1779: Nanny Town

 

1779: Nanny Town

July 25th, 1779:


I write this today to note my experiences in this Maroon settlement named ‘Nanny Town’. Hidden deep in the Blue Mountains in Jamaica, this community uses the rugged terrain and forest to hide from their former or would-be enslavers (1). It is a fascinating area, completely separate from the rest of Jamaica. This group has completely separated itself from any other political structure or group I have seen on my travels. This community has begun to rely on themselves for food and shelter and has also displayed cooperation with neighboring Native tribes (2). 


July 29th, 1779:


There is a leader of this town, and she goes by the name ‘Queen Nanny’. I would think that to be the reason as to why this community is called ‘Nanny Town’. She is hailed as a mystic healer, and there are many different plants that she uses in her remedies (3). She commands the warriors of this community, and they engage in deadly, secretive and methodic attacks (2). They leave few survivors, and it is a miracle that I still stand to tell my stories. From what I can tell, they appear to have been around since the late 17th century and are currently still fighting off the British. 



August 3rd, 1779:


I have just come across a painting done by John Gabriel Stedman (4) He appears to have been a Dutch soldier who had been sent to Suriname (a part of the mainland) to fight the Maroons (5). The mere thought of fighting the Maroons of Nanny Town is enough to put me into shock – why on Earth would someone ever think of doing such a thing? Nevertheless, I thought that this painting would do a good job showing what the terrain of this area looks like and what the Crown might look like walking around in the swamps. 


A note: This painting was probably done sometime in the early 1770s by John Gabriel Stedman but would not have been published anywhere until two decades later when his journal Narrative was published in London. This drawing was engraved by WIlliam Blake, and many of Stedman’s drawings became critical to the antislavery and abolitionist movement (5). 


1998: Nanny Town


August 29th, 1998:


We continued our excavation efforts in Nanny Town today. There are many different excavation groups here (6) and we’re focusing on interpreting the socio-cultural patterns of Nanny Town and determining the different factors that decided where the Maroons would settle. We’ve also obtained information that has allowed us to cite three different settlement phases. Phase one is noted by locally made earthenware, stone and shell artifacts and indigenous collaboration. Phase two is noted by figures of Nanny emerging as a mystical and herbal healer and by the use of equipment for battle. Phase three is representative of the Maroon’s encounters with the British (3). This information is fascinating and will be critical for my studies back at the University of the West Indies (6). 



(1) “Cultural Heritage: Blue and John Crowe Mountains National Park.” Blue and John Crowe Mountains National Park. https://www.blueandjohncrowmountains.org/cultural-heritage

(2) Price, Richard. “Maroon Societies in the Americas.” Oxford Research Encyclopedia of African History. Oxford University Press. December 2020. https://oxfordre-com.proxy.lib.miamioh.edu/africanhistory/display/10.1093/acrefore/9780190277734.001.0001/acrefore-9780190277734-e-935

(3) White, Cheryl. “The Nanny Town Maroons of Jamaica.” Encyclopedia of Caribbean Archeology, (2014): 6-8. https://www.academia.edu/10265308/The_Nanny_Town_Maroons_of_Jamaica 

(4) Blake, William. “March thro’ a swamp or Marsh in Terra firma.” National Gallery of Art, 1793, https://www.nga.gov/artworks/4993-march-thro-swamp-or-marsh-terra-firma

(5) “Narrative, of a five years’ expedition, against the revolted Negroes of Surinam, in Guiana, on the wild coast of South Amaerica, from the year 1772, to 1777.” Slavery and Portraiture in 18th Century Atlantic Britain. Interactive British Art at Yale. https://interactive.britishart.yale.edu/slavery-and-portraiture/304/narrative-of-a-five-years-expedition-against-the-revolted-negroes-of-surinam-in-guiana-on-the-wild-coast-of-south-america-from-the-year-1772-to-1777

(6) Agorsah, E. Kofi. “Nanny Town Excavations: Rewriting Jamaica’s History?” Newsletter of the Jamaican Geographical Society, (1993): 1, 6-7, https://pdxscholar.library.pdx.edu/black_studies_fac/48/

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