HAITIAN REVOLUTION

The 'Haitian Revolution' (1791-1804) was the most successful of the many African slave rebellions in the Western Hemisphere and established Haiti as a free, black republic, the first of its kind. At the time of the revolution, Haiti was a colony of France known as Saint-Domingue. By means of this revolution, Africans and people of African ancestry freed themselves from French colonization and from slavery. Although hundreds of rebellions occurred during the slave era, only the 1791 revolt on Saint-Domingue succeeded in permanently liberating an entire island.^[1]
Haiti is the first black republic in modern history. It went directly from being a French colony to self-governance through a process that has had lasting effect on the nation. The system established by slaveholders demonstrated the effectiveness of violence and force in controlling the majority. This system survived the revolution and continued under the nascent black republic. A light-skinned elite took control of political and economic power.^[2]
Historians traditionally identify the catalyst as being a particular Vodou service in August 1791 performed at Bois Caïman by Dutty Boukman, a high priest.^[3] However, in reality a number of complex events set the stage that culminated in the most significant revolt in the history of African enslavement.

Contents

Precursors

1789

1791 slave rebellion

Leadership of Toussaint

Free republic

Impacts

See also

References

Bibliography

Literature and Art

External links

Precursors

The riches of the Caribbean depended on the Europeans' increasing taste for sugar, which plantation owners could exchange for provisions from North America and manufactured goods from Europe. Starting in the 1730s, French engineers constructed complex irrigation systems to increase sugarcane production. By the 1740s Saint-Domingue, along with Jamaica, had become the main supplier of the world's sugar. Sugar production depended on the enormous amount of grueling manual labor provided by black slaves in the harsh Haiti colonial plantation economy. The white planters who derived their wealth from the sale of sugar knew they were vastly outnumbered by slaves and lived in fear of slave rebellion.
In 1758, the white landowners began passing legislation that set restrictions on the rights of other colors and classes, until a rigid caste system was defined. Most historians have classified the people there at the time into three groups. One was the white colonists, or ''blancs''. A second was the free blacks (usually mulattoes), or ''gens de couleur'' (people of color). A third group, outnumbering the others by a ratio of 10-to-1, was made up of mostly African-born slaves, who spoke a patois of French and West African languages known as Creole.^[4]
White colonists and black slaves frequently had violent conflicts. Gangs of runaway slaves, known as maroons, lived in the woods and often conducted violent and brutal raids on the island's sugar and coffee plantations. The success of these attacks established a black Haitian martial tradition of violence and brutality to effect political ends.^[5] However, although the numbers in these bands grew large (sometimes into the thousands), they generally lacked the leadership and strategy to accomplish large-scale objectives. The first effective maroon leader to emerge was the charismatic François Mackandal, who succeeded in unifying the black resistance. A Vodou priest, Mackandal inspired his people by drawing on African traditions and religions. He united the Maroon bands and also established a network of secret organizations among the plantation slaves. He drew the bands of slaves together and led a rebellion from 1751 through 1757. Although he was captured by the French and burned at the stake in 1758, large armed maroon bands continued their raiding and harassment after his death.^[6][1]

