First Maroon War
The Windward Maroons were based in the forested interior of the island, in the heart of the Blue Mountains (Jamaica). During the First Maroon War, Quao shared the leadership of the Windward Maroons with Queen Nanny, an outstanding female Maroon leader. Under the leadership of Quao and Nanny, the Windward Maroons carried out the bulk of the fighting against the British colonial authorities during the 1730s. When Governor Edward Trelawny realized that the British colonial forces would not be able to win the First Maroon War, he offered a treaty first to Cudjoe of the Leeward Maroons in 1739, and then to Quao in 1740. However, Cudjoe was able to secure a more advantageous treaty than Quao, probably because the western Maroon leader was negotiating from a stronger position. The 1739 treaty gave Cudjoe permission to keep all Maroons who had joined his town before he signed the document, but the Windward Maroons were required to return all runaways who joined them in the three years prior to Quao signing the 1740 treaty. Quao watched while the British military commanders quarreled over who should sign the treaty with the Windward Maroons, an argument that was eventually won by Robert Bennett. Quao and Bennett ‘cut their fingers, and mixed their blood in a calabash bowl’, after which they signed the peace treaty.Crawford's Town uprising
After the 1740 treaty, it appears that Quao and Nanny parted ways. It seems that Nanny took her supporters east to what would later becomeLegacy
It is not clear what happened to Quao, because he disappears from the records after Crawford's Town was destroyed. The supporters of Quao relocated to the neighbouring Maroon town of Scott's Hall (Jamaica), while the supporters of Crawford took up residence in the new Maroon community of Charles Town (Jamaica). The white superintendents took control of both Charles Town and Scott's Hall in the aftermath of the Crawford's Town uprising. Maroon officers, such as Davy the Maroon, reported to the superintendents in Scott's Hall.Siva, ''After the Treaties'', pp. 56-7.References
{{reflist Jamaican Maroon leaders Colony of Jamaica History of Jamaica Resistance to the British Empire Jamaican rebel slaves 18th-century Jamaican people