"For the Benefit of the Common Good": Regiments of Cacadores do Mato in Minas Gerais, Brazil

In 1754 the residents of the municipality of Sabará petitioned the king of Portugal for more permissive laws regarding weapons possession. They argued that they required better means to defend themselves from the threat posed by runaway slaves. During the first half of the eighteenth century colonial officials, following the Crown’s orders, attempted to impose order in the mining district by restricting the rights of mineiros to own or display weapons.¹ They explained further to the king that slaves “who come from the backlands of Africa always consider violent even the most benign form of captivity... and their main drive is to escape into the woods resembling those in which they were raised.”² Having embraced slavery as a major source of labor, residents of Sabará were nonetheless continuously confronted with the fact that individual slaves were not always compliant with the demands of a labor system based on coercion, no matter how benignly their owners treated them. Submitted to a regime of forced labor and having to endure the restraints of a life in bondage, slaves often manifested their dissatisfaction with their reality through what owners considered to be unruly behavior. As illustrated in different documents, it was not rare for slaves to refuse to work, to physically resist their owners or employers, to attack their owner’s property through theft or arson, or to attempt flight.

The frequency with which slaves in eighteenth-century Minas Gerais tried to escape their condition through flight led to constant battles between the captaincy’s free inhabitants and the several maroon settlements that emerged in the region. In an effort to control and suppress the activities of these groups of slaves, local government promoted the formation of regiments of soldiers (organized on the model of colonial militias) that were responsible for tracking down and retrieving runaway slaves. These regiments of caçadores do mato (bush hunters), as they were called, comprised a great number of ex-slaves and free persons of African descent. Despite growing suspicions of this group and continuous attempts to restrain their freedoms, white society in Minas Gerais could not help but place their safety in the hands of ex-slaves and their descendants. While the efforts of these men offered some relief from the threat posed by runaway slaves, their relationship to the society whose safety they were expected to insure was often a difficult one. On the one hand, caçadores do mato were repeatedly accused of abuse of power and negligence, leading to several reviews of the provisions regulating their activities in hopes of pressuring them to perform their duties with greater efficiency. On the other hand, compulsory service, lack of resources, and the poor training offered to potential soldiers, occasionally resulted in their refusal to carry out their orders.

The history of regiments of caçadores do mato in Minas Gerais has yet to be told in great detail. While different studies focusing on maroon societies, ex-slaves, and free persons of African descent in Minas Gerais have discussed to various degrees the activities of caçadores, few provide a deeper insight into the institutional, social and racial settings that marked the emergence and workings of these regiments.³ This article will examine more closely the history of regiments of caçadores do mato in Minas Gerais, placing a special focus on their presence and activities in the Municipality of Sabará. Though still a preliminary study, this article will provide a fuller account of these units and the men who composed them, while at the same time arguing that while serving in the regiment of caçadores do mato often suited the interests of free persons of African origin and descent, they nevertheless struggled to do so on their own terms.

The story of Gonçalo, an African slave who lived in the town of Sabará in the late eighteenth century, illustrates well the ongoing conflict of interests between bondsmen and their masters. The slave of Ana Maria da Rocha Lima, a free mulatto woman, Gonçalo worked as a hireling, helping...