1789

In 1789 Saint-Domingue, producer of 40 percent of the world's sugar, was the most valuable colony on earth. At the lowest level of society were the slaves although they outnumbered whites and coloreds eight to one.^[1] The slave population on the island totaled at least 500,000 by 1789, almost half of the one million slaves in the Caribbean.^[9] They were mostly African-born as the slavery system was extremely harsh and death rates exceeded birth rates. The slave population declined at an annual rate of two to five percent, due to overwork, inadequate food, shelter, clothing and medical care, and the imbalance between the sexes.^[10] Some slaves were of a creole elite class of urban slaves domestics, who worked as cooks, personal servants and artisans around the plantation manor. This relatively priviledged class was largely born in the Americas, while the under class born in Africa labored hard under harsh conditions.
The area known as the Plaine du Nord on the northern shore was the most fertile area with the largest sugar plantations. It was an area of vast economic importance. Here most of the slaves lived in relative isolation, separated from the rest of the colony by a high mountain range known as the ''Massif''. This area was a stronghold of the ''grand blancs'', the rich white colonists who wanted greater autonomy for the colony, especially economically, so they could do as they pleased.^[11]
Among St. Domingue’s 40,000 white French colonials in 1789, European-born Frenchmen monopolized administrative posts. The sugar planters, the ''grand blancs'', were largely minor aristocrats. Most returned to France as soon as possible, hoping to avoid the dreaded yellow fever.^[12] The poor whites, ''petit blancs'', included artisans, shopkeepers, slave dealers, overseers, and day laborers. St. Domingue’s free coloreds, the ''gens de couleur'' numbered over 28,000 by 1789.^[13]
Besides the racial conflicts cultivated by slave masters between whites, gens de couleur, and blacks of whom many were slaves of African birth, the country was polarized by regional rivalries between the North, South, and West. In addition, there was class conflict between rich white planters (''grands blancs''), poorer whites (''petits blancs''), free blacks or gens de couleur, and slaves, as well as conflict between proponents of independence, those loyal to France, allies of Spain, and allies of Britain. In France, an advisory body called the National Assembly made radical changes in French laws and on August 26, 1789, published the Declaration of the Rights of Man declaring all men free and equal. The French Revolution shaped the course of the conflict in Haiti and was at first widely welcomed in the island. So many were the twists and turns in the leadership in France, and so contorted were events in Haiti itself, that various classes and parties changed their alignments many times.

1791 slave rebellion

The African population on the island began to hear of the agitation for independence by the rich European planters, the ''grands blancs'', who had resented France's limitations on the island's foreign trade. This class mostly allied with the royalists and the British, as Africans understood that if Saint-Domingue's independence were to be led by white slave masters, it would probably mean even harsher treatment and increased injustice for the African population as the plantation owners would be free to inflict slavery as they pleased without even minimal accountability to their French peers.
Saint-Domingue's free people of color, most notably Julien Raimond, had been actively appealing to France for full civil equality with whites since the 1780s. Raimond used the French Revolution to make this the major colonial issue before the French National Assembly. In October 1790, Vincent Ogé, another wealthy free man of color from the colony, returned home from Paris, where he had been working with Raimond. Convinced that an ambiguous law passed by the French Constitutent Assembly had given full civil rights to wealthy men of color like himself, Ogé demanded the right to vote. When the colonial governor refused, he led a brief insurgency in the area around Cap Francais, before being captured and brutally executed, in early 1791, by being tied to a wheel, crushed by hammer blows and left to die. Ogé was not fighting against slavery, but his treatment was cited by later slave rebels as one of the factors in their decision to rise up in August 1791 and resist treaties with the colonists.
In general the conflict up to this point was between factions of whites and between whites and free colored while the black slaves watched from the sidelines.
The slaves were not expected to participate in the rebellion. But suddenly on August 22, 1791, a great slave uprising plunged the country into civil war. Thousands of slaves in the fertile Plaine du Nord region rose up to take vengeance on their masters and to fight for their liberty. Within the next ten days slaves had taken control of the entire northern province in an unprecedented slave revolt that left the whites controlling only a few isolated fortified camps. Within the next two months as the violence escalated, the rebelling slaves killed 2,000 whites and burned or destroyed 280 sugar plantations.^[1] Within a year the island was in revolutionary chaos. Slaves burnt the plantations where they had been forced to work, and killed masters, overseers and other whites.
Larger disturbances were underway as leaders Jean François and Georges Biassou led the slave uprising to align with the pro-royalist Spanish authorities in Santo Domingo. The slave rebellion that had began on the plantations in the north spread chaos across the colony. Eventually, on April 4, 1792, the French legislature proclaimed the equality of all free people in the French colonies regardless of color, and sent a commission that was dominated by Léger-Félicité Sonthonax to Saint-Domingue to ensure that the colonial authorities complied.

