View source for Haitian Revolution

{{Short description|1791–1804 slave revolt in Hispanola}}
{{protection padlock|expiry=indefinite|small=yes}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2020}}
{{Infobox military conflict
| conflict          = Haitian Revolution
| image             = {{multiple image|border=infobox|perrow=2/2|total_width=300
| image1=Incendie de la Plaine du Cap. Massacre des Blancs par les esclaves noirs révoltés. France militaire. Martinet et Masson.jpg
| image2=Haitian Revolution - Blacks murdering white civilians.gif
| image3=Battle-of-Vertières-in-1803-620x458.jpg
| image4=Révolte des esclaves contre les armées envoyées par Napoléon Bonaparte lors de l'expédition de Saint-Domingue entre 1801 et 1803. Gravure du XIXe siècle.jpg
}}'''Clockwise from top left:''' {{flatlist|
* Illustration of the [[1791 slave rebellion]]
* Slaves killing white civilians, 1791
* French cuirassiers attack Haitian rebels, {{circa|1801}}
* [[Battle of Crête-à-Pierrot]], 1803
}}
| date              = {{nowrap|21 August 1791 – 1 January 1804}} ({{Age in years, months, weeks and days|month1=08|day1=21|year1=1791|month2=01|day2=01|year2=1804}})
| place             = [[Hispaniola]]
| casus             = 
| partof            = the [[Atlantic Revolutions]] and the [[French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars]]
| territory         = Establishment of the [[First Empire of Haiti|Empire of Haiti]]
| result            = Haitian victory
* Abolition of slavery
* Independence of Haiti 
* [[1804 Haitian massacre|Massacres of French civilians]]
| combatant1  = 
'''1791–1793:'''{{plainlist|
* Haitian rebels
* {{flag|Spain|1795}}}}
'''1793–1798:'''{{plainlist|
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Saint-Domingue]]}}
'''1798–1802:'''{{plainlist|
* Haitian revolutionaries}}
'''1802–1804:'''{{plainlist|
* {{flagicon image|Flag of Haiti (1803-1804).svg}} [[Armée Indigène]]
* {{flag|United Kingdom|1803}} (from 1803)}}
| combatant2  = 
'''1791–1793:''' {{plainlist|
* {{Flagcountry|Kingdom of France|France}}}}
'''1793–1798:'''{{plainlist| 
* {{flag|Great Britain|1793}}
* {{flag|Spain|1795}}}}
'''1798–1803:''' {{plainlist|
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Saint-Domingue]]}}
'''1803–1804:'''{{plainlist|
* {{flag|First French Empire|name=France}}}}
| commander1        = '''1791–1793'''{{plainlist|
* [[Dutty Boukman]]{{KIA}}
* [[Jean-François Papillon]]
* [[Georges Biassou]]
* [[Jeannot]]
* [[Romaine-la-Prophétesse]]}}
'''1793–1798'''{{plainlist|
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Toussaint Louverture]]
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[André Rigaud]]
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Alexandre Pétion]]}}
'''1798–1801'''{{plainlist|
* [[Toussaint Louverture]]}}
'''1802–1804'''{{plainlist|
* {{flagicon image|Flag of Haiti (1803-1804).svg}} [[Toussaint Louverture]]{{Surrendered}}
* {{flagicon image|Flag of Haiti (1803-1804).svg}} [[Jean-Jacques Dessalines]]
* {{flagicon image|Flag of Haiti (1803-1804).svg}} [[Henri Christophe]]
* {{flagicon image|Flag of Haiti (1803-1804).svg}} [[Alexandre Pétion]]
* {{flagicon image|Flag of Haiti (1803-1804).svg}} [[François Capois]]
* {{Flagdeco|United Kingdom}} [[Sir John Duckworth, 1st Baronet|John Duckworth]]
* {{Flagdeco|United Kingdom}} [[John Loring (died 1808)|John Loring]]}}
| commander2        = '''1791–1793'''{{plainlist|
* {{Flagicon|Kingdom of France}} [[Philibert François Rouxel de Blanchelande|Viscount de Blanchelande]]{{Executed}}
* {{Flagicon|Kingdom of France}} [[Léger-Félicité Sonthonax]]}}
'''1793–1798'''{{plainlist|
* {{flagdeco|Kingdom of Great Britain}} [[Thomas Maitland (British Army officer)|Thomas Maitland]]}}
'''1798–1801'''{{plainlist|
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[André Rigaud]]}}
'''1802–1804'''{{plainlist|
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Napoleon Bonaparte]]
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Charles Leclerc (general, born 1772)|Charles Leclerc]]{{Natural Causes}}
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Donatien de Rochambeau]]{{Surrendered}}
* {{Flagdeco|France|1794}} [[Louis Thomas Villaret de Joyeuse|Villaret de Joyeuse]]}}
| strength1         = 
| strength2         = 
| strength3         = 
| casualties1       = 
| casualties2       = 
| casualties3       = {{ubl|Haitians: 200,000 dead<ref name="Scheina">{{cite book|last1=Scheina|title=Latin America's Wars|publisher=Potomac Books|page=1772}}</ref>|British: 100,000 dead or wounded{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=75–76}}|France: 75,000 dead<ref name="Scheina"/>|White colonists: 25,000 dead<ref name="Scheina"/>}}
| notes             = 
| campaignbox       = {{Campaignbox Haitian Revolution}}
{{Campaignbox French Revolutionary Wars}}
}}
{{History of Haiti}}
{{Revolution sidebar}}
The '''Haitian Revolution''' ([[Haitian Creole language|Haitian Creole]]: ''Lagè d Lendependans''; {{langx|fr|Révolution haïtienne}} {{IPA|fr|ʁevɔlysjɔ̃ a.isjɛn|}} or {{lang|fr|Guerre de l'indépendance}}) was a successful [[insurrection]] by rebellious [[Slave revolt|self-liberated]] enslaved Africans against [[French colonial rule]] in [[Saint-Domingue]], now the sovereign state of [[Haiti]].<ref>{{cite journal | doi=10.1371/journal.pone.0184311 | doi-access=free | title=A new species of hermit crab, Diogenes heteropsammicola (Crustacea, Decapoda, Anomura, Diogenidae), replaces a mutualistic sipunculan in a walking coral symbiosis | date=2017 | last1=Igawa | first1=Momoko | last2=Kato | first2=Makoto | journal=PLOS ONE | volume=12 | issue=9 | article-number=e0184311 | pmid=28931020 | pmc=5606932 | bibcode=2017PLoSO..1284311I | hdl=2433/227462 | hdl-access=free }}</ref> The revolution was one of the only known [[slave rebellion]]s in human history that led to the founding of a state which was both free from [[Slavery in the Americas|slavery]] (though not from [[forced labour]])<ref>{{Cite web |last1=Ghachem |first1=Malick W. |last2=Danforth |first2=Susan |title=The Other Revolution |url=https://www.brown.edu/Facilities/John_Carter_Brown_Library/exhibitions/haitian/pages/part7.html |access-date=2022-03-11 |website=[[John Carter Brown Library]] |publisher=[[Brown University]] }}{{Dead link|date=July 2025 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> and ruled by former captives.<ref>{{cite journal | url=https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_q6VhhkczIYelM4ZnNoUE9RWmM | title=The Haitian Revolution | author=Franklin W. Knight | journal=The American Historical Review |date=February 2000 | volume=105 | issue=1 | pages=103–115 | doi=10.2307/2652438| jstor=2652438 | url-access=subscription }}</ref>

The revolt began on 22 August 1791,<ref>{{cite book |author=Adam Hochschild |title=Bury the Chains |url=https://archive.org/details/burychainsprophe00hoch |url-access=registration |year=2005 |page=[https://archive.org/details/burychainsprophe00hoch/page/257 257] |publisher=Houghton Mifflin}}</ref> and ended in 1804 with the former colony's independence. It involved black, biracial, French, Spanish, British, and Polish participants—with the ex-slave [[Toussaint Louverture]] emerging as Haiti's most prominent general. The successful revolution was a defining moment in the history of the [[Atlantic World]]<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://aeon.co/essays/why-haiti-should-be-at-the-centre-of-the-age-of-revolution|title=Why Haiti should be at the centre of the Age of Revolution – Laurent Dubois |website=Aeon Essays|language=en|access-date=2019-09-04}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal | url=https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_q6VhhkczIYVlo3S1JpSllvTkU | title='The Haitian Turn': An Appraisal of Recent Literary and Historiographical Works on the Haitian Revolution | author=Joseph, Celucien L. | journal=Journal of Pan African Studies | year=2012 | volume=5 | issue=6 | pages=37–55}}</ref> and the revolution's effects on the institution of slavery were felt throughout the Americas. The end of French rule and the [[Abolitionism|abolition of slavery]] in the former colony was followed by a successful defense of the freedoms the former slaves had won, and with the collaboration of already [[free people of color]], of their independence from white Europeans.<ref>{{cite journal | title=Navigating Haiti's History: Saint-Domingue and the Haitian Revolution | author=Taber, Robert D. | journal=History Compass | year=2015 | volume=13 | issue=5 | pages=235–250 | doi=10.1111/hic3.12233}}</ref><ref name="Friends and Enemies">{{cite book | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZaTGbfYDB7gC | title=Friends and Enemies: The Scribal Politics of Post/colonial Literature|publisher=Liverpool University Press | author=Bongie, Chris | year=2008 | location=Liverpool, UK | page=45 | isbn=978-1-84631-142-0}}</ref><ref name="cross-border studies">{{cite book | title=Incorporating Comparisons in the Rift: Making Use of Cross-Place Events and Histories in Moments of World Historical Change, a chapter in Anna Amelina, Beyond methodological nationalism: research methodologies for cross-border studies | publisher=Taylor and Francis | author=Curtis Comstock, Sandra | year=2012 | pages=183–185 | isbn=978-0-415-89962-8}}</ref>

The revolution was the largest slave uprising since [[Spartacus]]' [[Third Servile War|unsuccessful revolt]] against the [[Roman Republic]] nearly 1,900 years earlier,<ref name="Vulliamy">{{cite web|url=https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2015/aug/28/10-best-revolutionaries-che-guevara-mahatma-gandhi-leon-trotsky |title=The 10 best revolutionaries |editor=Vulliamy, Ed |date=28 August 2010 |work=The Guardian|access-date=15 December 2015}}</ref> and challenged long-held European beliefs about alleged black inferiority and about slaves' ability to achieve and maintain their own freedom. The rebels' organizational capacity and tenacity under pressure inspired stories that shocked and frightened slave owners in the hemisphere.<ref>{{cite book | url=https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_q6VhhkczIYWmthRC1STHVDWWs | title=The Literary Impact of the Haitian Revolution, PhD dissertation | publisher=University of Warwick | author=Philip James Kaisary | year=2008 | pages=8–10}}</ref>

Compared to other [[Atlantic revolutions]], the events in Haiti have received comparatively little public attention in retrospect:<ref>{{Cite news |last=Collins |first=Lauren |date=2020-12-03 |title=The Haitian Revolution and the Hole in French High-School History |url=https://www.newyorker.com/culture/culture-desk/the-haitian-revolution-and-the-hole-in-french-high-school-history |access-date=2025-11-08 |work=The New Yorker |language=en-US |issn=0028-792X}}</ref> historian [[Michel-Rolph Trouillot]] characterizes the historiography of the Haitian Revolution as being "silenced" by that of the [[French Revolution]].<ref>Michel-Rolph Trouillot, ''Silencing the Past: Power and the Production of History''.</ref><ref>Marlene Daut, ''Tropics of Haiti''.</ref><ref>Hoel, [https://blogs.mediapart.fr/hoel-w/blog/221023/2021-et-la-revolution-francaise 2021-et-la-revolution-francaise].</ref>

==Background==
===Slave economy in Saint-Domingue===
Much of [[Caribbean]] economic development in the 18th century was contingent on Europeans' [[History of sugar|demand for sugar]]. [[Sugar plantations in the Caribbean|Plantation]] owners produced sugar as a commodity crop from cultivation of [[sugarcane]], which required extensive labor. The colony of [[Saint-Domingue]] also had extensive [[coffee]], [[Cocoa bean|cocoa]], and [[Indigo dye|indigo]] plantations, but these were smaller and less profitable than the sugar plantations.<ref name="Thomas E. Weil 1985">Thomas E. Weil, Jan Knippers Black, Howard I. Blustein, Kathryn T. Johnston, David S. McMorris, Frederick P. Munson, ''Haiti: A Country Study''. (Washington, D.C.: The American University Foreign Area Handbook Series 1985).</ref> The commodity crops were traded for European goods.

Starting in the 1730s, French engineers constructed complex [[irrigation system]]s to increase sugarcane production. By the 1740s, Saint-Domingue, together with the British [[colony of Jamaica]], had become the main suppliers of the world's sugar. Production of sugar depended on extensive manual labor provided by [[Slavery in the Americas|enslaved]] [[African people|Africans]]. An average of 600 ships engaged every year in shipping products from Saint-Domingue to [[Bordeaux]], and the value of the colony's crops and goods was almost equal in value to all of the products shipped from the [[Thirteen Colonies]] to Great Britain.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=61}} The livelihood of 1 million of the approximately 25 million people who lived in [[Kingdom of France|France]] in 1789 depended directly upon the agricultural imports from Saint-Domingue, and several million indirectly depended upon trade from the colony to maintain their standard of living.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=21}} Saint-Domingue was the most profitable French colony in the world, indeed one of the most profitable of all the European colonies in the 18th century.

