 As plantation after plantation fell to the enslaved Africans, the European population fled; eventually only half of the whites who had lived in the colony remained.Led by Cuffy (now the national hero of Guyana), the escaped enslaved Africans came to number about 3,000 and threatened European control over the Guianas.The rebels were defeated with the assistance of troops from neighbouring European colonies like from the British, French, Sint Eustatius and overseas from the Dutch Republic.