Leadership of Toussaint

One of the most successful black commanders was Toussaint L'Ouverture, a self-educated former domestic slave. Under the military leadership of Toussaint, the rebellious slaves were able to gain the upper hand and restore most of Saint-Domingue to France. Having made himself master of the island, however, Toussaint did not wish to surrender power to France, and ruled the country effectively as an autonomous entity. Toussaint overcame a succession of local rivals (including Sonthonax, André Rigaud, and Comte d'Hédouville). Hédouville forced a fatal wedge between Rigaud and Toussaint before he escaped back to France.^[15] Toussaint defeated a British expeditionary force in 1798, and even led an invasion of neighboring Santo Domingo, freeing the slaves there by 1801. A French general, Étienne Laveaux, was able to convince L'Ouverture to change sides in May 1794 and fight for the French Republic against the Spanish; meanwhile Sonthonax had proclaimed an end to slavery on 29 August 1793.
In 1801, Toussaint issued a constitution for Saint-Domingue which provided for autonomy and decreed that Toussaint himself would be governor-for-life. In retaliation, Napoleon Bonaparte dispatched an expeditionary force of French soldiers to the island, led by Bonaparte's brother in law Charles Leclerc, to restore French rule. The French soldiers were accompanied by mulatto troops led by Alexandre Pétion and André Rigaud, who had been defeated by Toussaint three years earlier. Some of Toussaint's closest allies, including Jean-Jacques Dessalines, defected to the French. Toussaint was promised his freedom, if he agreed to integrate his remaining troops into the French Army. Toussaint agreed to this in May 1802 but was deceived, and was seized and shipped off to France where he later died while imprisoned at Fort-de-Joux.

Jean Jacques Dessalines

For a few months the island was largely quiescent under Napoleonic rule. But when it became apparent that the French intended to re-establish slavery, Dessalines and Pétion switched sides again, in October 1802, and fought against the French. In November, Leclerc died of yellow fever, like much of his army, and his successor, the Vicomte de Rochambeau, fought an even more brutal campaign than his predecessor. His atrocities helped rally many former French loyalists to the rebel cause. The French were further weakened by a British naval blockade, and by the unwillingness of Napoleon to send the requested massive reinforcements. Napoleon had sold the Louisiana Territory to the United States in April 1803, and had begun to lose interest in his ventures in the Western Hemisphere. Dessalines led the rebellion until its completion when the French forces were finally defeated in 1803.
The last battle of the Haitian Revolution, the Battle of Vertières, occurred on November 18 1803, near Cap-Haitien and was fought between Haitian rebels led by Jean-Jacques Dessalines and the French colonial army under the Viscount of Rochambeau. The Battle of Vertières led to the Treaty of Ryswick in which Haiti was given its independence. This major loss was a decisive blow to France and its colonial empire.

Free republic

On January 1, 1804, Dessalines, the new leader under the dictatorial 1801 constitution, declared Haiti a free republic. Thus Haiti became the second independent nation in the Western Hemisphere, after the United States, and the only successful slave rebellion in world history. However, the country had been crippled by years of war, its agriculture devastated, its formal commerce nonexistent, and the people uneducated and mostly unskilled.^[16][17]
Haiti agreed to make reparations to French slaveholders in 1825 in the amount of 150 million frances, reduced in 1838 to 60 million francs, for its independence and to achieve freedom from French aggression. This indemnity bankrupted the Haitian treasury and mortgaged Haiti's future to the French banks providing the funds for the large first installment, permanently affecting Haiti's ability to be prosperous.^[18]
The end of the Haitian Revolution in 1804 marked the end of colonialism, but the social conflict that had been cultivated under slavery continued to affect the population. The revolution left in power an affranchi élite as well as the formidable Haitian army. These elements split into two factions – the supporters of Alexandre Pétion who were predominantly ''milat'' (mulatto, light-skinned), and those of Henri Christophe who were mainly ''nwa'' (noir, dark-skinned). The two factions assumed control of most of the businesses in the new country.
France continued the slavery system in Martinique and Guadeloupe but with the freedom of Haiti, Great Britain was able to abolish their slave trade in 1808 and in 1834 abolished slavery completely in the British West Indies. France formally recognized Haiti as an independence nation in 1834 as did the United States in 1862.^[11]

Impacts

The Haitian Revolution was influential in slave rebellions in America and British colonies. The loss of a major source of western revenue shook Napoleon's faith in the promise of the western world, encouraging him to unload other French assets in the region including the territory known as Louisiana. Many of the freed slaves of Saint-Domingue settled in New Orleans, profoundly influencing the history of that city. Britain became the first major power to permanently abolish the slave trade in 1807. Although many slaves in the United States attempted to mimic Toussaint L'Ouverture's actions in the Haitian Revolution and failed in the end, the Haitian Revolution stood as a blueprint for black American emancipation. L'Ouverture remains as a war hero and still appears in black art.
In 2004, Haiti celebrated the bicentennial of its independence from France.

