Runaways: Maroon Or Seminole Communities

For over 400 years,Runaway slaves would all come together and start communities in different parts of Southeast America, South America, even parts of Florida .These new social orders went from small groups that survived not as much as a year to effective states holding a huge number of individuals that made due for eras and even hundreds of years. Today their offspring still shape some independent spaces in a few sections of the world, in French Guiana, Jamaica, Colombia and Belize are proud of where they came from. Maroon or Seminole Communities,known in parts of Florida, were referred to as a group of runaways or castaways who ran away to nowhere and nothing. Which also correlates with where the word maroon comes from. Maroon comes from the spanish word
meaning wild or untamed ,and that is what most people thought maroon communities were. Little did they know that slaves formed independent settlements which operated under the ex slaves power and built on their will and determination to not go back where they came from. In most cases the slaves hid in jungles and forest to be under the natural cover of the trees and elements.
The first escapes happened in 1512 from spanish captors and either joined indigenous peoples or made out a living on their own. In 1655 communities were developed in places such as Jamaica.In the carribeans they formed groups which turned into whole communities and some islands had their own weapons. Maroon(Seminole) communities faced obstacles to survive from colonists, obtain food for good living, and to increase their numbers.On smaller islands the maroon settlers often were pushed out or deeper in the woods due to the fact that the people already there would use more and more land because they were planting more and using more space.On larger islands the marooners had more space to hunt and also plant comfortably without the worry of being forced out.As more Blacks got away from slavery and joined their groups they began to become even more developed. The maroon settlers were nomadic and precarious. That meant that they were dependent on circumstances beyond one's control .Midst of their situations their survival relied on using guerrilla strategies and home building by including traps and
diversions. Marooners attacked plantations that had slaves and during these assaults, they would burn crops, take animals and tools, execute slavers, and bring the slaves to join their groups. Small groups of Maroons often times allied themselves with the close homeland people and incidentally molded into these populations. Maroons assumed an essential part in the histories of Countries in the West Indies such as Brazil, Puerto Rico, Haiti, Dominican Republic, Cuba, and Jamaica. Subsequently. after all that these maroon communities had to go through to get to where they were in history they are significant and are felt in innumerable ways. These communities were significant because they symbolise the power, determination, and bond that African Americans had with each other in the storm of their situation. These runaway slaves had the intellect to run to the covered part of where they were to live and protect one another without getting found. They were in foreign land and made it their own , that speaks volumes about their ancestors and even themselves to show Africans strength to get things done themselves rather than on someone else's back. The communities are also significant because the islands in the caribbean wouldn't be what they are today if it had not been for the runaway slaves who changed their culture forever.