The Haitian Revolution:

History of a Successful
Slave Revolt
• The Haitian Revolution was the only successful black slave
revolt in history, and it led to the creation of the second
independent nation in the Western Hemisphere, after the
United States. Inspired in large part by the French Revolution,
diverse groups in the colony of Saint-Domingue began fighting
against French colonial power in 1791. Independence was not
fully achieved until 1804, at which point a complete social
revolution had taken place where former slaves had become
leaders of a nation.
Background and Causes

• The French Revolution of 1789 was a significant event for the

imminent rebellion in Haiti. The Declaration of the Rights of
Man and of the Citizen was adopted in 1791, declaring "liberty,
equality, and fraternity." Historian Franklin Knight calls the
Haitian Revolution the "inadvertent stepchild of the French
Revolution."
• In 1789, the French colony of Saint-Domingue was the most
successful plantation colony in the Americas: it supplied France
with 66% of its tropical produce and accounted for 33% of
French foreign trade. It had a population of 500,000, 80% of
whom were slaves. Between 1680 and 1776, roughly 800,000
Africans were imported to the island, one-third of whom died
within the first few years. In contrast, the colony was home to
only around 30,000 whites, and a roughly similar number
of affranchis or free people of color (composed primarily of
mulattoes, mixed-race people).
• Society in Saint Domingue was divided along both class and
color lines, with affranchis and whites often at odds in terms of
how to interpret the egalitarian language of the French
Revolution. White elites sought greater economic autonomy
from the metropolis (France). Working-class/poor whites
argued for the equality of all whites, not just for landed
whites. Affranchis aspired to the power of whites and begun to
amass wealth as landowners (often owning slaves themselves).
Beginning in the 1860s, white colonists began to restrict the
rights of affranchis. Also inspired by the French Revolution,
black slaves increasingly engaged in maroonage, running away
from plantations to the mountainous interior.
• France granted almost complete autonomy to Saint-Domingue
in 1790. However, it left open the issue of rights for free people
of color, and white planters refused to recognize them as equals,
creating a more volatile situation. In October
1790, affranchis led their first armed revolt against white
colonial authorities. In April 1791, slave revolts begin to break
out. In the meantime, France extended some rights
to affranchis, which angered white colonists.
Beginning of the Haitian Revolution

• By 1791, slaves and mulattoes were fighting separately for their own
agendas, and white colonists were too preoccupied with maintaining
their hegemony to notice the growing unrest among slaves.
Throughout 1791, slave revolts grew in numbers and frequency, with
slaves torching the most prosperous plantations and killing fellow
slaves who refused to join their revolt.
• The Haitian Revolution is considered to have begun officially on
August 14, 1791 with the Bois Caïman ceremony, a vodou ritual
presided over by Boukman, a maroon leader and vodou priest from
Jamaica. This meeting was the result of months of strategizing and
planning by slaves in the northern area of the colony who were
recognized as leaders of their respective plantations.
• Due to the fighting, the French National Assembly revoked the
decree granting limited rights to affranchis in September 1791,
which only spurred on their rebellion. That same month, slaves
burned one of the colony's most important cities, Le Cap, to the
ground. The following month, Port-au-Prince was burned to the
ground in fighting between whites and affranchis.
• 1792-1802
• The Haitian Revolution was chaotic. At one time there were six
different parties warring simultaneously: slaves, affranchis,
working-class whites, elite whites, invading Spanish, and
English troops battling for control of the colony, and the French
military. Alliances were struck and quickly dissolved. For
example, in 1792 blacks and affranchis became allies with the
British fighting against the French, and in 1793 they allied with
the Spanish.
• Furthermore, the French often tried to get slaves to join their
forces by offering them freedom to help put down the
rebellion. In September 1793, a number of reforms took place in
France, including the abolition of colonial slavery. While
colonists began negotiating with slaves for increased rights, the
rebels, led by Touissant Louverture, understood that without
land ownership, they could not stop fighting.
• Throughout 1794, the three European forces took control of
different parts of the island. Louverture aligned with different
colonial powers at different moments. In 1795, Britain and
Spain signed a peace treaty and ceded Saint-Domingue to the
French. By 1796, Louverture had established dominance in the
colony, though his hold on power was tenuous. In 1799, a civil
war broke out between Louverture and the affranchis. In 1800,
Louverture invaded Santo Domingo (the eastern half of the
island, modern-day Dominican Republic) in order to bring it
under his control.
• Between 1800 and 1802, Louverture tried to rebuild the
destroyed economy of Saint-Domingue. He reopened
commercial relations with the U.S. and Britain, restored
destroyed sugar and coffee estates to operating condition, and
halted the wide-scale killing of white people. He even discussed
importing new Africans to jump-start the plantation economy.
In addition, he outlawed the very popular vodou religion and
established Catholicism as the colony's main religion, which
angered many slaves. He established a constitution in 1801 that
asserted the colony's autonomy with respect to France and
became a de-facto dictator, naming himself governor-general
for life.
The Final Years of the Revolution

