The name of the village hints at the history of St. Lucia, at the wars between the English and the French, and also at the slaves and runaways (called Nèg Mawons), the free blacks and the Caribs, who formed a ragtag but capable guerrilla army and whose role in the culture of St. Lucia is still being uncovered. This was an outpost of those who were waging their own war for freedom as the Europeans vied for dominance in the Caribbean. The Brigands War, as it was called, lasted from 1794 to 1798. In some ways it was an echo of the French Revolution, when black St. Lucians believed they had a reasonable hope of defeating slavery.

By February 1794, the French had been in possession of St. Lucia for thirteen years, Louis XVI had been beheaded, and the Republic had declared slavery abolished in the French Antilles. The settlement at Fond Gens Libre already existed, if it was not yet known by that name.

The freedom fighters' victory was not to last. In 1796, the British took control of the island, this time more or less for good. The British reimposed slavery (as did the French elsewhere in the Caribbean) for another forty years. And some people remained in the woods.

Jimmy told me that for a long time people were ashamed to come from Fond Gens Libre or other Brigand strongholds and felt tainted by association with the uneducated, violent rebels. Their history was recounted as a story of defeat and humiliation. Only recently has the narrative started to change as historians and archaeologists search out records not just in European archives but in the caves, tunnels, and ovens hidden throughout the infinite nooks and crannies of St. Lucia, places with descriptive Kwéyòl names like Wavin Konba ("Battle Ravine"), Kan Bwigan ("Brigands Camp"), and Ba Kan Nèg Mawon ("Runaways Camp").

Even after the British took control of St. Lucia, the French legal system remained in place for another thirty years. The French also continued to influence the culture through religion (the population is ninety percent Catholic) and education (the Church has run St. Mary's and St. Joseph's, the island's top schools for children of the elite, for more than a century). In subtle ways, conflict between British and French culture remains. There is a feeling among some that British resentment of the French led to spots with heavy French culture, such as Soufrière, being ignored. The clash is most evident in traditional social attitudes about language. Before British rule, people of all classes spoke patois and the middle and upper classes spoke French. But once English was established as the official language, speaking Kwéyòl became déclassé and the basis for social discrimination, particularly for the twenty percent of the population who could not speak English. Perhaps this, too, is starting to change: In a bookstore in Rodney Bay, I found both a dictionary and a language guide for Kwéyòl; more important, the language can now be used in the national legislature.