Slavery sustained sugar production under harsh conditions; diseases such as [[malaria]] (brought from Africa) and [[yellow fever]] caused high mortality, thriving in the tropical Caribbean climate. In 1787 alone, approximately 20,000 slaves were transported from Africa to Saint-Domingue, in comparison to the roughly 38,000 slaves that were imported to the [[British West Indies]].{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=61}} The [[death rate]] from yellow fever was such that at least 50% of the slaves from Africa died within a year of arriving, so while the white planters preferred to work their slaves as hard as possible, providing them only the bare minimum of food and shelter, they calculated that it was better to get the most work out of their slaves with the lowest expense possible, since they were probably going to die of yellow fever anyway.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=40}} The death rate was so high that [[polyandry]]—one woman being married to several men at the same time—developed as a common form of marriage among the slaves.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=40}} As slaves had no legal rights, [[rape]] by planters, their unmarried sons, or [[Plantation overseer|overseers]] was a common occurrence on the plantations.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=43}}

===Demographics===
The largest sugar plantations and concentrations of slaves were in the north of the island, and the whites lived in fear of [[slave rebellion]].<ref name="brief"/> Even by the standards of the Caribbean, French slave masters were extremely cruel in their treatment of slaves.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=61}} They used the threat and acts of physical violence to maintain control and suppress efforts at rebellion. When slaves left the plantations or disobeyed their masters, they were subject to [[flagellation|whipping]] or to more extreme torture such as [[castration]] or burning, the punishment being both a personal lesson and a warning for other slaves. King [[Louis XIV|Louis XIV of France]] passed the ''[[Code Noir]]'' in 1685 in an attempt to regulate such violence and the treatment of slaves in general in the colony, but masters openly and consistently broke the code. During the 18th century, local legislation reversed parts of it.<ref name="Laurent Dubois 2004">Laurent Dubois, ''Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution''. (Cambridge, Massachusetts: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press 2004).</ref>{{page needed|date=March 2020}}

In 1758, the planters began passing legislation restricting the rights of other groups of people until a rigid [[caste|caste system]] was defined. Most historians classify the people of the era into three groups:

The first group were white colonists, or ''les blancs''. This group was generally subdivided into the plantation owners and a lower class of whites who often served as overseers or day laborers, as well as [[artisan]]s and shopkeepers.

The second group were [[free people of color]], or ''gens de couleur libres'', who were usually mixed-race (sometimes referred to as [[mulatto]]es), being of both African and French descent. These ''gens de couleur'' tended to be educated and literate, and the men often served in the army or as administrators on plantations. Many were children of white planters and enslaved mothers, or free women of color. Others had purchased their freedom from their owners through the sale of their own produce or artistic works. They often received education or artisan training, and sometimes inherited freedom or property from their fathers. Some ''gens de couleur'' owned and operated their own plantations and became slave owners.

The third group, outnumbering the others by a ratio of ten to one, was made up of mostly African-born slaves. A high rate of mortality among them meant that planters continually had to import new slaves. This kept their culture more African and separate from other people on the island. Many plantations had large concentrations of slaves from a particular region of Africa, and it was therefore somewhat easier for these groups to maintain elements of their culture, religion, and language. This also separated new slaves from Africa from [[Creole peoples|creoles]] (slaves born in the colony), who already had kin networks and often had more prestigious roles on plantations and more opportunities for emancipation.<ref name="Laurent Dubois 2004"/> Most slaves spoke a ''[[patois]]'' of the French language known as [[Haitian Creole]], which was also used by island-born mulattoes and whites for communication with the workers.<ref name="kreyol-003">{{cite web|url=http://www.kreyol.com/history003.html|title= Haiti – French Colonialism|access-date=27 November 2006}}</ref>

The majority of the slaves were [[Yoruba people|Yoruba]] from what is now modern [[Nigeria]], [[Fon people|Fon]] from what is now [[Benin]], and [[Kongo people|Kongo]] from the [[Kingdom of Kongo]] in what is now modern northern [[Angola]] and the western [[Democratic Republic of the Congo|Congo]].{{sfn|Dubois|2005|pp=40–43}} The Kongolese at 40% were the largest of the African ethnic groups represented amongst the slaves.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=40}} The slaves developed their own religion, a syncretic mixture of [[Catholicism]] and [[Religion in Africa|West African religions]] known as [[Haitian Vodou|Vodou]], usually called "voodoo" in English. This belief system implicitly rejected the Africans' status as slaves.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|pp=43–44}}

===Social conflict===
Saint-Domingue was a society seething with hatred, with white colonists and black slaves frequently coming into violent conflict. The French historian Paul Fregosi wrote:

{{Blockquote|text="Whites, mulattos and blacks loathed each other. The poor whites couldn't stand the rich whites, the rich whites despised the poor whites, the middle-class whites were jealous of the [[aristocracy|aristocratic]] whites, the whites born in France looked down upon the locally born whites, mulattoes envied the whites, despised the blacks and were despised by the whites; free Negroes brutalized those who were still slaves, Haitian born blacks regarded those from Africa as savages. Everyone—quite rightly—lived in terror of everyone else. Haiti was hell, but Haiti was rich."{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=61–62}}|author=The French historian Paul Fregosi}}Many of these conflicts involved slaves who had escaped the plantations. Many runaway slaves—called [[maroons]]—hid on the margins of large plantations, living off the land and what they could steal from their former masters. Others fled to towns, to blend in with urban slaves and freed blacks who often migrated to those areas for work. If caught, these runaway slaves would be severely and violently punished. However, some masters tolerated petit marronages, or short-term absences from plantations, knowing these allowed release of tensions.<ref name="Laurent Dubois 2004" />

The larger groups of runaway slaves who lived in the hillside woods away from white control often conducted violent raids on the island's sugar and coffee plantations. 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 [[Haitian Vodou]] priest [[François Mackandal]], who inspired his people by drawing on African traditions and religions. He united the maroon bands and established a network of secret organizations among plantation slaves, leading a rebellion from 1751 through 1757. Although Mackandal was captured by the French and [[Death by burning|burned at the stake]] in 1758, large armed maroon bands persisted in raids and harassment after his death.<ref name="brief">{{cite book| last = Rogozinski| first = Jan| title = A Brief History of the Caribbean| edition = Revised| year = 1999| publisher = Facts on File| location = New York| isbn = 978-0-8160-3811-4| pages = [https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofca00rogo_0/page/85 85, 116–17, 164–65]| url = https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofca00rogo_0/page/85}}</ref><ref name="kreyol-004">{{cite web|url= http://www.kreyol.com/history004.html|title=The Slave Rebellion of 1791|access-date=27 November 2006}}</ref>

===Slavery in Enlightenment thought===
French writer [[Guillaume Raynal]] attacked slavery in his history of European colonization. He warned, "the Africans only want a chief, sufficiently courageous, to lead them on to vengeance and slaughter."<ref>"[http://chnm.gmu.edu/revolution/d/278/ Antislavery Agitation: Abbe Raynal]", ''Philosophical and Political History of the Settlements and Trade of the East and West Indies'' (1770), accessed 8 May 2014.</ref> Raynal's [[The Enlightenment|Enlightenment]] philosophy went deeper than a prediction and reflected many similar philosophies, including those of [[Jean-Jacques Rousseau|Rousseau]] and [[Denis Diderot|Diderot]]. Raynal's admonition was written thirteen years before the [[Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen]], which highlighted freedom and liberty but did not abolish slavery.
[[File:Anne-Louis Girodet De Roucy-Trioson - Portrait of J. B. Belley, Deputy for Saint-Domingue - WGA09508.jpg|thumb|right|''[[Portrait of Jean-Baptiste Belley]]''  by [[Anne-Louis Girodet de Roussy-Trioson]], 1797]]
In addition to Raynal's influence, [[Toussaint Louverture]], a free black who was familiar with Enlightenment ideas within the context of European colonialism, would become a key "enlightened actor" in the Haitian Revolution. Enlightened thought divided the world into "enlightened leaders" and "ignorant masses."<ref>Goldmann, Lucien. ''The Philosophy of the Enlightenment: the Christian Burgess and the Enlightenment.'' Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press, 1973.</ref> Louverture sought to bridge this divide between the popular masses and the enlightened few by striking a balance between Western Enlightened thought as a necessary means of winning liberation, and not propagating the notion that it was morally superior to the experiences and knowledge of people of color on Saint-Domingue.<ref>Paul B. Miller, "Enlightened Hesitations: Black Masses and Tragic Heroes in C. L. R. James's The Black Jacobins". ''MLN'' 116: 1069–1090. (accessed 8 May 2014).</ref><ref>[[C. L. R. James]], ''[[The Black Jacobins]]: Toussaint Louverture and the San Domingo Revolution'', 1st ed. New York: Vintage Books, 1963 p. 271.</ref> Louverture wrote a constitution for a new society in Saint-Domingue that [[abolitionism|abolished slavery]]. The existence of slavery in Enlightened society was an incongruity that had been left unaddressed by European scholars prior to the [[French Revolution]]. Louverture took on this inconsistency directly in his constitution. In addition, he exhibited a connection to Enlightenment scholars through the style, language,{{clarify|text= and accent of his text.|date=October 2023}}<ref>Miller, 1069–1090.</ref>{{page needed|date=August 2020}}

Like Louverture, [[Jean-Baptiste Belley]] was an active participant in the insurrection. The portrait of Belley by [[Anne-Louis Girodet de Roussy-Trioson]] depicts a man who encompasses the French view of its colonies, creating a stark dichotomy between the refinement of Enlightenment thought and the reality of the situation in Saint-Domingue, through the bust of Raynal and the figure of Belley, respectively. While distinguished, the portrait still portrays a man trapped by the confines of race. Girodet's portrayal of the former [[National Convention]] deputy is telling of the French opinion of colonial citizens by emphasizing the subject's sexuality and including an earring. Both of these racially charged symbols reveal the desire to undermine the colony's attempts at independent legitimacy, as citizens of the colonies were not able to access the elite class of French Revolutionaries because of their race.<ref>Sylvia Musto, "Portraiture, Revolutionary Identity and Subjugation: Anne-Louis Girodet's Citizen Belley", ''RACAR: Revue d'Art Canadienne / Canadian Art Review'' 20 (1993): 60–71.</ref>

==Situation in 1789==
===Social stratification===
In 1789, Saint-Domingue produced 60% of the world's coffee and 40% of the sugar imported by France and Britain. The colony was not only the most profitable possession of the [[French colonial empire]], but it was the wealthiest and most prosperous colony in the Caribbean.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=61}}

The colony's white population numbered 40,000; mulattoes and free blacks, 28,000; and black slaves, an estimated 452,000.<ref>{{cite book| author = Bonham C. Richardson| title = The Caribbean in the Wider World, 1492–1992 A Regional Geography| url = https://archive.org/details/caribbeaninwider0000rich| url-access = registration| year = 1992| publisher = Cambridge University Press| isbn = 978-0-521-35977-1| page = [https://archive.org/details/caribbeaninwider0000rich/page/166 166] }}</ref> This was almost half the total slave population in the Caribbean, estimated at one million that year.<ref>Herbert Klein, ''Transatlantic Slave Trade'', pp. 32–33</ref> Enslaved blacks, regarded as the lowest class of colonial society, outnumbered whites and free people of color by a margin of almost eight to one.<ref name="brief2">{{cite book| last = Rogozinski| first = Jan| title = A Brief History of the Caribbean| edition = Revised| year = 1999| publisher = Facts on File, Inc.| location = New York| isbn = 978-0-8160-3811-4| pages = [https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofca00rogo_0/page/164 164–165]| url = https://archive.org/details/briefhistoryofca00rogo_0/page/164}}</ref>

Two-thirds of the slaves were African born, and they tended to be less submissive than those born in the Americas and raised in slave societies.{{sfn|James|1989|p=17}} The death rate in the Caribbean exceeded the birth rate, so imports of enslaved Africans were necessary to maintain the numbers required to work the plantations. The slave population declined at an annual rate of two to five percent, due to overwork, inadequate food and shelter, insufficient clothing and medical care, and an imbalance between the sexes, with more men than women.<ref>Tim Matthewson, ''A Pro-Slavery Foreign Policy: Haitian-American Relations During the Early Republic'', (Praeger: Westport, CN and London: 2003) p. 3</ref> Some slaves were of a creole elite class of urban slaves and domestics, who worked as cooks, personal servants and artisans around the plantation house. This relatively privileged class was chiefly born in the Americas, while the under-class born in Africa labored hard, and often under abusive and brutal conditions.

Among Saint-Domingue's 40,000 white colonists, European-born Frenchmen monopolized administrative posts. The sugar planters, or ''[[White Haitians|grands blancs]]'' (literally, "big whites"), were chiefly minor aristocrats. Most returned to France as soon as possible, hoping to avoid the dreaded yellow fever, which regularly swept the colony.{{sfn|James|1989|p=29}} The lower-class whites, ''petits blancs'' (literally "small whites"), included artisans, shopkeepers, slave dealers, overseers, and day laborers.

