Abstract

DAZA-VILLAR, Vladimir. From Vagrants to Recruits and Deserters. Desertions in the Colonial Militias of the Caribbean Provinces of Neogranadino, XVIII Century. Historelo.rev.hist.reg.local [online]. 2023, vol.15, n.33, pp.112-144.  Epub May 01, 2023. ISSN 2145-132X.  https://doi.org/10.15446/historelo.v15n33.102388.

This article analyzes the efforts to promote a military reform in the Neo-Granadian Caribbean, seen as measures of colonial authorities to contain desertions from the military during the eighteenth century. Likewise, it exposes the repressive treatments that were instituted to control them and to understand the nature of this phenomenon. For this purpose, it relied on documentary sources from the Militias and Marines Fund of the Colonial Section of the General Archive of the Nation of Colombia. This documentary collection, which covers almost all the colonial centuries in the Caribbean, contains news about fugitives and complaints by the authorities against deserters. The research aims to contribute to studying military reform in the Neo-granadian Caribbean in the eighteenth century in relation to deserters. To reach the conclusion that the strategies of escape and concealment show that the decision to desert was conscious and maintained over time, and, in a certain way, they were a strong opposition to the colonial social order.

Keywords : colonial militias; soldiers; desertions; discipline; Neo-Granadine Caribbean; 18^th century.

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