Qualla: Accompong

Accompong: Introduction

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. In 1751, the planter Thomas Thistlewood recorded meeting a man he called Captain Compoon. The Maroon leader wore a ruffled shirt, a blue broadcloth coat with scarlet cuffs and gold buttons, a black hat, and white linen breeches puffed at the knee. He wore no stockings or shoes. Four years later, another observer described Accompong in an embroidered waistcoat, gold lace around his hat, silver rings on every finger, and still barefoot. Here was a man who dressed in the finery of colonial power while refusing to stand on its terms. His village, Accompong, nestled in the limestone hills of Jamaica's Cockpit Country, has operated on that same principle for nearly three centuries.

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Image: Public domain

Accompong: The Kindah Tree

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Angra (talk), CC BY 3.0. The name comes from the Asante word Acheampong, linking this Jamaican hilltop to the Akan people of present-day Ghana. Accompong was reportedly the brother of Cudjoe, the legendary Maroon leader who united formerly enslaved and Indigenous Taino people into a guerrilla force that ...

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Image: Angra (talk) | CC BY 3.0

Accompong: The Price of the Treaty

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Audrey Dreygo Headley, CC BY-SA 4.0. Autonomy came with conditions that stained the Maroons' own history. In exchange for self-governance and military alliance with the British, the Maroons agreed to return enslaved people who had escaped the plantations, collecting a bounty of two dollars per person. This clause to...

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Image: Audrey Dreygo Headley | CC BY-SA 4.0

Accompong: Wars Within Wars

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. When Cudjoe died in 1764, Accompong tried to claim control of both towns, as the 1739 treaty had named him Cudjoe's successor. The governor intervened, stripping Accompong of the Trelawny Town badge of authority and handing it to a local officer named Lewis. Accompong was told hi...

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Image: Public domain

Accompong: Endurance in the Cockpits

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Public domain. The village grew steadily: 85 people in 1740, 159 in 1788, 238 by 1808, and 436 by 1841. After emancipation ended slavery across the British Empire in the 1830s, the bounty-hunting clause became moot, but the Maroons' distinct identity persisted. The Accompong Maroons helped the ...

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Image: Public domain

Accompong: Governing from the Hilltop

Fri, 06 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Audrey Dreygo Headley, CC BY-SA 4.0. Today, Accompong governs itself through a system rooted in Akan traditions brought from West Africa centuries ago. The executive leader holds the title Colonel-in-Chief and leads the Maroon Council. Richard Currie was elected to the position in February 2021. Since Jamaica's inde...

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Image: Audrey Dreygo Headley | CC BY-SA 4.0