On the Island of Jamaica, the Maroon Council is the executive body with administrative powers and obligations for the Maroon communities. [1] [2] Maroon Council members are appointed by the Colonel-in-Chief (Colonel), while the Colonel is officially elected by the community as the Head of Government. [3] Each Maroon Community (Accompong, Nanny Town, Charles Town, Trelawny Town, and Scotts Hall) has its own independent Maroon Council with legislative authority. [4]
Jamaica is an island country situated in the Caribbean Sea. Spanning 10,990 square kilometres (4,240 sq mi) in area, it is the third-largest island of the Greater Antilles and the Caribbean. Jamaica lies about 145 kilometres (90 mi) south of Cuba, and 191 kilometres (119 mi) west of Hispaniola ; the British Overseas Territory of the Cayman Islands lies some 215 kilometres (134 mi) to the north-west.
The Baptist War, also known as the Sam Sharpe Rebellion, the Christmas Rebellion, the Christmas Uprising and the Great Jamaican Slave Revolt of 1831–32, was an eleven-day rebellion that started on 25 December 1831 and involved up to 60,000 of the 300,000 slaves in the Colony of Jamaica. The uprising was led by a black Baptist deacon, Samuel Sharpe, and waged largely by his followers.
Accompong is a historical Maroon village located in the hills of St. Elizabeth Parish on the island of Jamaica. It is located in Cockpit Country, where Jamaican Maroons and indigenous Taíno established a fortified stronghold in the hilly terrain in the 17th century. They defended it and maintained independence from the Spanish and then later against British forces, after the colony changed hands.
Queen Nanny, Granny Nanny or Nanny of the Maroons ONH, was an 18th-century leader of the Jamaican Maroons. She led a community of formerly enslaved Africans called the Windward Maroons. In the early 18th century, under the leadership of Nanny, the Windward Maroons fought a guerrilla war over many years against British authorities in the Colony of Jamaica in what became known as the First Maroon War. .
The First Maroon War was a conflict between the Jamaican Maroons and the colonial British authorities that started around 1728 and continued until the peace treaties of 1739 and 1740. It was led by self-liberated Africans who set up communities in the mountains. The name "Maroon" was given to these Africans, and for many years they fought the British colonial Government of Jamaica for their freedom. The maroons were skilled particularly in guerrilla warfare. It was followed about half a century later by the Second Maroon War.
The Second Maroon War of 1795–1796 was an eight-month conflict between the Maroons of Cudjoe's Town, a Maroon settlement later re-named after Governor Edward Trelawny at the end of First Maroon War, located near Trelawny Parish, Jamaica in the St James Parish, and the British colonials who controlled the island. The Windward communities of Jamaican Maroons remained neutral during this rebellion and their treaty with the British still remains in force. Accompong Town, however, sided with the colonial militias, and fought against Trelawny Town.
Cockpit Country is an area in Trelawny and Saint Elizabeth, Saint James, Saint Ann, Manchester and the northern tip of Clarendon parishes in Jamaica. The land is marked by steep-sided hollows, as much as 120 metres (390 ft) deep in places, which are separated by conical hills and ridges. Maroons who had escaped from plantations used the difficult territory for its natural defences to develop communities outside the control of Spanish or British colonists.
Jamaican Maroons descend from Africans who freed themselves from slavery on the Colony of Jamaica and established communities of free black people in the island's mountainous interior, primarily in the eastern parishes. Africans who were enslaved during Spanish rule over Jamaica (1493–1656) may have been the first to develop such refugee communities.
Moore Town is a Maroon settlement located in the Blue Mountains and John Crow Mountains of Portland, Jamaica, accessible by road from Port Antonio. The easternmost Maroon town, Moore Town is located in the eastern end of the parish. Formerly known as New Nanny Town, Moore Town was founded in 1740 when the Peace Treaty was signed between the British colonial authorities and the Windward Maroons. This treaty allotted the Moore Town Maroons 1000 acres, but Moore Town only received 500. In 1781 the initial 500 acres was augmented with another 500 acres, taking their communal land up to 1,000 acres.
Cudjoe, Codjoe or Captain Cudjoe, sometimes spelled Cudjo – corresponding to the Akan day name Kojo, Codjoe or Kwadwo – was a Maroon leader in Jamaica during the time of Nanny of the Maroons. In Twi, Cudjoe or Kojo is the name given to a boy born on a Monday. He has been described as "the greatest of the Maroon leaders."
Major-General The Honourable George Walpole, was a British soldier and politician. He gained distinction after suppressing the Maroon insurrection in Jamaica in 1795. After entering Parliament in 1797, he served as Under-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs from 1806 to 1807 in the Ministry of All the Talents headed by Lord Grenville.
Ferron Williams is a Maroon politician and from 2009 - 2021 he was Colonel-in-Chief of Accompong, Jamaica, a self-governing community of Jamaican Maroons established in 1739 by treaty with Great Britain.
Timothy E. McPherson Jr is a descendant of the Nanny Town Maroons and he is the chairman for the Economic Community of States, Nations, Territories and Realms of the African Diaspora Sixth Region (ECO-6) and he is also the founding governor of the Central Solar Reserve Bank of Accompong, which he created during his tenor as the minister of Finance for the Accompong Maroons. He is Chairman of the Door of Return initiative, which is being spearheaded across Africa in cooperation with Ghana and Nigeria as part of the United Nation's (UN) International Decade for People of African Descent. During the 2018 Door of Return celebration in Nigeria, McPherson was officially honoured by the Akran of Badagry Kingdom and conferred with the Royal Chieftaincy title as "Yenwa of Badagry Kingdom".
The Door of Return is an emblem of African Renaissance and is a pan-African initiative that seeks to launch a new era of cooperation between Africa and its diaspora in the 21st century. The initiative is Chaired by the Hon. Timothy E. McPherson Jr., Minister of Finance for the Accompong Maroons in Jamaica, and is being spearheaded across Africa in cooperation with Nigeria, Ghana and Zimbabwe as part of the United Nations's International Decade for People of African Descent. The name is a reference to the "Door of No Return", a monument commemorating the transatlantic slave trade.
Cudjoe's Town was located in the mountains in the southern extremities of the parish of St James, close to the border of Westmoreland, Jamaica.
Me-no-Sen-You-no-Come is a village in the Cockpit Country of western Jamaica. It is now a part of a district called Aberdeen, Jamaica, in the north-east section of Saint Elizabeth Parish, and is not extinct, as was originally believed. From the Jamaican dialect, the village name translates in English as, 'If I don't send for you, don't come.'
Charles Town is one of four official towns of the Jamaican Maroons. It is located on Buff Bay River in Portland Parish.
Scott's Hall is one of the four official towns of the Jamaican Maroons. It is located in Saint Mary Parish, Jamaica.
The African Kingdoms LUMI was established as legal tender within the 2014 Bank Act of Accompong and issued to the public by the Central Solar Reserve Bank of Accompong as the currency of the Sovereign Maroon State of Accompong with its physical bank notes printed in Canada. The LUMI was created by the then Minister of Finance and Founding Governor of the Bank of Accompong, H.H. Chief Timothy McPherson, who is a global financial engineer that hails from the Maroon territory of Queen Nanny of the Maroons on the Island of Jamaica.
Free black people in Jamaica fell into two categories. Some secured their freedom officially, and lived within the slave communities of the Colony of Jamaica. Others ran away from slavery, and formed independent communities in the forested mountains of the interior. This latter group included the Jamaican Maroons, and subsequent fugitives from the sugar and coffee plantations of coastal Jamaica.