Runaway Slaves in the Jacmel Quarter

Although hardly the best method for arriving at an adequate overview of the "nations" of slaves in a region, perusing Le marronnage dans le monde atlantique's digitized runaway notices from Saint Domingue is always useful. In this case, we used the search bar to find every record mentioning Jacmel, Cayes de Jacmel, or Bainet, keeping count for the number of times a maroon each "nation" appeared. We did not include more than once maroons whose owners posted ads multiple times. Nor did we, whenever ambiguous or unclear, count slaves whose owners were not in Jacmel or were not explicitly said to have left Jacmel (or its associated regions, like Bainet). 

This method, of course, is far from perfect. And it it probable that the high number of Congos is at least partly related to the elevating numbers of West Central Africans imported in the final decades of colonial rule. Similarly, the high number of Creoles may, in part, be a result of them knowing the land better and having more connections, thereby increasing their share of maroons. Further, since many acts of marronage were of a small-scale or short duration, rather than grand marronage, this sample only reflects a portion of the totality of slave resistance. 

Despite these and additional problems, these runaway notices sometimes capture or include slaves from minority "nations" who are not always easy to detect. For example, Macoua, Mozambique, or "Black Indian" slaves, few in number in this area, were still present in this corner of the colony. Their numbers, while small, nonetheless help us contextualize slave demographics and the slave trade in various parts of the colony. The presence of Southeast Africans or "Indians" (in this case, possibly Asian Indians), as well as the numbers of Creoles from other European colonies in the Caribbean, demonstrate the Jacmel area's connections to slave trading networks that may have involved smuggling. The preponderance of nations that are difficult to identify and tiny numbers for several likewise illustrates the tremendous diversity of "nations" represented in Saint Domingue.