Saint-Domingue's free people of color, or ''gens de couleur libres'', numbered more than 28,000. Around that time, colonial legislations, concerned with this growing and strengthening population, passed discriminatory laws that required these freedmen to wear distinctive clothing and limited where they could live. These laws also barred them from occupying many public offices.<ref name="Thomas E. Weil 1985"/> Many freedmen were also artisans and overseers, or domestic servants in the plantation houses.<ref>Robert Heinl, ''Written in Blood: The History of the Haitian People'', New York: Lanham, 1996, p. 45</ref> [[Cap-Haïtien|Le Cap Français]] (Le Cap), a northern port, had a large population of free people of color, including freed slaves. These men would become important leaders in the slave rebellion and later revolution.<ref name="Laurent Dubois 2004"/>

===Regional conflicts===
Saint-Domingue's Northern province was the center of shipping and trading, and had the largest population of ''grands blancs''.<ref name="caribbean">{{cite book| last = Knight| first = Franklin W.| title = The Caribbean The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism| edition = 3rd| year = 1990| publisher = Oxford University Press| location = New York| isbn = 978-0-19-505441-5| pages = [https://archive.org/details/caribbeangenesis0002knig/page/204 204–208]| url = https://archive.org/details/caribbeangenesis0002knig/page/204}}</ref> The [[Plaine-du-Nord]] on the northern shore of Saint-Domingue was the most fertile area, having the largest sugar plantations and therefore the most slaves. It was the area of greatest economic importance, especially as most of the colony's trade went through these ports. The largest and busiest port was Le Cap, the former capital of Saint-Domingue.<ref name="Laurent Dubois 2004" /> Enslaved Africans in this region lived in large groups of workers in relative isolation, separated from the rest of the colony by the high mountain range known as the ''Massif du Nord''.

The Western province, however, grew significantly after the colonial capital was moved to [[Port-au-Prince]] in 1751, becoming increasingly wealthy in the second half of the 18th century. The Southern province lagged in population and wealth because it was geographically separated from the rest of the colony. However, this isolation allowed freed slaves to find profit in trade with Jamaica, and they gained power and wealth here.<ref name="Laurent Dubois 2004"/> In addition to these interregional tensions, there were conflicts between proponents of independence, those loyal to France, and allies of Britain and [[Spanish Empire|Spain]]—who coveted control of the valuable colony.

==Effects of the French Revolution==
{{Further|French Revolution}}
After the establishment of the [[French First Republic]], the [[National Assembly (French Revolution)|National Assembly]] made radical changes to French laws and, on 26 August 1789, published the [[Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen]], declaring all men free and equal. The Declaration was ambiguous as to whether this equality applied to women, slaves, or citizens of the colonies, and thus influenced the desire for freedom and equality in Saint-Domingue. White planters saw it as an opportunity to gain independence from France, which would allow them to take control of the island and create trade regulations that would further their own wealth and power.<ref name="Thomas E. Weil 1985"/> However, the Haitian Revolution quickly became a test of the new French republic, as it radicalized the slavery question and forced French leaders to recognize the full meaning of their stated ideology.<ref>Blackburn, Robin. "The Force of Example". ''The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World''. Ed. David P. Geggus. (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press, 2001).{{page needed|date=August 2023}}</ref>

The African population on the island began to hear of the agitation for independence by the planters, who had resented France's limitations on the island's foreign trade. The Africans mostly allied with the [[House of Bourbon|royalists]] and the British, as they 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. The planters would be free to operate slavery as they pleased without the existing minimal accountability to their French peers.<ref name="caribbean"/>

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. In October 1790, another wealthy free man of color, [[Vincent Ogé]], demanded the [[right to vote]] under the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen. When the colonial governor refused, Ogé led a brief 300-man [[insurgency]] in the area around Le Cap, fighting to end racial discrimination in the area.<ref>{{cite book|last1=Langley|first1=Lester|title=The Americas in the Age of Revolution, 1750–1850|url=https://archive.org/details/americasinageofr00lang|url-access=registration|date=1996|publisher=Yale University Press|location=New Haven|page=[https://archive.org/details/americasinageofr00lang/page/110 110]|isbn=978-0-300-06613-5}}</ref> He was captured in early 1791, and brutally executed by being "broken on the [[Breaking wheel|wheel]]" before being beheaded.{{sfn|James|1989|pp=73–74}} While Ogé was not fighting against slavery, 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. The conflict up to this point was between factions of whites, and between whites and free people of color. Enslaved blacks watched from the sidelines.<ref name="brief"/>

Leading 18th-century French writer [[Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, comte de Mirabeau|Count Mirabeau]] had once said the Saint-Domingue whites "slept at the foot of [[Vesuvius]]",<ref>Hochschild, Adam ''Bury the Chains: The British Struggle to Abolish Slavery'' (2006){{page needed|date=August 2023}}</ref> suggesting the grave threat they faced should the majority of slaves launch a sustained major uprising.

==1791 slave rebellion==
{{Main|1791 slave rebellion}}
{{Further|Slavery in Haiti}}
{{North American Slave Revolts}}

===Onset of the revolution===
[[Guillaume Thomas François Raynal|Guillaume Raynal]] attacked slavery in the 1780 edition of his history of European colonization. He also predicted a general slave revolt in the colonies, saying that there were signs of "the impending storm".<ref>Center and Hunt, ''Liberty, Equality and Fraternity'', 119.</ref> One such sign was the action of the French revolutionary government to grant citizenship to wealthy free people of color in May 1791. Since white planters refused to comply with this decision, within two months isolated fighting broke out between the mulattoes and the whites. This added to the tense climate between mulattoes and ''grands blancs''.<ref>Blackburn, "Haiti's Slavery in the Age of the Democratic Revolution", ''William and Mary Quarterly'' 63.4, 633–644 (2006).</ref> Meanwhile, enslaved Black people, already resentful of both whites and mulattoes for maintaining the system of bondage, began to see their own opportunity for rebellion.

[[Guillaume Thomas François Raynal|Raynal's]] prediction came true on the night of 21 August 1791, when the slaves of [[Saint-Domingue Creoles|Saint-Domingue]] rose in revolt; thousands of slaves attended a secret [[Haitian Vodou|vodou]] ceremony as a [[tropical storm]] came in — the lightning and the thunder were taken as auspicious [[omen]]s — and later that night, the slaves began to kill their masters and plunged the colony into [[civil war]].{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=60}} The signal to begin the revolt had been given by [[Dutty Boukman]], a high priest of [[Haitian Vodou|vodou]] and leader of the [[Maroons|Maroon slaves]], and [[Cécile Fatiman|Cecile Fatiman]] during a religious ceremony at [[Bois Caïman]] on the night of 14 August.<ref>Censer and Hunt, ''Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity'', 123. ''Dutty Boukman'', Haitianite.com [http://www.haitianite.com] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090202094802/http://www.haitianite.com/|date=2 February 2009}}</ref> Within the next ten days, slaves had taken control of the entire Northern Province in an unprecedented slave revolt. Whites kept control of only a few isolated, fortified camps. The slaves sought revenge on their masters through "pillage, rape, torture, mutilation, and death".<ref name="ReferenceA">Censer and Hunt, ''Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity'', p. 124.</ref> The long years of oppression by the planters had left many blacks with a hatred of all whites, and the revolt was marked by extreme violence from the very start. The masters and mistresses were dragged from their beds to be killed, and the heads of French children were placed on pikes that were carried at the front of the rebel columns.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=60}} In the south, beginning in September<!-- 1791-->, thirteen thousand slaves and rebels led by [[Romaine-la-Prophétesse]], based in Trou Coffy, took supplies from and burned plantations, freed slaves, and occupied (and burned) the area's two major cities, [[Léogâne]] and [[Jacmel]].<ref name="Rey 2017 a">Terry Rey, ''The Priest and the Prophetess: Abbé Ouvière, Romaine Rivière, and the Revolutionary Atlantic World'' (2017), pp. 28, 32–35, 48–49, 52</ref><ref>Matthias Middell, Megan Maruschke, The French Revolution as a Moment of Respatialization (2019), p. 71.</ref><ref name="Dun 2016 65">James Alexander Dun, ''Dangerous Neighbors: Making the Haitian Revolution'' (2016), p. 65</ref><ref>David F. Marley, ''Wars of the Americas: A Chronology of Armed Conflict'' (2008), p. 534</ref>

The planters had long feared such a revolt, and were well armed with some defensive preparations. But within weeks, the number of slaves who joined the revolt in the north reached 100,000. Within the next two months, as the violence escalated, the slaves killed 4,000 whites and burned or destroyed 180 sugar plantations and hundreds of coffee and indigo plantations.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> At least 900 coffee plantations were destroyed, and the total damage inflicted over the next two weeks amounted to 2 million [[franc]]s.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=62}} In September 1791, the surviving whites organized into militias and struck back, killing about 15,000 blacks.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=62}}

Though demanding freedom from slavery, the rebels did not demand independence from [[France]] at this point. Most of the rebel leaders professed to be fighting for the king of France, who they believed had issued a decree freeing the slaves, which had been suppressed by the colonial governor. As such, they were demanding their rights as Frenchmen which had been granted by the king.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=105}}
[[File:Incendie de la Plaine du Cap. Massacre des Blancs par les esclaves noirs révoltés. France militaire. Martinet et Masson.jpg|thumb|left|Slave rebellion of 1791]]
By 1792, slave rebels controlled a third of [[Saint-Domingue]].<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/266962/Hispaniola |title=Hispaniola Article |publisher=Britannica.com |access-date=4 January 2014}}</ref> The success of the rebellion caused the National Assembly to realize it was facing an ominous situation. The Assembly granted civil and political rights to free men of color in the colonies in March 1792.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> Countries throughout [[Europe]], as well as the [[United States]], were shocked by the decision, but the Assembly was determined to stop the revolt. Apart from granting rights to free people of color, the Assembly dispatched 6,000 French soldiers to the island.<ref name="blackpast.org">Blackpast.com [http://www.blackpast.org/?q=gah/haitian-revolution-1791-1804], Haitian Revolution 1791–1804</ref> A new governor sent by Paris, [[Léger-Félicité Sonthonax]], abolished slavery in the Northern Province and had hostile relations with the planters, whom he saw as royalists.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=63}} The same month<!--March 1792-->, a coalition of whites and conservative free blacks and forces under French ''commissaire nationale'' Edmond de Saint-Léger put down the Trou Coffy uprising in the south,<ref name="Dun 2016 65"/><ref name="Rey 2017 b">Rey (2017), pp. 137, 157–159.</ref><ref name="Popkin 2011 51">Jeremy D. Popkin, ''A Concise History of the Haitian Revolution'' (2011), p. 51</ref> after [[André Rigaud]], then based near [[Port-au-Prince]], declined to ally with them.<ref name="Rey 2017 c">Rey (2017), p. 103.</ref>

===Britain and Spain enter the conflict===

Meanwhile, in 1793, France [[War of the First Coalition|declared war on Great Britain]]. The ''grands blancs'' in Saint-Domingue, unhappy with [[Léger-Félicité Sonthonax|Sonthonax]], pleaded with British authorities in Jamaica for assistance against the Republican commissioners.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=63}} The [[first Pitt ministry]] of Great Britain, in particular Prime Minister [[William Pitt the Younger]] and Secretary of State for War [[Henry Dundas, 1st Viscount Melville|Henry Dundas]], made plans to invade Saint-Domingue. Both men recognised the financial value of the colony and its status as a useful bargaining chip in possible peace negotiations with France. Furthermore, they were concerned the ongoing slave rebellion in Saint-Domingue could lead to similar unrest in the British West Indies.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=63–63}} Dundas instructed [[Sir Adam Williamson]], the [[List of governors of Jamaica|lieutenant-governor of Jamaica]], to sign an agreement with representatives of counterrevolutionary French colonists in the colony which promised to restore the ''[[ancien régime]]'', discrimination against [[free people of color]] and protect slavery, a move that drew criticism from British abolitionists [[William Wilberforce]] and [[Thomas Clarkson]].<ref>C.L.R. James, ''Black Jacobins'' (London: Penguin, 1938), p. 109.</ref><ref name="Geggus">David Geggus, ''Slavery, War and Revolution: The British Occupation of Saint Domingue, 1793–1798'' (New York: Clarendon Press, 1982).</ref> The troops who came to Saint-Domingue from Britain had an extremely low survival rate, often dying to diseases such as [[yellow fever]]. The British government would send less trained adolescents to maintain strong regiments. The incompetence of the new soldiers, combined with the ravaging of disease upon the army, led to a very unsuccessful campaign in Saint-Domingue.<ref name="Geggus" /> The American journalist James Perry notes that the great irony of the British campaign in Saint-Domingue was that it ended as a complete debacle, costing the British treasury millions of pounds and the British military thousands upon thousands of dead, all for nothing.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=69}}

Spain, which controlled the rest of the island of [[Hispaniola]] ([[Captaincy General of Santo Domingo|Santo Domingo]]), also joined the conflict and fought with Britain against France. The proportion of slaves was not as high in the Spanish portion of the island. Spanish forces invaded Saint-Domingue and were joined by the rebels. For most of the conflict, the British and Spanish supplied the rebels with food, ammunition, arms, medicine, naval support, and military advisors. By August 1793, there were only 3,500 French soldiers on the island. On 20 September 1793, about 600 British soldiers from [[Jamaica]] landed at Jérémie to be greeted with shouts of, ''"Vivent les Anglais!"'' from the French population.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=64}} On 22 September 1793, Mole St. Nicolas, the main French naval base in Saint-Domingue, surrendered to the [[Royal Navy]] peacefully.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=65}}

