May 10, 1655

• Adm. William Penn and Gen. Robert Venables commanded an English expedition, planning to control Hispaniola (modern-day Haiti and the Dominican Republic). The heavily guarded island deterred them, so they overtook Spanish settlers in Jamaica. The Spanish freed their slaves and fled to Cuba. The newly freed slaves ran to the hills and jungles to avoid capture by British, forming the Jamaican Maroon society. This community of black people, mainly from West Africa, resisted the British and kept their oral traditions alive because of their secure location.
  
  

Sugar Plantations

• Sir Thomas Modyford, the owner of a sugar plantation, became the first governor of Jamaica in 1664. Plantations that grew cash crops to be sold to England began in Jamaica soon after the British took control. Those plantations relied heavily on male and female slaves to tend the fields, perform domestic duties and work as skilled laborers and tradesmen. Plantations first grew crops such as tobacco and cocoa, but plantation owners soon began focusing on sugar as their primary cash crop. The sugar industry flourished, starting with 57 plantations in 1673 and growing to about 430 by 1739. Slaves often escaped to Maroon communities in the mountains of Jamaica.
  
  

First Maroon War

• In 1729, the British tried overtaking the Maroon communities on the island of Jamaica. "Captain Cudjoe," the leader of the Maroons, convinced his followers to fight for their freedom, even if it meant death. He and his people resisted the British for 10 years. The Maroons and the British signed a treaty in 1739 that granted Maroons relative independence and tax exemptions. The terms of the agreement stated that Maroons would return runaway slaves. Maroons then became slave hunters.
  
  

Second Maroon War

• The Maroons helped British plantation owners maintain control of slaves on Jamaican plantations. A second Maroon War occurred in 1795, when the British became dissatisfied with the arrangement they had made with freed blacks on the island and when 300 Maroons in Trelawney Town revolted against the colonial government.
  
  The Maroons were not as successful at holding off the British as they had been in the first war. The British used dogs to flush Maroons out of hiding and forced them to sign a peace agreement. The British broke the treaty and captured 590 Maroons, exiling them to the cold Canadian province of Nova Scotia. Most died, but a few survivors were sent to Sierra Leone, West Africa. Maroon communities still exist in Jamaica.
  
  

Abolition and Independence

• In 1834, the British Parliament abolished slavery in Jamaica, but a few black people remained bound to slave owners until 1838. Some prospered, but most were oppressed and suffered economically. Jamaica finally gained independence on August 6, 1962, and Alexander Bustamante of the Jamaica Labour Party became the first prime minister.
  
  

Present Day

• Jamaica experienced economic prosperity in the 1960s, particularly in the mining, tourism, manufacturing and construction sectors. In the 1970s and 1980s, this prosperity was derailed by poverty, violence and drug trafficking, as well as government scandals. In the late 1980s, Hurricane Gilbert plunged the country into a dark economic period, and crime rates rose until the early 21st century. In 2007, Portia Simpson Miller became Jamaica's first female prime minister.
  
  According to the Encyclopedia of the Nations website, Jamaica's population of more than 2.6 million people is made up of 90.9 percent of African descent, 7.3 of mixed race and 1.8 of other ethnic groups, including whites and East Indians. The tourism industry still prospers despite the criminal elements on the island.