• Napoleon Bonaparte, who had assumed power in France in 1799, had

dreams of restoring slavery in Saint-Domingue, and he saw
Louverture (and Africans in general) as uncivilized. He sent his
brother-in-law Charles Leclerc to invade the colony in 1801. Many
white planters supported Bonaparte's invasion. Furthermore,
Louverture faced opposition from black slaves, who felt he was
continuing to exploit them and who was not instituting land reform.
In early 1802 many of his top generals had defected to the French
side and Louverture was eventually forced to sign an armistice in
May 1802. However, Leclerc betrayed the terms of the treaty and
tricked Louverture into getting arrested. He was exiled to France,
where he died in prison in 1803.
• Believing that France's intention was to restore slavery in the
colony, blacks and affranchis, led by two of Louverture's former
generals, Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Henri Christophe,
reignited the rebellion against the French in late 1802. Many
French soldiers died from yellow fever, contributing to the
victories by Dessalines and Christophe.
Effects of the Haitian Revolution

• The outcome of the Haitian Revolution loomed large across

slaveholding societies in the Americas. The success of the slave
revolt inspired similar uprisings in Jamaica, Grenada,
Colombia, and Venezuela. Plantation owners lived in fear that
their societies would become "another Haiti." In Cuba, for
example, during the Wars of Independence the Spanish were
able to use the spectre of the Haitian Revolution as a threat to
white landowners: if landowners supported Cuban
independence fighters, their slaves would rise up and kill their
white masters and Cuba would become a Black republic like
Haiti
• There was also a mass exodus from Haiti during and after the
Revolution, with many planters fleeing with their slaves to
Cuba, Jamaica, or Louisiana. It's possible that up to 60% of the
population that lived in Saint-Domingue in 1789 died between
1790 and 1796.
• The newly independent Haiti was isolated by all the western
powers. France would not recognize Haiti's independence until
1825, and the U.S. did not establish diplomatic relations with
the island until 1862. What had been the wealthiest colony in
the Americas became one of the poorest and least developed.
The sugar economy was transferred to colonies where slavery
was still legal, like Cuba, which quickly replaced Saint-
Domingue as the world's leading sugar producer in the early
19th century.
•
According to historian Franklin Knight, "The Haitians were forced to
destroy the entire colonial socioeconomic structure that was the
raison d'etre for their imperial importance; and in destroying the
institution of slavery, they unwittingly agreed to terminate their
connection to the entire international superstructure that
perpetuated slavery and the plantation economy. That was an
incalculable price for freedom and independence."
• Knight continues, "The Haitian case represented the first complete
social revolution in modern history...no greater change could be
manifest than the slaves becoming the masters of their destinies
within a free state." In contrast, the revolutions in the U.S., France,
and (a few decades later) Latin America were largely "reshufflings of
the political elites—the ruling classes before remained essentially the
ruling classes afterward."
Haiti Independence

• Dessalines created the Haitian flag in 1803, whose colors represent the
alliance of blacks and mulattoes against whites. The French began to
withdraw troops in August 1803. On January 1, 1804, Dessalines published
the Declaration of Independence and abolished the colony of Saint-
Domingue. The original indigenous Taino name of the island, Hayti, was
restored.

• Dessalines created the Haitian flag in 1803, whose colors represent the
alliance of blacks and mulattoes against whites. The French began to
withdraw troops in August 1803. On January 1, 1804, Dessalines published
the Declaration of Independence and abolished the colony of Saint-
Domingue. The original indigenous Taino name of the island, Hayti, was
restored.
Reference
• "History of Haiti: 1492-
1805." https://library.brown.edu/haitihistory/index.html
• Knight, Franklin. The Caribbean: The Genesis of a Fragmented
Nationalism, 2nd edition. New York: Oxford University Press,
1990.
• MacLeod, Murdo J., Lawless, Robert, Girault, Christian
Antoine, & Ferguson, James A. "Haiti."
https://www.britannica.com/place/Haiti/Early-
period#ref726835