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The Corps of Colonial Marines were two Marine units raised from former slaves for service in the Americas by the British at the behest of Alexander Cochrane. The units were created at two different times, and were later disbanded once the military threat had disappeared. The first Corps was a small unit that served in the Caribbean from 1808 to 12 October 1810, recruited from former slaves to address the shortage of military manpower in the Caribbean. The locally-recruited men were less susceptible to tropical illnesses than were troops sent from Britain. The Corps followed the practice of the British Army's West India Regiments in recruiting slaves as soldiers.〔In the previous year, the Mutiny Act of 1807 emancipated all slaves in the British Army and, as a result, subsequently enlisted slaves were considered free on enlistment.〕 The second, more substantial, Corps served from 18 May 1814 until 20 August 1816. The greater part of the Corps was stationed on the Atlantic coast, with a smaller body occupying a fort on the Gulf coast in Florida.〔Heidler, p434〕 Recruits were escaped slaves who gained their freedom by joining the British but, unlike the men of the West India Regiments, the Corps' recruits were loath to view themselves as "slave soldiers". Previously disenfranchised, the offer of freedom appealed to them; however, the establishment of the force sparked controversy at the time (the arming of former slaves represented a psychological threat to the slave-owning society of the Americas).〔Owsley & Smith, p105〕 As a consequence, the two senior officers of the Corps in Florida (George Woodbine and Edward Nicolls) were demonised in ''Niles' Register'' for their association with the Corps and inducing slave revolt. At the end of the War of 1812, as the British post in Florida was evacuated the Corps' Florida detachment was paid off and disbanded.〔Landers, p125〕 Although several men accompanied the British to Bermuda, the majority continued to live in settlements around the wooden stockade the Corps had garrisoned (which had become a symbol of slave insurrection).〔Owsley & Smith, p107〕 This legacy of a community of armed fugitive slaves with a substantial arsenal would lead to tensions with the United States of America.〔Rodriguez (Ed), p346〕 Those remaining later took part in the Battle of Negro Fort in July 1816, after which they joined the southward migration of Seminoles and African Americans escaping the American advance. Members of the Colonial Marine battalion who were deployed on the Atlantic coast withdrew from American territory.〔Nicolas, p288〕 They would continue in British service as garrison-in-residence at Bermuda until 1816, when the unit was disbanded and the ex-Marines resettled on Trinidad.〔Rodriguez (Ed), p66〕 ==First Corps== Rear Admiral Sir Alexander Cochrane raised the first Corps of Colonial Marines in 1808 while commander-in-chief of British naval forces on the Leeward Islands station during the Napoleonic Wars. The British had captured the island of Marie Galante earlier that year, but the French governor of Guadeloupe attacked the island on hearing that illness had weakened its British garrison. Marie Galante slaves assisted the British when promised that they would not be returned to their proprietors;〔Buckley, p284〕 by this means, the island was preserved under British control until the arrival of three companies of the 1st West India Regiment.〔Ellis, p125〕 Cochrane named the ex-slaves the Corps of Colonial Marines, which was enlarged with fugitive slaves from Guadeloupe. The Corps was paid from Marie Galante revenues, clothed from Royal Navy stores and commanded by Royal Marine officers.〔Letters from Commander-in-Chief, Leeward Islands ((ADM 1/329 )) Cochrane to Admiralty, 18 October 1808, reporting the formation of the Corps from slaves of masters on Marie Galante helping the French and from slaves from Guadeloupe; Cochrane to Poole, 2 Nov 1808, describing the Colonial Corps as "nearly complete, having upwards of two hundred volunteer Blacks, ... principally deserters and others captured from the enemy".〕 After the repossession of Guadeloupe Cochrane maintained the Corps, and on 12 October 1810 redistributed the men: 70 among the ships of the squadron, 20 to 30 to the battery at the Saintes (a group of small islands south of Guadeloupe) and 50 remaining in the Marie Galante garrison. They saw no further action as a distinct body, but were listed in ships' musters among supernumeraries for wages and victuals under the description "Colonial Marine" until mid-1815.〔Marie Galante garrison muster, ADM 37/8610. Members of the Corps listed in various Royal Navy ships' musters in the (ADM 37 series ).〕〔McNish Weiss, John. (2007). "Sir Alexander Cochrane's first Corps of Colonial Marines: Marie Galante 1808". Paper for 2007 Naval History Symposium, United States Naval Academy, Annapolis, Maryland, USA〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Corps of Colonial Marines」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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