See also

★ Mawon

★ Polish Legions in Italy

★ U.S. Reaction to the Haitian Revolution

★ ''The Crime of Napoleon (book)''

References

1. A Brief History of the Caribbean, , Jan, Rogozinski, Facts on File, Inc., 1999, ISBN 0-8160-3811-2
2. Haiti: Historical Setting
3. Prelude to the Revolution: 1760 to 1789
4. Haiti - French Colonialism
5. The Haitian Revolution - The Slave Rebellion of 1791

6. The Slave Rebellion of 1791
7. A Brief History of the Caribbean, , Jan, Rogozinski, Facts on File, Inc., 1999, ISBN 0-8160-3811-2
8. A Brief History of the Caribbean, , Jan, Rogozinski, Facts on File, Inc., 1999, ISBN 0-8160-3811-2
9. Herbert Klein, Transatlantic Slave Trade, Pg. 32-33
10. Tim Matthewson, A Pro-Slavery Foreign Policy: Haitian-American Relations During the Early Republic, (Praeger: Westport, Ct. and London, 2003) Pg. 3
11. The Caribbean: The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism, , Franklin W., Knight, Oxford University Press, 1990, ISBN 0-19-505441-5
12. C.L.R. James, Black Jacobins (Vintage, 1989) Pg. 29
13. Robert Heinl, Written in Blood: The History of the Haitian People (Lanham, New York and London, 1996) Pg. 45
14. A Brief History of the Caribbean, , Jan, Rogozinski, Facts on File, Inc., 1999, ISBN 0-8160-3811-2
15. Review of Haitian Revolution Part II
16. Independent Haiti
17. Chapter 6 - Haiti: Historical Setting
18. A Country Study: Haiti -- Boyer: Expansion and Decline
19. The Caribbean: The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism, , Franklin W., Knight, Oxford University Press, 1990, ISBN 0-19-505441-5

Bibliography

★ Dubois, Laurent. ''Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution.'' Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University (2005) ISBN 0-674-01826-5.

★ Dubois, Laurent & Garrigus, John D. ''Slave Revolution in the Caribbean, 1789–1804: A Brief History with Documents.'' Bedford/St. Martin's Press (2006) ISBN 0-312-41501-X.

★ Garrigus, John D. ''Before Haiti: Race and Citizenship in Saint-Domingue.'' Palgrave-Macmillan, (2006) ISBN 1-4039-7140-4.

★ Geggus, David P. ''Haitian Revolutionary Studies.'' University of South Carolina Press, (2002) ISBN 1-57003-416-8.

★ James, C.L.R. ''The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L'Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution.'' Vintage, 2nd edition, (1989) ISBN 0-679-72467-2.

★ Ott, Thomas O. ''The Haitian Revolution, 1789-1804.'' University of Tennessee Press, 1973.

★ Peyre-Ferry, Joseph Elysée. ''Journal des opérations militaires de l'armée francaise à Saint-Domingue,1802-1803'' (2006), ISBN 2846210527.

Literature and Art

★ English poet William Wordsworth published his sonnet To Toussaint L'Ouverture in January 1803.

★ In 1938, American artist Jacob Lawrence created a series of paintings about the life of Toussaint L'Ouverture, which he later adapted into a series of prints.

★ Cuban writer Alejo Carpentier's second novel, The Kingdom of this World (1949) explores the Haitian Revolution in depth. It is almost universally recognized as one of the novels that inaugurated the Latin American "Boom" in fiction during the middle part of the twentieth century.

★ In 2004 an exhibition of paintings entitled Caribbean Passion: Haiti 1804, by artist Kimathi Donkor, was held in London to celebrate the bicentenary of Haiti's revolution.

External links

★ Haiti: Revolutionary War 1791 - 1803

★ The Louverture Project: Timeline of Events in Haitian Revolutionary History

★ Portals to the World - Haiti

★ Haitian Constitution of 1801 (English)

★ Haiti Archives

★ Haiti - The First Black Republic in the World