The Haitian Revolution

LECTURE 2:

Revolts of the Masses

Black slaves saw this act as a clear sign they would never be granted freedom by the Colonial land owners. Some began to form a plan to take freedom instead.

On August 14 1791 a black man named Dutty Boukman gave a signal to begin a massive slave revolt. Within weeks 1000 plantations were destroyed and 100,000 people were rebelling.

In order to stop the revolt, leaders of the French Republic granted complete civil and political rights to all people of color in the colonies. Despite the monumental change, the Haitian Revolution was far from over.

The French military fought back on behalf of the land owners, and killed 15,000 rebels in return. The revolt in Haiti continued, but was then led by a man named Toussaint Louverture.

Louverture trained the rebels to fight as an army, and used Spain’s rivalry with France to get support and weapons for the battles. France’s other rival, Britain, also joined the fight. France was in danger of losing their colony.

French aristocrats and clergy enjoyed unbelievable luxuries, while most working people starved. Eventually the people of France engaged in a bloody revolution that replaced their monarchy with a republic.

Leaders of the new French Republic declared that wealthy people of color in the colonies were now considered to be full citizens. Grands Blanc's refused to honor this decision, and fighting began between whites and mixed race people.

San Domingue was ruled by France, who in 1789 was one of the most powerful countries in all of Europe and the world. Despite that power France was about to face dramatic changes.

Life for men and women in San Domingue was rarely free and equal. Mixed race people were discriminated against despite their ability to own land.

Black people in San Domingue had no equality or freedoms. Their lives were disposable, and many whites needed their continued slavery in order to stay wealthy.

Part of France’s Revolution was the writing of a document called the “Declaration of the Rights of Man.” It described how men “are born and remain free and equal in rights.” But did this apply to the French colony San Domingue?

The Haitian

Revolution

The French

Revolution

Colonial

Freedom?

"Article I – Men are born and remain free and equal in rights. Social distinctions can be founded only on the common good."

LECTURE 3:

The Cost of Liberty

The Haitian

Revolution

Lectures 1 - 3

Toussaint and

San Domingue

When France freed its slaves in San Domingue, Toussaint Louverture joined forces with the French Republic - the only power in the world to emancipate black people. War continued, but with different alliances.

Louverture came to rule the entire island after his power was challenged and a rival caused a civil war. Louverture maintained freedom for the people of San Domingue, and tried to keep peace between the races.

San Domingue was still a colony of France, and when the Republic came to be ruled by Napoleon Bonaparte all liberties awarded to the former slaves was threatened. Napoleon wished to return the colony to slavery.

The Haitian

Independence War

Toussaint Louverture and his army refused to accept a return to slavery and declared San Domingue independent of France. In response Napoleon sent the most powerful army in the world to retake control.

Louverture was soon captured, and sent to a French prison. Before he was captured he gave his top general - Jean-Jacques Dessalines - a strategy to defeat what seemed like an unbeatable enemy.

European fighters were susceptible to a disease called “Yellow Fever.” Thousands of French died from the disease the longer they stayed on the island. The longer the rebels resisted, the better their chances.

Despite this advantage, Dessalines’ soldiers were little match for Napoleon’s Grande Armée - one of the greatest armies in world history. In order to simply survive the war the rebels were forced to use guerilla tactics.

Napoleon’s Grande Armée also busied itself with trying to rule all of Europe. Countries who resisted France usually lost, but people everywhere continued to resist their attacks. This provided the San Domingue rebels with their chance.

With so many soldiers dying from Yellow Fever, and with the rebels showing no signs of surrendering, Napoleon made the decision to withdraw the Grande Armée from San Domingue. The rebels were free.

First Contact

For most of its history the land now known as Haiti was inhabited by indigenous people known as the Tainos. They called their land Ayiti.

In 1492 Europeans from Spain made contact with the Taino people. The Spanish colonized the land, exploited the Tainos, and used them as slaves to search for gold.

The Cost of Liberty?

Tainos were raped, killed for sport, and dehumanized. Many committed suicide, and many others died from disease. Ayiti’s population almost disappeared.

Spanish colonizers called the island Santo Domingo. They were eventually joined by colonizers from France who would call the island San Domingue.

Exploiting

San Domingue

French colonizers eventually began farming cash crops on the Western third of the island. The most profitable were sugar and coffee.

On January 1st, 1804 the independent country of Haiti was born. Dessalines was its first leader. This was the first time in history slaves won liberty from their masters and formed their own country.

Sugar earned colonizers the most money, but it was difficult work and very expensive to grow. Colonizers were able to profit from growing sugar by using slave labor.

When the Taino people began to die off, colonizers looked to Western Africa for new slaves.

For more than 300 years people were kidnapped and made to work the land in San Domingue.

If black slaves survived the terrible journey to San Domingue from Africa they faced a life of forced labor, beatings, rapes, and dehumanization. Slaves died so quickly that colonizers often bought new people to replace them.

In the months after Haitian independence Dessalines ordered that all whites in Haiti be executed. Men, women, and children alike were murdered by the Haitian army as a message to the world that Haiti would never return to slavery.

The Social Classes

By the year 1790 four distinct social classes lived on the French portion of San Domingue. Wealthy whites (called Grand Blancs) held the most power and owned land. Poor whites (Petit Blancs) worked for them.

Mixed race black (called “Mulattos”) sometimes lived free as the children of white colonists. Some had wealth and a few “mulattos” even owned slaves. They were often resented by the Petit Blancs.

African slaves occupied the lowest social class on San Domingue. There were 500,000 slaves, most of whom with little to no chance of ever improving their social class or winning their freedom.

~500,000

~32,000

~24,000

LECTURE 1:

Before the Revolution