising attracted a lot of criticism from Methodist missionaries and residents of Saint Thomas Parish, Jamaica.