===French declare slavery abolished===

To prevent military disaster, and secure the colony for republican France as opposed to Britain, Spain, and French royalists, separately or in combination, the French commissioners Sonthonax and [[Étienne Polverel]] offered freedom to the slaves who would agree to fight alongside them. Then, under pressure, they gradually emancipated all the slaves of the colony. On 29 August 1793, Sonthonax proclaimed the abolition of slavery in the northern province. On 31 October, Étienne Polverel did the same in the other two western and southern provinces.<ref>[https://independent.academia.edu/HOELWA Hoel, ''La Révolution française, Saint-Domingue et l'esclavage'']</ref>

Sonthonax sent three of his deputies, namely the colonist Louis Duffay, the free black army officer Jean-Baptiste Belley and a free man of color, [[Jean-Baptiste Mills]], to seek the National Convention's endorsement for the emancipation of slaves near the end of January 1794.<ref name=":0">{{Cite book|title=A Concise History of the Haitian Revolution|last=Popkin|first=Jeremy D.|publisher=John Wiley & Sons, Incorporated|year=2011|page=66}}</ref> On 4 February, Dufay gave a speech to the convention arguing that abolishing slavery was the only way to keep the colony in control of the French, and that former slaves would willingly work to restore the colony.<ref name=":0" /> The convention deputies agreed and made the dramatic decree that "slavery of the blacks is abolished in all the colonies; consequently, it decrees that all men living in the colonies, without distinction of color, are French citizens and enjoy all the rights guaranteed by the constitution".<ref name=":0" />{{sfn|James|1989|pp=141–142}}

The National Convention abolished slavery by law in France and all its colonies, and granted civil and political rights to all black men in the colonies. The French constitutions of 1793 and 1795 both included the abolition of slavery. The constitution of 1793 never went into effect, but that of 1795 did; it lasted until it was replaced by the consular and imperial constitutions under [[Napoleon Bonaparte]]. Despite racial tensions in Saint-Domingue, the French revolutionary government at the time welcomed abolition with a show of idealism and optimism. The emancipation of slaves was viewed as an example of liberty for other countries, much as the American Revolution was meant to serve as the first of many liberation movements. [[Georges Danton]], one of the Frenchmen present at the meeting of the National Convention, expressed this sentiment:

<blockquote>Representatives of the French people, until now our decrees of liberty have been selfish, and only for ourselves. But today we proclaim it to the universe, and generations to come will glory in this decree; we are proclaiming universal liberty&nbsp;... We are working for future generations; let us launch liberty into the colonies; the English are dead, today.<ref>{{cite book| author = Laurent Dubois|author2=John D. Garrigus| title = Slave Revolution in the Caribbean, 1789–1804 A Brief History with Documents| year = 2006| publisher = Bedford/St. Martins| isbn = 978-0-312-41501-3 }}, Document 26.</ref> </blockquote>

In nationalistic terms, the abolition of slavery also served as a moral triumph of France over England, as seen in the latter half of the above quote. Yet [[Toussaint Louverture]] did not stop working with the [[Spanish Army]] until sometime later, as he was suspicious of the French.

The British force that landed in Saint-Domingue in 1793 was too small to conquer the colony, being capable only of holding only few coastal enclaves. The French planters were disappointed as they had hoped to regain power; Sonthonax was relieved, as he had twice refused ultimatums from Commodore [[John Ford (Royal Navy officer)|John Ford]] to surrender Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=65}} In the meantime, a Spanish force under Captain-General [[Joaquín García y Moreno]] had marched into the Northern Province.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=63}} Louverture, the ablest of the Haitian generals, had joined the Spanish, accepting an officer's commission in the Spanish Army and being made a knight in the Order of St. Isabella.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}}

The main British force for the conquest of Saint-Domingue under General [[Charles Grey, 1st Earl Grey|Charles Grey]], nicknamed "No-flint Grey", and Admiral Sir [[John Jervis, 1st Earl of St Vincent|John Jervis]] set sail from Portsmouth on 26 November 1793, which was in defiance of the well-known rule that the only time that one could campaign in the West Indies was from September to November, when the mosquitoes that carried malaria and yellow fever were scarce.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=64–66}} After arriving in the West Indies in February 1794, Grey chose to conquer [[Martinique]], [[Saint Lucia]], and [[Guadeloupe]]. Troops under the command of John Whyte did not arrive in Saint-Domingue until 19 May 1794.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=66}} Rather than attacking the main French bases at Le Cap and Port-de-Paix, Whyte chose to march towards Port-au-Prince, whose harbour was reported to have forty-five ships loaded with sugar.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=67}} Whyte took Port-au-Prince, but Sonthonax and the French forces were allowed to leave in exchange for not burning the sugar-loaded ships.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=67–68}} By May 1794, the French forces were severed in two by Toussaint, with Sonthonax commanding in the north and [[André Rigaud]] leading in the south.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}} As slavery continued to exist in areas of Saint-Domingue under British occupation, the colony's Black residents were motivated to fight against them on the side of the French.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=167}}

===Spanish depart Saint Domingue===
In May 1794, Toussaint suddenly joined the French and turned against the Spanish, ambushing his allies as they emerged from attending mass in a church at San Raphael on 6 May 1794.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}} The Haitians soon expelled the Spanish from Saint-Domingue.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}} Toussaint proved to be forgiving of the whites, insisting that he was fighting to assert the rights of the slaves as black French people to be free. He said he did not seek independence from France, and urged the surviving whites, including the former slave masters, to stay and work with him in rebuilding Saint-Domingue.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=188}}

Rigaud had checked the British in the south, taking the town of [[Léogâne]] by storm and driving the British back to Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}} During the course of 1794, most of the British forces were killed by yellow fever, the dreaded "black vomit" as the British called it. Within two months of arriving in Saint-Domingue, the British lost 40 officers and 600 men to yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=69}} Of Grey's 7,000 men, about 5,000 died of yellow fever while the Royal Navy reported losing "forty-six masters and eleven hundred men dead, chiefly of yellow fever".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=69}} The British historian Sir John Fortescue wrote, "It is probably beneath the mark to say that twelve thousand Englishmen were buried in the West Indies in 1794".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=69}} Rigaud failed in attempt to retake Port-au-Prince, but on Christmas Day 1794, he stormed and retook [[Tiburon Peninsula, Haiti|Tiburon]] in a surprise attack.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}} The British lost about 300 men, and Rigaud's forces took no prisoners, summarily executing any soldier or sailor they captured.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=68–69}}

===British "great push"===
At this point, Pitt decided to launch what he called "the great push" to conquer Saint-Domingue and the rest of the French West Indies, sending out the largest expedition Britain had yet mounted in its history, a force of about 30,000 men to be carried in 200 ships.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=68}} Fortescue wrote that the aim of the British in the first expedition had been to destroy "the power of France in these pestilent islands&nbsp;... only to discover when it was too late, that they practically destroyed the British army".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=69}} By this point, it was well known that service in the West Indies was virtually a death sentence. In [[Dublin]] and [[Cork (city)|Cork]], soldiers from the [[104th Regiment of Foot (Royal Manchester Volunteers)|104th]], [[105th Regiment of Foot (1794)|105th]], [[111th Regiment of Foot (Loyal Birmingham Volunteers)|111th]], and [[112th Regiment of Foot (1794)|112th]] regiments rioted when they learned that they were being sent to Saint-Domingue.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=70}} The fleet for the "great push" left Portsmouth on 16 November 1795 and was wrecked by a storm, before sending out again on 9 December.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=70–71}} The overall forces in St Domingue was at that time under the command of the lieutenant-governor of Jamaica, Sir Adam Williamson.<ref>Michael Craton, ''Testing the Chains'' (New York: Cornell University Press, 1982) pp. 211–212.</ref> He was optimistically given the title "Governor of St Domingue", and among his British forces were Jamaican "Black Shot" militias.<ref>C.V. Black, ''History of Jamaica'' (London: Collins, 1958), pp. 131–132.</ref>

General [[Ralph Abercromby]], the commander of the forces committed to the "great push", hesitated over which island to attack when he arrived in Barbados on 17 March 1796. He dispatched a force under Major General [[Gordon Forbes (British Army officer)|Gordon Forbes]] to Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=70–71}} Forbes's attempt to take the French-held city of Léogâne ended in disaster. The French had built a deep defensive ditch with palisades and Forbes had neglected to bring along heavy artillery.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=72}} The French commander, mulatto general [[Alexandre Pétion]], proved to be an excellent artilleryman, who used the guns of his fort to disable two of the three ships of the line under Admiral [[Hyde Parker (Royal Navy officer, born 1739)|Hyde Parker]] in the harbour, before turning his guns to a nearby British field battery; a French sortie led to a rout of Forbes' troops, who retreated back to Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=72}} As more ships arrived with British troops, more soldiers died of yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=72}} By 1 June 1796, of the 1,000 from the [[66th (Berkshire) Regiment of Foot|66th Regiment]], only 198 had not been infected with yellow fever; and of the 1,000 men of the [[69th (South Lincolnshire) Regiment of Foot|69th Regiment]], only 515 were not infected with yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=72}} Abercromby predicted that at the current rate of yellow fever infection, all of the men from the two regiments were dead by November.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=72}} Ultimately, 10,000 British soldiers arrived in Saint Domingue by June, but aside from some skirmishing near Bombarde, the British remained in Port-au-Prince and other coastal enclaves, while yellow fever continued to ravage them.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=72}} The government attracted criticism in the House of Commons about the mounting costs of the expedition to Saint-Domingue. In February 1797, General [[John Graves Simcoe]] arrived to replace Forbes with orders to pull back British forces to Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}} As the human and financial costs of the expedition mounted, the British public demanded a withdrawal from Saint-Domingue, which was devouring money and soldiers, while failing to produce the expected profits.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=216}}

On 11 April 1797, Colonel [[Thomas Maitland (British Army officer)|Thomas Maitland]] of the [[62nd (Wiltshire) Regiment of Foot|62nd Regiment of Foot]] landed in Port-au-Prince, and wrote in a letter to his brother that British forces in Saint-Domingue had been "annihilated" by yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}} Service in Saint-Domingue was extremely unpopular in the British Army owing to the terrible death toll caused by yellow fever. One British officer wrote of his horror of seeing his friends "drowned in their own blood" while "some died raving Mad".{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=216}} Simcoe used the new British troops to push back French troops, but in a counter-offensive, Toussaint and Rigaud stopped the offensive. Toussaint retook the fortress at Mirebalais.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}} On 7 June 1797, Toussaint attacked Fort Churchill in an assault that was as noted for its professionalism as for its ferocity.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}} Under a storm of artillery, his troops placed ladders on the walls and were driven back four times, with heavy losses.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}} Even though Toussaint had been repulsed, the British were astonished that he had turned a group of former slaves with no military experience into troops whose skills were the equal of a European army.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}}<ref>C.L.R. James, ''Black Jacobins'' (London: Penguin, 1938), p. 172.</ref>

===British withdrawal===
In July 1797, Simcoe and Maitland sailed to [[London]] to advise a total withdrawal from Saint-Domingue. In March 1798 Maitland returned with a mandate to withdraw, at least from Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=74}} On 10 May 1798, Maitland met with Toussaint to agree to an [[armistice]], and on 18 May the British left Port-au-Prince.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=75}} The British forces were reduced to only holding the western peninsular towns of Mole St Nicholas in the north and Jeremie in the south. The new governor of Jamaica, [[Alexander Lindsay, 6th Earl of Balcarres]], urged Maitland not to withdraw from Mole St Nicholas. However, Toussaint sent a message to Balcarres, warning him that if he persisted, to remember that Jamaica was not far from St Domingue, and could be invaded.<ref>C.L.R. James, ''Black Jacobins'' (London: Penguin, 1938), p. 170.</ref>

Maitland knew that his forces could not defeat Toussaint, and that he had to take action to protect Jamaica from invasion.<ref>C.L.R. James, ''Black Jacobins'' (London: Penguin, 1938), pp. 170–171.</ref> British morale had collapsed with the news that Toussaint had taken Port-au-Prince, and Maitland decided to abandon all of Saint-Domingue, writing that the expedition had become such a complete disaster that withdrawal was the only sensible thing to do, even though he did not have the authority to do so.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=75}} On 31 August, Maitland and Toussaint signed an agreement whereby in exchange for the British pulling out of all of Saint-Domingue, Toussaint promised not to "meddle in the affairs of Jamaica".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=75}} Rigaud took control of Jeremie without any cost to his forces, as Maitland withdrew his southern forces to Jamaica. In the end of 1798, Maitland withdrew the last of his forces from Mole St Nicholas, as Toussaint took command of the fortress.<ref>C.L.R. James, ''Black Jacobins'' (London: Penguin, 1938), pp. 171, 182.</ref> Maitland disbanded his "Black Shot" troops and left them in Saint-Domingue, fearing they might return to Jamaica and cause further unrest. Many of them subsequently joined Toussaint's army.<ref>C.V. Black, ''History of Jamaica'' (London: Collins, 1958), p. 132.</ref>

