The Haitian Revolution
Overview
The Haitian Revolution
In 1791, two years after the French Revolution began in France, the clarion call, “Liberty! Equality! Fraternity!," reached the French colony of Saint Domingue (present-day Haiti). The resulting Haitian Revolution is seminal in the history of slave revolts. Unlike other revolts and revolutions, the Haitian Revolution was successful. To date, it remains the most successful slave revolution.
Learning Objectives
- Examine the causes, events, and impact of the Haitian Revolution.
- Evaluate how the French Revolution influenced the Haitian Revolution.
Key Terms / Key Concepts
- Haiti: island nation in the Caribbean, formerly known as Saint Domingue
- Saint Domingue: name given to Haiti when it was a French colony
- Julien Raimond: a prosperous planter and free man of color who petitioned France for support of the Haitian Revolution
- Vincent Ogé: a wealthy, free man of color who led a revolt against racial discrimination promoted by the government of Saint Domingue
- Toussaint L’Ouverture: Haitian leader and general during the Haitian Revolution
- Jean-Jacques Dessalines: Haitian general during the Revolution and subsequent Emperor of Haiti
- The French Massacre of 1804: massacre of French and mixed-race civilians in Haiti undertaken by Dessalines and his troops
Background
The Latin American and Caribbean Wars of Independence, which took place during the late 18th and early 19th centuries, were deeply influenced by the American and French Revolutions. The notion of independence simmered throughout Latin America and the Caribbean before other major revolutions occurred, as these areas had been long governed and certainly oppressed by European nations such as Spain, Portugal, and France. And by the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, wars of independence had erupted throughout the Caribbean and Latin America.
The French and the Colony of Saint Domingue
From its earliest history as a French colony, Saint Domingue was rife with social conflict. Society was organized around a complex class system of free whites, free Africans, Indigenous peoples, and enslaved Africans. [a] Of these groups, enslaved Africans totaled half a million—far more than the free whites and Africans combined. Yet, the whites, many of whom were immigrants from France or direct descendants of French parents, dominated the wealth and industry in Saint Domingue.
The African slaves, many of whom were recently arrived from Africa’s west coast, were forced to work on the massive sugar plantations. Sugar production was complex and extremely labor-intensive. Not only must the crop be planted and harvested, but whole tracts of land cleared, usually by burning. Sugar fields also had to be thoroughly irrigated, rotationally planted, and fertilized. After the harvest, the cane was sent to a mill for refinement and transport abroad. To complicate matters, plantation owners oversaw production of sugar with intense ferocity on par with that of their North American neighbors. Slaves were beaten, forced to live in ramshackle housing, and issued minimal rations.
French colonists and slaves frequently came into violent conflict. The French Revolution, which began in 1789, shaped the course of the ongoing conflict in Saint-Domingue and was at first welcomed on the island. In France, the National Assembly made radical changes to French laws, and on August 26, 1789, published the Declaration of the Rights of Man, declaring all men free and equal. Wealthy whites in Saint Domingue saw it as an opportunity to gain independence from France, which would allow elite plantation owners to take control of the island and create trade regulations that would further their own wealth and power. There were so many changes in the leadership in France and so many complex events in Saint-Domingue that various classes and parties changed their alignments many times. However, the Haitian Revolution quickly became a test of the ideology of the French Revolution.
Violence comes to Saint-Domingue
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 National Assembly of France.
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 a law passed by the French Constituent Assembly gave full civil rights to wealthy men of color, Ogé demanded the right to vote. When the colonial governor refused, Ogé led a brief insurgency in the area around Cape Français. He and an army of around 300 free blacks fought to end racial discrimination in the area. He was captured in early 1791 and was brutally executed by being “broken on the wheel” before being beheaded. The conflict up to this point was between factions of whites and between whites and free blacks. Enslaved blacks watched from the sidelines. Ogé was not fighting against slavery, but his actions later served as propaganda for slaves during the Haitian Revolution.
The Revolution in Haiti did not wait on the Revolution in France. The individuals in Haiti relied upon themselves to lead the revolution. Ideas such as individual freedoms and equality, which were the rallying cry of the French Revolution, inspired Haitians to take matters into their own hands. What ensued was the most successful and comprehensive slave rebellion in history. Just as the French were successful in transforming their society, so were the Haitians. On April 4, 1792, The French National Assembly granted citizenship to slaves in Haiti. A year later, they granted freedom to all slaves who would side with the French in the revolution.
A New Face for the Revolution: Toussaint L’Ouverture
The French decision to emancipate the slaves catapulted a new hero to the face of the Haitian Revolution. Toussaint L’Ouverture, a freed African man and Haitian general, emerged as the quintessential figure of the Revolution. He allied with the French army, defeated French plantation owners and their allies-- British troops. By 1801, he had defeated his rivals and proposed a constitution for Haiti. The new constitution was progressive. It abolished slavery and put freed Haitians at the forefront of society. However, Haiti was not yet independent. In fact, its new constitution still proclaimed loyalty to France. Critically, L’Ouverture took the constitution one step too far for France's new ruler, Napoleon Bonaparte. L'Ouverture proclaimed himself “Governor for Life” of Haiti. The title irked Napoleon. He saw it as a threat to his power in Haiti and the broader French colonies.
In 1802, Napoleon again sent French troops to Haiti to eliminate L’Ovuerture’s new government. Tricked into attending a meeting in France, L’Ovuerture was quickly arrested and imprisoned by French soldiers. He later died in exile in a French prison in the Jura Mountains along the French-Swiss border.
Legacy of the Haitian Revolution
The death of the “Father of Haiti,” as L’Ovuerture was later called, sparked an all-out war between the Haitians and the French troops in Haiti. The Haitian Revolution exploded in extreme violence in 1804. One of L'Ovuerture's former allies and soliders, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, ordered the execution of all remaining French people (including those of mixed race). Under his authority, Haitian troops executed between 4,000-5,000 French men, women, and children of all ages. The French Massacre of 1804 helped secure Haiti's independence, and lower the morale of French troops. Thousands of French troops also succumbed to diseases such as malaria and yellow fever. Fed up with the effort of maintaining a small colony in the Caribbean, Napoleon pulled his troops back.
In 1804, Haiti emerged as an independent state and abolished slavery. Dessalines was declared governor-general of Haiti. Within a year, Dessalines was declared Emperor of Haiti by generals in the Haitian army. Almost as quickly as Dessalines became emperor, strong resistance to his autocratic leadership formed. Political opposition grew, and a conspiracy to murder the emperor was hatched. On October 17, 1806, Dessalines was violently murdered near the capital city, Port-au-Prince. His death catapulted Haiti into a civil war between rival political factions until the island was divided into two parts: the Kingdom of Haiti ruled by Henri Christophe; and the Republic of Haiti under Alexandre Sabès Pétion.
Attributions
Images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
Cole, Joshua and Carol Symes. Western Civilizations: Their History and Culture, 5th Ed. W.W. Norton & Company, New York: 2020. 636-637.
Boundless World History
"The South American Revolutions"
https://courses.lumenlearning.com/boundless-worldhistory/chapter/the-south-american-revolutions/