A re-examination of Jamaica’s First Maroon War, 1728-1738/9, prompted by finding a description of a British defeat in 1731 in an English provincial records office, and then extended as part of a broader project on the transformation of Jamaica during the first century of English rule from 1655 - c. 1770, identified a number of journals kept by the commanders of patrols sent out against the “rebel Negroes”. These offer immediate reports from a prolonged guerrilla war.
Reconsidering how the war was fought allows a broader reconsideration of its place in island politics and Jamaica’s wider development. Such re-evaluations prompt comparisons with earlier frontier campaigning that Governor Robert Hunter had overseen as Governor of New York, besides offering a context for the Jamaican colonists’ parallel political campaign during the 1730s targeting the North American colonies for the enforcement of the Sugar Duties.

All papers are pre-circulated electronically to those who plan to attend the seminar in person. For a copy of the paper, e-mail Heather Radke at scholl@newberry.org,or call (312) 255-3524.

The Newberry Library Seminar in Early American History and Culture is co-sponsored by the History Departments of DePaul University, Northern Illinois University, Northwestern University, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and the Karla Scherer Center for the Study of American Culture at the University of Chicago