===Toussaint consolidates control===
After the departure of the British, Toussaint turned his attention to Rigaud, who was conspiring against him in the south of Saint Domingue.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=76}} In June 1799, Rigaud initiated the [[War of the South]] against Toussaint's rule, sending a brutal offensive at [[Petit-Goâve]] and [[Grand-Goâve]]. Taking no prisoners, Rigaud's predominantly mulatto forces put blacks and whites to the sword. Though the United States was hostile towards Toussaint, the U.S. Navy agreed to support Toussaint's forces with the frigate USS ''General Greene'', commanded by Captain Christopher Perry, providing fire support to the blacks as Toussaint laid siege to the city of [[Jacmel]], held by mulatto forces under the command of Rigaud.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=77}} To the United States, Rigaud's ties to France represented a threat to American commerce. On 11 March 1800, Toussaint took Jacmel and Rigaud fled on the French schooner ''La Diana''.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=77}} Though Toussaint maintained he was still loyal to France, to all intents and purposes, he ruled Saint Domingue as its dictator.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=78}}

==Leadership of Louverture==
[[File:Général Toussaint Louverture.jpg|thumb|240px|left|General Toussaint Louverture]]

===Toussaint Louverture ===
[[Toussaint Louverture]], although a self-educated former domestic slave, was one of the most successful black commanders. Like [[Jean-François Papillon|Jean François]] and [[Biassou]], he initially fought for the Spanish crown. After the British had invaded Saint-Domingue, Louverture decided to fight for the French if they would agree to free all the slaves. Sonthonax had proclaimed an end to slavery on 29 August 1792. Louverture worked with a French general, [[Étienne Laveaux]], to ensure that all slaves would be freed. Louverture abandoned the Spanish Army in the east and brought his forces over to the French side on 6 May 1794 after the Spanish refused to take steps to end slavery.{{sfn|Bryan|1984|p=23}}

Under the military leadership of Toussaint, the former slaves succeeded in winning concessions from the British and expelled the Spanish forces. In the end, Toussaint essentially restored control of Saint-Domingue to France. Having made himself master of the island, however, Toussaint did not wish to surrender too much power to France. He began to rule the country as an effectively autonomous entity. Louverture overcame a succession of local rivals, including: the Commissioner Sonthonax, a French white man who gained support from many Haitians, angering Louverture; [[André Rigaud]], a free man of color who fought to keep control of the South in the [[War of the South]]; and [[Comte d'Hédouville]], who forced a fatal wedge between Rigaud and Louverture before escaping to France. Louverture led an invasion of neighboring Santo Domingo (December 1800), and freed the slaves there on 3 January 1801.

In 1801, Louverture issued a constitution for Saint-Domingue that decreed he would be governor-for-life and called for black autonomy and a sovereign black state. In response, Napoleon Bonaparte dispatched a [[Saint-Domingue expedition|large expeditionary force]] of French soldiers and warships to the island, led by Bonaparte's brother-in-law [[Charles Leclerc (general, born 1772)|Charles Leclerc]], to restore French rule.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=78}} They were under secret instructions to restore slavery, at least in the formerly Spanish-held part of the island. Bonaparte ordered that Toussaint was to be treated with respect until the French forces were established; once that was done, Toussaint was to be summoned to Le Cap and arrested; if he failed to show, Leclerc was to wage "a war to the death" with no mercy and all of Toussaint's followers to be shot when captured.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=78–79}} Once that was completed, slavery would be ultimately restored.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=78}} The numerous French soldiers were accompanied by mulatto troops led by [[Alexandre Pétion]] and [[André Rigaud]], mulatto leaders who had been defeated by Toussaint three years earlier.

===Napoleon invades Haiti===
The French arrived on 2 February 1802 at Le Cap with the Haitian commander [[Henri Christophe]] being ordered by Leclerc to turn over the city to the French.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=79}} When Christophe refused, the French assaulted Le Cap and the Haitians set the city afire rather than surrender it.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=79}} Leclerc sent Toussaint letters promising him: "Have no worries about your personal fortune. It will be safeguarded for you, since it has been only too well earned by your own efforts. Do not worry about the liberty of your fellow citizens".{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=79–80}} When Toussaint still failed to appear at Le Cap, Leclerc issued a proclamation on 17 February 1802: "General Toussaint and General Christophe are outlawed; all citizens are ordered to hunt them down, and treat them as rebels against the French Republic".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}} Captain [[Marcus Rainsford]], a British Army officer who visited Saint-Domingue observed the training of the Haitian Army, writing: "At a whistle, a whole brigade ran three or four hundred yards, and then, separating, threw themselves flat on the ground, changing to their backs and sides, and all the time keeping up a strong fire until recalled. This movement was executed with such facility and precision as totally to prevent cavalry from charging them in bushy and hilly country".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}}

===Haitian resistance and scorched-earth tactics===
In a letter to [[Jean-Jacques Dessalines]], Toussaint outlined his plans for defeating the French using [[scorched-earth]]: "Do not forget, while waiting for the rainy reason which will rid us of our foes, that we have no other resource than destruction and fire. Bear in mind that the soil bathed with our sweat must not furnish our enemies with the smallest sustenance. Tear up the roads with shot; throw corpses and horses into all the foundations, burn and annihilate everything in order that those who have come to reduce us to slavery may have before their eyes the image of the hell which they deserve".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}} Dessalines never received the letter as he had already taken to the field, evaded a French column sent to capture him and stormed Léogâne.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}} The Haitians burned down Léogâne and killed all of the French with the Trinidadian historian [[C. L. R. James]] writing of Dessalines's actions at Léogâne: "Men, women and children, indeed all the whites who came into his hands, he massacred. And forbidding burial, he left stacks of corpses rotting in the sun to strike terror into the French detachments as they toiled behind his flying columns".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}} The French had been expecting the Haitians to happily go back to being their slaves, as they believed it was natural for blacks to be the slaves of whites, and were stunned to learn how much the Haitians hated them for wanting to reduce them back to a life in chains.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}} A visibly shocked General Pamphile de Lacroix after seeing the ruins of Léogâne wrote: "They heaped up bodies" which "still had their attitudes; they were bent over, their hands outstretched and beseeching; the ice of death had not effaced the look on their faces".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=80}}

Leclerc ordered four French columns to march on [[Gonaives]], which was the main Haitian base.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} One of the French columns was commanded by General [[Donatien de Rochambeau]], a proud white supremacist and a supporter of slavery who detested the Haitians for wanting to be free. Toussaint tried to stop Rochambeau at Ravine-à-Couleuvre, a very narrow gully up in the mountains that the Haitians had filled with chopped down trees.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} In the ensuring [[Battle of Ravine-à-Couleuvres]], after six hours of fierce hand-to-hand fighting with no quarter given on either side, the French finally broke through, albeit with heavy losses.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} During the battle, Toussaint personally took part in the fighting to lead his men in charges against the French.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} After losing 800 men, Toussaint ordered a retreat.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}}

===Crête-à-Pierrot fortress===
The Haitians next tried to stop the French at a British-built fort up in the mountains called Crête-à-Pierrot, [[Battle of Crête-à-Pierrot|a battle]] that is remembered as a national epic in Haiti.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} While Toussaint took to the field, he left Dessalines in command of Crête-à-Pierrot, who from his fastness could see three French columns converging on the fort.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} Dessalines appeared before his men standing atop of a barrel of gunpowder, holding a lit torch, saying, "We are going to be attacked, and if the French put their feet in here, I shall blow everything up", leading his men to reply "We shall die for liberty!".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} The first of the French columns to appear before the fort was commanded by General Jean Boudet, whose men were harassed by skirmishers until they reached a deep ditch the Haitians had dug.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} As the French tried to cross the ditch, Dessalines ordered his men who were hiding to come out and open fire, hitting the French with a tremendous volley of artillery and musket fire, inflicting heavy losses on the attackers.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} General Boudet himself was wounded and as the French dead and wounded started to pile up in the ditch, the French retreated.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} The next French commander who tried to assault the ditch was General Charles Dugua, joined shortly afterwards by the column commanded by Leclerc.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} All of the French assaults ended in total failure, and after the failure of their last attack, the Haitians charged the French, cutting down any Frenchmen.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=81}} General Dugua was killed, Leclerc was wounded and the French lost about 800 dead.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} The final French column to arrive was the one commanded by Rochambeau, who brought along heavy artillery that knocked out the Haitian artillery, though his attempt to storm the ditch also ended in failure with about 300 of his men killed.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} Over the following days, the French kept on bombarding and assaulting the fort, only to be repulsed every time while the Haitians defiantly sang songs of the French Revolution, celebrating the right of all men to be equal and free.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} The Haitian psychological warfare was successful with many French soldiers asking why they were fighting to enslave the Haitians, who were only asserting the rights promised by the Revolution to make all men free.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} Despite Bonaparte's attempt to keep his intention to restore slavery a secret, it was widely believed by both sides that was why the French had returned to Haiti, as a sugar plantation could only be profitable with slave labour.{{citation needed|date=November 2020}} Finally after twenty days of siege with food and ammunition running out, Dessalines ordered his men to abandon the fort on the night of 24 March 1802 and the Haitians slipped out of the fort to fight another day.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} Even Rochambeau, who hated all blacks was forced to admit in a report: "Their retreat—this miraculous retreat from our trap—was an incredible feat of arms".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} The French had won, but they had lost 2,000 dead against an opponent whom they held in contempt on racial grounds, believing all blacks to be stupid and cowardly, and furthermore, that it was shortages of food and ammunition that forced the Haitians to retreat, not because of any feats of arms by the French army.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}}

After the [[Battle of Crête-à-Pierrot]], the Haitians abandoned conventional warfare and reverted to guerrilla tactics, making the French hold over much of the countryside from Le Cap down to the Artibonite valley very tenuous.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} With March, the rainy season came to Saint-Domingue, and as stagnant water collected, the mosquitoes began to breed, leading to yet another outbreak of yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} By the end of March, 5,000 French soldiers had died of yellow fever and another 5,000 were hospitalized with yellow fever, leading to a worried Leclerc to write in his diary: "The rainy season has arrived. My troops are exhausted with fatigue and sickness".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}}

===Capture of Toussaint===
On 25 April 1802, the situation suddenly changed when Christophe defected, along with much of the Haitian Army, to the French.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} Louverture was promised his freedom if he agreed to integrate his remaining troops into the French army. Louverture agreed to this on 6 May 1802.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} Just what motivated Toussaint to give up the fight has been the subject of much debate with most probable explanation being that he was just tired after 11 years of war.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=83}} Under the terms of surrender, Leclerc gave his solemn word that slavery would not be restored in Saint-Domingue, that blacks could be officers in the French Army, and that the Haitian Army would be allowed to integrate into the French Army. Leclerc also gave Toussaint a plantation at Ennery.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=82}} Toussaint was later deceived, seized by the French and shipped to France. He died months later in prison at [[Fort-de-Joux]] in the Jura Mountains.<ref name="kreyol-004"/> Shortly afterwards, the ferocious Dessalines rode into Le Cap to submit to France and was rewarded by being made the governor of Saint-Marc, a place that Dessalines ruled with his customary cruelty.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=83}} However, the surrender of Christophe, Toussaint, and Dessalines did not mean the end of Haitian resistance. Throughout the countryside, guerrilla warfare continued and the French staged mass executions via firing squads, hanging, and drowning Haitians in bags.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=83}} Rochambeau invented [[Gas chamber|a new means of mass execution]], which he called "fumigational-sulphurous baths": killing hundreds of Haitians in the holds of ships by burning sulphur to make [[sulphur dioxide]] to gas them.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=83}}

==War of independence==
[[Image:Prise de la Ravine-à-Couleuvres (23 février 1802), par Karl Girardet, gravé par Jean-Jacques Outhwaite.jpg|thumb|Battle at "Snake Gully" in 1802]]

===Rebellion against reimposition of slavery===
{{see also|Polish Legions (Napoleonic period)#The Haitian campaign}}
For a few months, the island was quiet under Napoleonic rule. But when it became apparent that the French intended to re-establish slavery (because they had nearly done so on [[Guadeloupe]]), black cultivators revolted in the summer of 1802. Yellow fever had decimated the French; by the middle of July 1802, the French lost about 10,000 dead to yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=84}} By September, Leclerc wrote in his diary that he had only 8,000 fit men left as yellow fever had killed the others.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=83}}

In 1802, Napoleon added a [[Polish Legions (Napoleonic period)|Polish legion]] of around 5,200 to the forces sent to [[Saint-Domingue]] to fight off the slave rebellion. However, the Poles were told that there was a revolt of prisoners in Saint-Domingue. Upon arrival and the first fights, the Polish soldiers soon discovered that what was actually taking place in the colony was a rebellion of slaves fighting off their French masters for their freedom.<ref name="haitimega">{{cite web |title=The Polish Influence in Casale, Haiti and Contribution to the Haitian Revolution |url=http://www.haitimega.com/Haiti_Grand_Anse-The_Polish_Influence_in_Casale_Haiti_and_Contribution_to_the_Haitian_Revolution/84117465590726656/article_86845847910949337.jsp |url-status=usurped |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130406044447/http://www.haitimega.com/Haiti_Grand_Anse-The_Polish_Influence_in_Casale_Haiti_and_Contribution_to_the_Haitian_Revolution/84117465590726656/article_86845847910949337.jsp |archive-date=2013-04-06 |access-date=7 February 2014}}</ref> During this time, there was a familiar situation going on back in their homeland as these Polish soldiers were fighting for their liberty from the [[Partitions of Poland|occupying forces of Russia, Prussia, and Austria that began in 1772]]. Many Poles believed that if they fought for France, Bonaparte would reward them by restoring Polish independence, which had been ended with the [[Third Partition of Poland]] in 1795.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=84}} As hopeful as the Haitians, many Poles were seeking union amongst themselves to win back their freedom and independence by organizing an uprising. As a result, many Polish soldiers admired their opponents, to eventually [[Defection|turn on the French army]] and join the Haitian slaves. Polish soldiers participated in the Haitian revolution of 1804, contributing to the establishment of the world's first free black republic and the first independent Caribbean state.<ref name="haitimega" />

