In eastern Colombia, near the cities of Vélez, Cúcuta, Socorro and Tunja, Africans manufactured textile’s in commercial mills. Emerald mines outside of Bogotá relied on African labourers. Other sectors of the Colombian economy, like tobacco, cotton, artisanship and domestic work would have been impossible without African labor. In pre-abolition Colombian society, many Afro-Colombian captives fought the Spanish, their colonial forces and their freedom as soon as they arrived in Colombia. Those who escaped from their oppressors would live in free Black African towns called "Palenques", where they would live as ""Cimarrones"," or fugitives. Some historians considered Chocó to be a very big "palenque", with a large population of "Cimarrones, especially in the areas of the Baudó River. This is where Cimarrón leaders like Benkos Biohó and Barule fought for freedom.