Haiti's first head of state [[Jean-Jacques Dessalines]] called Polish people ''"the White Negroes of Europe"'', which was then regarded a great honor, as it meant brotherhood between Poles and Haitians. Many years later [[François Duvalier]], the president of Haiti who was known for his [[Black nationalism|black nationalist]] and [[Pan-Africanism|Pan-African]] views, used the same concept of ''"European white negroes"'' while referring to Polish people and glorifying their patriotism.<ref>{{cite book|author=Susan Buck-Morss|title=Hegel, Haiti, and Universal History|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=gj4sh2Ot76AC&pg=PA75|year=2009|publisher=University of Pittsburgh Pre|isbn=978-0-8229-7334-8|pages=75–}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|author=Riccardo Orizio|title=Lost White Tribes: The End of Privilege and the Last Colonials in Sri Lanka, Jamaica, Brazil, Haiti, Namibia, and Guadeloupe|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UbicFX_JGjAC&pg=PA159|year=2000|publisher=Simon and Schuster|isbn=978-0-7432-1197-0|pages=159–}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |jstor=41440998 |title=The Polish Presence in Latin America: An Introduction |journal=Polish American Studies |author= Dapía, Silvia G. |year=2012 |volume=69 |issue=1 |pages=5–8 |publisher=University of Illinois Press |doi=10.2307/41440998 |s2cid=254441853 }}</ref>
After Haiti gained its independence, the Poles acquired Haitian citizenship for their loyalty and support in overthrowing the French colonialists, and were called "black" by the Haitian constitution.<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=6p6QrBL79xEC&q=cazale+haiti&pg=PT142 |title=Haiti: A Shattered Nation |author= Abbott, Elizabeth |date=2011 |publisher=Overlook |isbn=978-1-4683-0160-1 |access-date=1 January 2015}}</ref>

===Dessalines and Pétion join Haitian forces===
Dessalines and Pétion remained allied with France until they switched sides again, in October 1802, and fought against the French. As Leclerc lay dying of yellow fever and heard that Christophe and Dessalines had joined the rebels, he reacted by ordering all of the blacks living in Le Cap to be killed by drowning in the harbour.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} In November, Leclerc died of [[yellow fever]], like much of his army.<ref name="kreyol-004"/>{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}} }}

His successor, the [[Vicomte de Rochambeau]], fought an even more brutal campaign. Rochambeau waged a near-genocidal campaign against the Haitians, killing everyone who was black.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} Rochambeau imported about 15,000 attack dogs from Jamaica, who had been trained to savage blacks and mulattoes.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} (Other sources suggest the dogs may have been [[dogo cubano]]s sourced in their hundreds from Cuba rather than Jamaica.)<ref>{{Cite journal|last1=Parry|first1=Tyler D.|last2=Yingling|first2=Charlton W.|date=2020-02-01|title=Slave Hounds and Abolition in the Americas|url=https://academic.oup.com/past/article/246/1/69/5722095|journal=Past & Present|language=en|issue=246|pages=69–108|doi=10.1093/pastj/gtz020|issn=0031-2746|doi-access=free}}</ref> At the Bay of Le Cap, Rochambeau had blacks drowned. No one would eat fish from the bay for months afterward, as no one wished to eat the fish that had eaten human flesh.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} Bonaparte, hearing that most of his army in Saint-Domingue had died of yellow fever and the French held only [[Port-au-Prince]], [[Le Cap]], and [[Les Cayes]], sent about 20,000 reinforcements to Rochambeau.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}}

[[File:Leclerc Expedition.png|thumb|300x300px|France's Leclerc Expedition to Haiti in 1804]]

Dessalines matched Rochambeau in his vicious cruelty. At Le Cap, when Rochambeau hanged 500 blacks, Dessalines replied by killing 500 whites and sticking their heads on spikes all around Le Cap, so that the French could see what he was planning on doing to them.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} Rochambeau's atrocities helped rally many former French loyalists to the rebel cause. Many on both sides had come to see the war as a race war where no mercy was to be given. The Haitians burned French prisoners alive, cut them up with axes, or tied them to a board and sawed them into two.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=83}}

===War between France and Britain===
{{further|Blockade of Saint-Domingue}}
With Napoleon's inability to send the requested massive reinforcements after the outbreak of war on 18 May 1803 with the British, the Royal Navy immediately dispatched a squadron under [[Sir John Duckworth, 1st Baronet|Sir John Duckworth]] from Jamaica to cruise in the region, seeking to eliminate communication between the French outposts and to capture or destroy the French warships based in the colony. The Blockade of Saint-Domingue not only cut the French forces out from reinforcements and supplies from France, but also meant that the British began to supply arms to the Haitians.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} Trapped, engaged in a vicious race war, and with much of his army dying of yellow fever, Rochambeau fell to pieces. He lost interest in commanding his army and as James wrote, he "amused himself with sexual pleasures, military balls, banquets and the amassing of a personal fortune".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}}

The Royal Navy squadrons soon blockaded the French-held ports of Cap Français and Môle-Saint-Nicolas on the Northern coast of the French colony. In the summer of 1803, when war broke out between the United Kingdom and the French Consulate, Saint-Domingue had been almost completely overrun by Haitian forces under the command of [[Jean-Jacques Dessalines]]. In the north of the country, the French forces were isolated in the two large ports of [[Cap Français]] and [[Môle-Saint-Nicolas]] and a few smaller settlements, all supplied by a French naval force based primarily at Cap Français.

[[File:Combats entre les insurgés de Saint-Domingue et les troupes françaises envoyées par Napoléon Bonaparte (1802-1803).jpg|thumb|1839 illustration of the 1802 [[Battle of Crête-à-Pierrot]]]]

On 28 June, the squadron encountered a French convoy from Les Cayes off Môle-Saint-Nicolas, capturing one ship although the other escaped. Two days later an independently sailing French frigate was chased down and captured in the same waters. On 24 July, another British squadron intercepted the main French squadron from Cap Français, which was attempting to break past the blockade and reach France. The British, led by Commodore [[John Loring (Royal Navy officer, died 1808)|John Loring]] gave chase, but one French ship of the line and a frigate escaped. Another ship of the line was trapped against the coast and captured after coming under fire from Haitian shore batteries. The remainder of the squadron was forced to fight two more actions on their return to Europe, but did eventually reach the Spanish port of [[A Coruña|Corunna]].

On 8 October 1803, the French abandoned Port-au-Prince as Rochambeau decided to concentrate what was left of his army at Le Cap.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=85}} Dessalines marched into Port-au-Prince, where he was welcomed as a hero by the 100 whites who had chosen to stay behind.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=86}} Dessalines thanked them all for their kindness and belief in racial equality, but then he said that the French had treated him as less than human when he was a slave, and so to avenge his mistreatment, he promptly had the 100 whites all hanged.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=86}} On 3 November, the frigate HMS ''Blanche'' captured a supply schooner near Cap Français, the last hope in supplying the French forces. On 16 November 1803, Dessalines began attacking the French blockhouses outside of Le Cap.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=86}} The last battle on land of the Haitian Revolution, the [[Battle of Vertières]], occurred on 18 November 1803, near Cap-Haïtien fought between Dessalines' army and the remaining French colonial army under the Vicomte de Rochambeau; the slave rebels and freed revolutionary soldiers won the battle. By this point, Perry observed that both sides were "a little mad" as the pressures of the war and yellow fever had taken their toll, and both the French and the Haitians fought with a reckless courage, seeing death in battle as preferable to a slow death by yellow fever or being tortured to death by the enemy.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=86}}

===Haitian victory===
<!-- Feel free to re-add this if you can fit it in nicely, or re-write it to fit better:

Having sold the [[Louisiana Territory]] to the United States in April 1803, Napoleon accepted defeat in his failing ventures in the Western Hemisphere. Dessalines won a string of victories against Leclerc and Rochambeau, becoming arguably the most successful military commander in the struggle against Napoleonic France.<ref>Christer Petley, ''White Fury: A Jamaican Slaveholder and the Age of Revolution'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018), p. 182.</ref>

Napoleon then turned his attention towards France's European enemies such as Great Britain and Prussia. With that, he withdrew a majority of the French forces in Haiti to counter the possibility of an invasion from Prussia, Britain, and Spain on a weakened France. -->

Rochambeau, seeing defeat inevitable, procrastinated until the last possible moment, but eventually was forced to surrender to the British commander—by the end of the month the garrison was starving, having reached the conclusion at a council of war that surrender was the only way to escape from this "place of death".{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=86}} Commodore Loring, however, refused the French permission to sail and agreed terms with Dessalines that permitted them to safely evacuate provided they had left the port by 1 December. On the night of 30 November 1803, 8,000 French soldiers and hundreds of white civilians boarded the British ships to take them away.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=86}} One of Rochambeau's ships was almost wrecked while leaving the harbour, but was saved by a British lieutenant acting alone, who not only rescued the 900 people on board, but also refloated the ship. At Môle-Saint-Nicolas, General Louis de Noailles refused to surrender and instead sailed to Havana, Cuba in a fleet of small vessels on 3 December, but was intercepted and mortally wounded by a Royal Navy frigate. Soon after, the few remaining French-held towns in Saint-Domingue surrendered to the Royal Navy to prevent massacres by the Haitian army. Meanwhile, Dessalines led the rebellion until its completion, when the French forces were finally defeated by the end of 1803.<ref name="kreyol-004" />

On 1 January 1804, from the city of [[Gonaïves]], Dessalines officially declared the former colony's independence, renaming it "Haiti" after the [[indigenous peoples of the Americas|indigenous]] [[Arawak peoples|Arawak]] name. Although he lasted from 1804 to 1806, several changes began taking place in Haiti. The independence of Haiti was a major blow to France and its colonial empire, but the French state would take several decades to recognize the loss of the colony. As the French retreated, Haiti, which had once been called the "Pearl of the Antilles", the richest French colony in the world, was impoverished, as its economy was in ruins after the revolution. Haiti struggled to recover economically from the war.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=86–87}} The Haitians had paid a high price for their freedom, losing about 200,000 dead between 1791 and 1803, and unlike the majority of the European dead, who were killed by yellow fever, the majority of the Haitian dead were the victims of violence.{{sfn|Perry|2005|p=60}}

==Casualties==
In the early 21st century, historian Robert L. Scheina estimated that the slave rebellion resulted in the death of 350,000 Haitians and 50,000 European troops.<ref>{{cite book|last=Scheina|first=Robert L.|title=Latin America's Wars, Vol. 1: The Age of the Caudillo, 1791–1899|year=2003|publisher=Brassey's|location=Washington, DC|page=18}}</ref> According to the ''Encyclopedia of African American Politics'', "Between 1791 and independence in 1804 nearly 200,000 blacks died, as did thousands of mulattoes and as many as 100,000 French and British soldiers."<ref>{{cite book| author = Robert C. Smith| title = Encyclopedia of African American Politics| url = https://books.google.com/books?id=Kb0sFxQ6yHoC&pg=PA166| year = 2003| publisher = Infobase Publishing| isbn = 978-1-4381-3019-4| page = 166 }}</ref> Yellow fever caused the most deaths. Geggus points out that at least 3 of every 5 British troops sent there in 1791–1797 died of disease.<ref>David Geggus, "The British Army and the Slave Revolt", ''History Today'' (1982) 32#7 pp. 35–39</ref><ref>John S. Marr, and John T. Cathey. "The 1802 Saint-Domingue yellow fever epidemic and the Louisiana Purchase". ''Journal of Public Health Management and Practice'' 19#.1 (2013): 77–82. [http://s2.medicina.uady.mx/observatorio/docs/er/ac/RE2013_Ac_Marr.pdf online] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160204181607/http://s2.medicina.uady.mx/observatorio/docs/er/ac/RE2013_Ac_Marr.pdf |date=4 February 2016 }}</ref> There has been considerable debate over whether the number of deaths caused by disease was exaggerated.{{sfn|Girard|2011|pp=179–180}}

An estimated 37,000 French soldiers were killed in action during the Haitian Revolution,<ref>{{cite web |title=The Haitian Revolution and the Louisiana Purchase |url=https://gazette.com/woodmenedition/jefferson-the-haitian-revolution-and-the-louisiana-purchase-get-out-of-town/article_e5b9a5de-88b2-11ea-9b22-1f1cf7020e1f.html |website=The Gazette|date=10 June 2021 }}</ref> exceeding the total French soldiers killed in action across various 19th-century colonial campaigns in Algeria, Mexico, Indochina, Tunisia, and West Africa, which resulted in approximately 10,000 French soldiers killed in action combined.<ref>{{cite book |title=Warfare and Armed Conflicts: A Statistical Encyclopedia of Casualty and Other Figures, 1492–2015, 4th ed. | isbn=978-0-7864-7470-7 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8urEDgAAQBAJ&pg=PA199|quote=French losses from 1830–51 were 3,336 killed in battle and 92,329 died of wounds or from all other causes. Between 1830 and 1870, 411 French officers were killed and 1,360 were wounded. The toll for the ranks was an estimated 10,000 killed and 35,000 wounded in all French colonial campaigns. A few thousand from this number died in Mexico or Indochina, but the great bulk met their deaths in Algeria. Disease took an even greater toll. One estimate puts total French and Foreign Legion deaths from battle and disease for the entire century at 110,000. | last1=Clodfelter | first1=Micheal | date=23 May 2017 | publisher=McFarland }}</ref> Between 1793 and 1798, the expedition to Saint-Domingue had cost the British treasury four million pounds (in 1798 money) and 100,000 men either dead, wounded, or permanently disabled from the effects of yellow fever.{{sfn|Perry|2005|pp=75–76}}

==Free republic==
{{see also|Haitian Declaration of Independence}}

On 1 January 1804, Dessalines, the new leader under the dictatorial 1805 constitution, declared Haiti a free republic in the name of the Haitian people,<ref>Haitian Declaration of Independence: ''Liberty or Death: Indigent Army,'' by the General in Chief Dessalines, in the name of the Haitian people. Held in the British National Archives: [http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/dol/images/examples/haiti/0001.pdf]</ref> which was followed by the [[1804 Haiti massacre|massacre of the remaining whites]].<ref>Philippe Girard, "Jean-Jacques Dessalines and the Atlantic System: A Reappraisal," William and Mary Quarterly (July 2012).</ref> His secretary [[Boisrond-Tonnerre]] stated, "For our declaration of independence, we should have the skin of a white man for parchment, his skull for an inkwell, his blood for ink, and a bayonet for a pen!"<ref name="haiti">[http://lcweb2.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/r?frd/cstdy:@field(DOCID+ht0019) Independent Haiti], [[Library of Congress Country Studies]].</ref> Haiti was the first independent nation in Latin America, the first post-colonial independent black-led nation in the world, and the only nation whose independence was gained as part of a successful slave rebellion.

The country was damaged from years of war, its agriculture devastated, its formal commerce nonexistent.<ref name="kreyol-005">{{cite web|url=http://www.kreyol.com/history005.html|title=Independent Haiti|access-date=27 November 2006 }}</ref><ref name="Ch6">{{cite web|url = http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/httoc.html#ht0013|title=Chapter 6 – "Haiti: Historical Setting", in ''A Country Study: Haiti''|author=Anne Greene|publisher=Federal Research Service of Library of Congress|date=1988–1998 }}</ref> The country, therefore, had to be rebuilt. To realise this goal, Dessalines adopted the economic organisation of [[serfdom]].{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}} He proclaimed that every citizen would belong to one of two categories, laborer or soldier.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}} Furthermore, he proclaimed the mastery of the state over the individual and consequently ordered that all laborers would be bound to a plantation.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}} Those that possessed skills outside of plantation work, like craftsmanship and artisans, were exempt from this ordinance. To avoid the appearance of slavery, however, Dessalines abolished the ultimate symbol of slavery, the whip.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}} Likewise, the working day was shortened by a third.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}} His chief motivator nonetheless was production, and to this aim he granted much freedom to the plantations' overseers. Barred from using the whip, many instead turned to [[liana|lianes]], which were thick vines abundant throughout the island, to persuade the laborers to keep working.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}} Many of the workers likened the new labor system to slavery, much like Toussaint L'Ouverture's system, which caused resentment between Dessalines and his people. Workers were given a fourth of all wealth produced from their labor. Nevertheless, he succeeded in rebuilding much of the country and in raising production levels, thus slowly rebuilding the economy.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=34}}

Dessalines paid large sums of money to liberate slaves on slave ships near the Haitian coast. He paid for the expenses of the returns of the thousands of Haitian refugees that left during the revolution.

Fearing a return of French forces, Dessalines first expanded and maintained a significant military force. During his reign, nearly 10% of able-bodied men were in active service resulting in a military force of up to 37,000 men.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=37}} Furthermore, Dessalines ordered the construction of massive fortifications throughout the island, like the [[Citadelle Laferrière]], the largest fortress in the Western Hemisphere. Cities and commercial centers were moved to the interior of the country, while less important ones were kept to the coast, so they could be burnt down completely to discourage the French; many commentators believe that this over-militarization contributed to many of Haiti's future problems.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=37}} In fact, because young fit men were the most likely to be drafted into the army, the plantations were thus deprived of the workforce needed to function properly.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=37}}

There was growing frustration between the workers, the elites, and Dessalines. A conspiracy led by the mulatto elites ultimately led to Dessalines' assassination and two separate sovereign states of Haiti.{{Citation needed|date=October 2024}}

== 1804 massacre of the French ==
{{main|1804 Haiti massacre}}
[[File:Manuel Lopez Lopez Iodibo - Desalines - Huyes del valor frances, pero matando blancos.jpg|thumb|200px|An 1806 engraving of Jean-Jacques Dessalines. It depicts the general, sword raised in one arm, while the other holds a severed head of a white woman.]]

The 1804 massacre was carried out against the remaining white population of French colonists<ref name="Farmer">{{cite book|first=Paul|last=Farmer|title=AIDS and Accusation: Haiti and the Geography of Blame|year=2006|publisher=California University Press|isbn=978-0-520-24839-7|page=284}}</ref> and loyalists,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F4-dAwAAQBAJ |title=Famous Assassinations in World History: An Encyclopedia [2 volumes] |author=Newton, Michael |page=110 |year=2014 |isbn=978-1-61069-286-1 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |access-date=22 January 2017}}</ref> both enemies and traitors of the revolution,<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/haitianrevoluti00stewgoog |title=The Haitian Revolution, 1791 to 1804: Or, Side Lights on the French Revolution |year=1914 |author=Steward, Theophilus Gould |page=[https://archive.org/details/haitianrevoluti00stewgoog/page/n279 241] |edition=2nd |publisher=Crowell |access-date=22 January 2017}}</ref> by the black population of Haiti on the order of [[Jean-Jacques Dessalines]], who declared the French as ''barbarians'', demanding their expulsion and vengeance for their crimes.<ref name="Findlay; Holdsworth">{{cite web|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=464OAQAAIAAJ |title=The History of the Wesleyan Methodist Missionary Society, Volume 2 |author1=Findlay, George Gillanders |author2=Holdsworth, William West |page=258 |year=1921 |publisher=Epworth Press |access-date=22 January 2017}}</ref><ref name="Land">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=b89eCwAAQBAJ |title=Enemies of Humanity: The Nineteenth-Century War on Terrorism |author=Land, Isaac |page=59 |year=2008 |isbn=978-0-230-61254-9 |publisher=Springer |access-date=22 January 2017}}</ref> The massacre—which took place in the entire territory of Haiti—was carried out from early February 1804 until 22 April 1804. During February and March, Dessalines traveled among the cities of Haiti to assure himself that his orders were carried out. Despite his orders, the massacres were often not carried out until he personally visited the cities.<ref name="Popkin2012"/>

The course of the massacre showed an almost identical pattern in every city he visited. Before his arrival, there were only a few killings, despite his orders.{{sfn|Girard|2011|pp=321–322}} When Dessalines arrived, he first spoke about the atrocities committed by former French authorities, such as [[Donatien-Marie-Joseph de Vimeur, vicomte de Rochambeau|Rochambeau]] and [[Charles Leclerc (general, born 1772)|Leclerc]], after which he demanded that his orders about mass killings of the area's French population be carried out. Reportedly, he also ordered the unwilling to take part in the killings, especially men of mixed-race, so that blame would not rest solely on the black population.<!--was: {{sfn|Dayan|1998|p={{page needed|date=February 2012}}}} but no Dayan is cited-->{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}} }} Mass killings then took place on the streets and on places outside the cities. In parallel to the killings, plundering and rape also occurred.{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}} }} Women and children were generally killed last. White women were "often raped or pushed into forced marriages under threat of death".{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}} }}

By the end of April 1804, some 3,000 to 5,000 people had been killed{{sfn|Girard|2011|p=322}} practically eradicating the country's white population. Dessalines had specifically stated that France is "the real enemy of the new nation." This allowed certain categories of whites to be excluded from massacre who had to pledge their rejection to France: the Polish soldiers who deserted from the French army; the group of German colonists of [[Nord-Ouest (department)|Nord-Ouest]] who were inhabitants before the revolution; French widows who were allowed to keep their property;<ref name="Land"/> select male Frenchmen;{{sfn|Girard|2011|p=325}} and a group of medical doctors and professionals.<ref name="Popkin2012">{{cite book|first=Jeremy D.|last=Popkin|year=2012|title=A Concise History of the Haitian Revolution|location=Chicester, West Sussex|publisher=Wiley-Blackwell|isbn=978-1-4051-9820-2|page=137}}</ref> Reportedly, also people with connections to Haitian notables were spared,{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}}}} as well as the women who agreed to marry non-white men.{{sfn|Girard|2011|p=322}} In the 1805 constitution that declared all its citizens as ''black'',{{sfn|Girard|2011|p=325}} it specifically mentions the naturalizations of German and Polish peoples enacted by the government, as being exempt from Article XII that prohibited whites ("non-Haitians;" foreigners) from owning land.<ref name="Farmer"/>{{sfn|Girard|2011|p=322}}<ref name="Findlay; Holdsworth"/>

==Post-Revolution era==
An independent government was created in Haiti, but the country's society remained deeply affected by patterns established under French colonial rule. As in other French colonial societies, a class of free people of color had developed after centuries of French rule here. Many planters or young unmarried men had relations with African or Afro-Caribbean women, sometimes providing for their freedom and that of their children, as well as providing for education of the mixed-race children, especially the boys. Some were sent to France for education and training, and some joined the French military. The mulattoes who returned to Saint-Domingue became the elite of the people of color. As an educated class used to the French political system, they became the elite of Haitian society after the war's end. Many of them had used their [[social capital]] to acquire wealth, and some already owned land. Some had identified more with the French colonists than the slaves. Many of the free people of color, by contrast, were raised in French culture, had certain rights within colonial society, and generally spoke French and practiced Catholicism (with syncretic absorption of African religions.)

Following Dessaline's assassination, another of Toussaint's black generals, [[Henri Christophe]], succeeded his in control of the north, while [[Alexandre Pétion]] presided over mulatto rule in the south. There were large differences in governance between Petion's republic, and what would eventually become Christophe's kingdom. While the southern republic did not have as much focus on economic development, and put more attention on liberal land distribution and education, the northern kingdom went on to become relatively wealthy, though wealth distribution was disputed. As a result of temporary trade agreements between Christophe, the United States, and British colonies, Christophe was able to rebuild the northern region. There were large investments in education and public works, military infrastructure, and many chateaux, the most notable being the [[Sans-Souci Palace|Sans Souci palace]] in Milot. However, much like his predecessors, this was achieved through forced labor which ultimately led to his downfall. Contrarily, Petion was beloved by his people, but despised by his northern counterpart.

A major effort by Christophe to capture Port-au-Prince in mid–1812 failed. The mulattoes were harassed by a pocket of black rebellion in their rear from February 1807 to May 1819 led by a black leader named Goman in the southern mountains of the Grand-Anse, who resisted several mulatto punitive expeditions. In 1819, the new mulatto leader, Jean-Pierre Boyer, sent six regiments into the Grand-Anse to ferret out Goman, who was trapped and shot off a 1,000-foot cliff. In 1820, the island nation was reunified after Christophe killed himself. Boyer with 20,000 troops marched into [[Cap-Haïtien]], the northern capital, shortly afterward to establish his power over all of Haiti. Not too long after, Boyer was able to secure cooperation with the general of the neighboring [[Spanish Haiti]], and in February 1822 began a [[Unification of Hispaniola|22 year long unification]] with the eastern state,<ref>{{cite web|title=Dominican Republic – Haiti and Santo Domingo|url=http://countrystudies.us/dominican-republic/4.htm|work=Country Studies|publisher=[[Library of Congress]]; Federal Research Division}}</ref> which ended in 1844 with the outbreak of the [[Dominican War of Independence]].

=== Independence debt ===
{{Main|Haiti indemnity controversy}}
The nascent state's future was hobbled in 1825 when France under [[Charles X of France|Charles X]] forced it (with French warships anchored off the coast during the negotiations{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=70}}) to pay 150 million gold francs in reparations to French ex-slaveholders—as a condition of French political recognition and to end the newly formed state's political and economic isolation.<ref name="autogeneratedb">{{cite web|year=2000|url=http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/httoc.html#ht0021|title=A Country Study: Haiti – Boyer: Expansion and Decline|publisher= Library of Congress|access-date=30 August 2007}}</ref> By an order of 17 April 1825, the King of France renounced his rights of sovereignty over Santo Domingo, and recognized the independence of Haiti.<ref name="FrenchEmbassy">{{cite web|title=La première ambassade française en Haïti|url=https://ht.ambafrance.org/La-premiere-ambassade-francaise-en-Haiti|access-date=27 October 2017|website=Menu Contenu Plan du siteAmbassade de France à Port-au-Prince|publisher=Government of France|language=fr}}</ref><ref>M. Degros, Création des postes diplomatiques et consulaires, Revue d'histoire diplomatique, 1986; in French</ref><ref>J-F. Brière, Haïti et la France, 1804–1848: le rêve brisé, Paris, Karthala 2008; in French</ref> President [[Jean-Pierre Boyer]] believed that the constant threat of a French invasion was stymieing the Haitian economy and thus felt the need to settle the matter once and for all.{{sfn|Leyburn|1961|p=70}}

Though the amount of the reparations was reduced to 90&nbsp;million francs in 1838, Haiti was unable to finish paying off its debt until 1947. The indemnity bankrupted the Haitian treasury and left the country's government deeply impoverished, causing long-term instability. Haiti was therefore forced to take out a loan from French banks, who provided the funds for the large first installment,{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}}}} severely affecting Haiti's ability to prosper.

=== Influence on other abolitionist and post-colonial movements ===
While Haiti suffered major economic setbacks during the early years of the post revolutionary era, the ideals of freedom and anti-colonialism never ceased to be part of the Haitian consciousness. Citizenship was offered to any slave or oppressed person that made it to Haiti's shores as mandated by Dessaline's constitution. All four of Haiti's earlier rulers, Dessalines, Christophe, Petion, and Boyer all had programs that involved swaying [[Haitian emigration|African Americans to resettle]] there and assure their freedom. Slave boats that were captured and brought to Haiti's shores resulted in the liberation and integration of all captives on board into Haitian society. On one occasion, President Alexandre Petion protected Jamaican slaves from re-enslavement after they escaped their plantation and landed in the southern city of [[Jérémie]].<ref>{{Cite web|title=Jamaica Observer Limited|url=http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/columns/Our-debt-to-Haiti_77305|access-date=2020-09-17|website=Jamaica Observer}}</ref>  On multiple occasions, Haiti's leaders offered asylum to liberal revolutionaries globally. One of the more notable examples of this included Haiti's involvement with [[Gran Colombia]], where Dessalines and Petion both offered aid, ammunitions, and asylum to [[Francisco de Miranda]] and [[Simón Bolívar]], who even went as far as to credit Haiti for the liberation of his country.{{Citation needed|date=October 2020}} Dessalines offered citizenship and assistance to slaves in Martinique and Guadeloupe so that they could start their own uprisings.<ref>{{Cite book|last=Jenson|first=Deborah|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=UF6xgqsY-kUC&pg=PT7|title=Beyond the Slave Narrative: Politics, Sex, and Manuscripts in the Haitian Revolution|date=2011|publisher=Liverpool University Press|isbn=978-1-84631-497-1|language=en}}</ref> Mexican nationalists, [[Martín Francisco Javier Mina y Larrea|Francisco Javier Mina]] and [[José Joaquín de Herrera]] took asylum in Les Cayes and were welcomed by Petion during Mexico's War of Independence.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Antecedentes |url=https://embamex.sre.gob.mx/haiti/index.php/embajada/antecedentes-historicos|access-date=2020-09-17|website=embamex.sre.gob.mx}}</ref> The Greeks later received support from President Boyer during their [[Greek War of Independence|fight against the Ottomans]].

The end of the Haitian Revolution in 1804 marked the end of French colonialism on the island. However, the social conflict cultivated under slavery continued to affect the population for years to come. Mulatto domination of politics and economics, and urban life after the revolution, created a different kind of two-caste society, as most Haitians were rural subsistence farmers.<ref name="Ch6" /> The ''[[affranchi]]'' élite, who continued to rule Haiti while the formidable Haitian army kept them in power. France continued the slavery system in [[French Guiana]], [[Martinique]], and [[Guadeloupe]].<ref name="caribbean2">{{cite book|last=Knight|first=Franklin W.|url=https://archive.org/details/caribbeangenesis0002knig/page/212|title=The Caribbean The Genesis of a Fragmented Nationalism|publisher=Oxford University Press|year=1990|isbn=978-0-19-505441-5|edition=2nd|location=Oxford|page=[https://archive.org/details/caribbeangenesis0002knig/page/212 212]}}</ref>

==Influence on slavery in the Americas==
{{See also|United States and the Haitian Revolution}}
Historians continue to debate the importance of the Haitian Revolution. David Geggus asks: "How much of a difference did it make?" A limited amount, he concludes, for slavery flourished in the western hemisphere for many more decades.<ref>{{cite book |editor=David Patrick Geggus |editor2=Norman Fiering |title=The World of the Haitian Revolution|year=2009|publisher=Indiana University Press|page=397}}</ref> In the opposing camp, [[African Americans|African American]] historian [[W. E. B. Du Bois]] said that the Haitian Revolution was an economic pressure without which the British parliament would not have accepted abolitionism as readily.<ref name="foreignpolicyDuBois">{{cite magazine|last=Du Bois|first=W. E. Burghardt|author-link=W. E. B. Du Bois|date=July 1943|title=The Realities in Africa: European Profit or Negro Development?|volume=21|number=4|magazine=[[Foreign Affairs]]|url=https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/africa/1943-07-01/realities-africa|issn=0015-7120|url-access=subscription|df=mdy-all|quote=The rise of liberal and philanthropic thought in the latter part of the eighteenth century accounts, of course, for no little of the growth of opposition to slavery and the slave trade; but it accounts for only a part of it. Other and dominant factors were the diminishing returns of the African slave trade itself, the bankruptcy of the West Indian sugar economy through the Haitian revolution, the interference of Napoleon and the competition of Spain. Without this pressure of economic forces, Parliament would not have yielded so easily to the abolition crusade. Moreover, new fields of investment and profit were being opened to Englishmen by the consolidation of the empire in India and by the acquisition of new spheres of influence in China and elsewhere. In Africa, British rule was actually strengthened by the anti-slavery crusade, for new territory was annexed and controlled under the aegis of emancipation. It would not be right to question for a moment the sincerity of Sharpe, Wilberforce, Buxton and their followers. But the moral force they represented would have met with greater resistance had it not been working along lines favorable to English investment and colonial profit.}}</ref>

Other historians say the Haitian Revolution influenced slave rebellions in the U.S. as well as in British colonies. The biggest slave revolt in U.S. history was the [[1811 German Coast uprising]] in Louisiana. This slave rebellion was put down and the punishment the slaves received was so severe that no contemporary news reports about it exist.<ref>{{cite book|last=Rasmussen|first=Daniel|title=American Uprising: The Untold Story of America's Largest Slave Revolt|url=https://archive.org/details/americanuprising00dani|url-access=registration|year=2011|publisher=[[HarperCollins]]|page=288|isbn=978-0-06-199521-7}}</ref> The neighboring revolution brought the slavery question to the forefront of U.S. politics, and though inspiring to the enslaved themselves<ref name="WGBH">{{Cite episode|title=Brotherly Love (1776-1834)|url=https://alexanderstreet.com/view/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cvideo_work%7C3483591|url-access=subscription|access-date=2020-09-19|series=Africans in America: America's Journey Through Slavery|last=Jones|first=Jacquie|author-link=Jacquie Jones|station=[[WGBH-TV|WGBH]]|year=1998|institution=[[WGBH Educational Foundation]]|number=3|minutes=8:00|transcript=Transcript|transcript-url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part3/3i3130.html|via=[[Alexander Street Press]]|df=mdy-all|quote=All of the American newspapers covered events in [[Saint-Domingue]] in a great deal of detail. All Americans understood what was happening there. It wasn't that the revolution in Saint-Domingue taught mainland slaves to be rebellious or to resist their bondage. They had always done so, typically as individuals who stole themselves and ran away, sometimes in small groups, who tried to get to the frontier and build [[Maroons|maroon]] colonies and rebuild African societies. But the revolutionaries in Saint-Domingue, led by Toussaint Louverture, were not trying to pull down the power of their absentee masters, but join those masters on an equal footing in the [[Atlantic World]]. And the revolt in Haiti reminded American slaves, who were still enthusiastic about the promise of 1776, that not only could liberty be theirs if they were brave enough to try for it, but that equality with the master class might be theirs if they were brave enough to try. For black Americans, this was a terribly exciting moment, a moment of great inspiration. And for the southern planter class, it was a moment of enormous terror.}}{{Dead link|date=October 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} See also {{IMDb title|qid=Q123678763|title=Africans in America: America's Journey Through Slavery: Brotherly Love (1776–1834)}}.</ref> the resulting intensification of racial divides and sectional politics ended the idealism of the Revolutionary period.<ref>Newman, Simon P. "American Political Culture and the French and Haitian Revolutions: Nathaniel Cutting and the Jeffersonian Republicans." ''The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World''. Ed. David P. Geggus. (University of South Carolina Press 2001).</ref> The American President [[Thomas Jefferson]]—who was a [[Thomas Jefferson and slavery|slaveholder]] himself—refused to establish diplomatic relations with Haiti (the United States did not recognize Haiti until 1862) and imposed an [[Economic sanctions|economic embargo]] on trade with Haiti that also lasted until 1862 in an attempt to ensure the economic failure of the new republic as Jefferson wanted Haiti to fail, regarding a successful slave revolt in the West Indies as a dangerous example for American slaves.{{sfn|Dubois|2005|p=303}}

[[File:Fire in Saint-Domingo 1791, German copper engraving.jpg|thumb|240px|Saint-Domingue slave revolt in 1791]]
Beginning during the slave insurrections of 1791, white refugees from Saint-Domingue fled to the United States, particularly to Philadelphia, [[History of the French in Baltimore|Baltimore]], New York, and Charleston. The immigration intensified after the journée (crisis) of 20 June 1793, and soon American families began to raise money and open up their homes to help exiles in what became the United States' first refugee crisis. While some white refugees blamed the French Revolutionary government for sparking the violence in Haiti, many supported the Republican regime and openly expressed their support of the [[Jacobin]]s.<ref>Popkin, Jeremy D. 'You Are All Free: The Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of Slavery. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.</ref> There is also some historical evidence suggesting that displaying solidarity with the French Revolution was the easiest way for the refugees to earn the support and sympathy of the Americans, who had just recently lived through their own revolution.<ref>Popkin, p. 298.{{Incomplete short citation|date=January 2018}}</ref> American slaveholders, in particular, commiserated with the French planters who had been forcibly removed from their plantations in Saint-Domingue. While the exiles found themselves in a peaceful situation in the United States—safe from the violence raging in both France and Haiti—their presence complicated the already precarious diplomatic relations among Britain, France, and the U.S.

Many of the whites and [[free people of color]] who left Saint-Domingue for the United States settled in southern Louisiana, adding many new members to its French-speaking, mixed-race, and black populations. The exiles causing the most alarm were the African slaves who came with their refugee owners. Some southern planters grew concerned that the presence of these slaves who had witnessed the revolution in Haiti would ignite similar revolts in the United States.<ref>Davis, David Brion. "Impact of the French and Haitian Revolutions." The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World. Ed. David P. Geggus. (Columbia: University of South Carolina Press 2001).</ref> Other planters, however, were confident they had the situation under control.<ref>Ashli White, ''Encountering Revolution: Haiti and the Making of the Early Republic'' (2010) p. 139</ref>

In 1807, Haiti was divided into two parts, the Republic of Haiti in the south, and the Kingdom of Haiti in the north. Land could not be privately owned; it reverted to the State through ''Biens Nationaux'' (national bonds), and no French whites could own land. The remaining French settlers were forced to leave the island. Those who refused were slaughtered. The Haitian State owned up to 90% of the land and the other 10% was leased in 5-year intervals.

Since the resistance and the murderous disease environment made it impossible for Napoleon to regain control over Haiti, he gave up hope of rebuilding a French New World empire. He decided to [[Louisiana Purchase|sell Louisiana]] to the U.S. The Haitian Revolution brought about two unintended consequences: the creation of a continental America and the virtual end of Napoleonic rule in the Americas.<ref>{{cite book|author=James A. Henretta|title=America's History, Volume 1: To 1877|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5PmY3sBubw8C&pg=PA220|year=2011|publisher=Bedford/St. Martin's|page=220|display-authors=etal|isbn=978-0-312-38791-4}}</ref>

There never again was such a large-scale slave rebellion. Napoleon reversed the French abolition of slavery in law, constitution, and practice, which had occurred between 1793 and 1801, and reinstated slavery in the French colonies in 1801–1803—which lasted until 1848.

==Relationship between the French and Haitian Revolutions==
{{essay-like|section|date=October 2023}}

===Reason for revolution===

The Haitian Revolution was a revolution ignited from below, by the underrepresented majority of the population.<ref>Fick, Carolyn E. "Preface." In ''The Making of Haiti: The Saint Domingue Revolution from Below''. Knoxville: University of Tennessee Press, 1990.{{page needed|date=August 2023}}</ref> A huge majority of the supporters of the Haitian revolution were slaves and freed Africans who were severely discriminated against by colonial society and the law.<ref>Akamefula, Tiye, Camille Newsom, Burgey Marcos, and Jong Ho. "Causes of the Haitian Revolution." Haitian Revolution. 1 September 2012. Accessed 25 March 2015. http://haitianrevolutionfblock.weebly.com/causes-of-the-haitian-revolution.html./{{dead link|date=December 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref>

===Brutality===
Despite the idealist, rational and utopian thinking surrounding both uprisings, extreme brutality was a fundamental aspect of both uprisings. Besides initial cruelty that created the precarious conditions that bred the revolution, there was violence from both sides throughout the revolution. The period of violence during the French Revolution is known as the [[Reign of Terror]]. Waves of suspicion meant that the government rounded up and killed thousands of suspects, ranging from known aristocrats to people thought to oppose the leaders. They were killed by guillotine, "breaking at the wheel", mobs and other death machines: death toll estimates range from 18,000 to 40,000.<ref>"Reign of Terror: 1793–1794." PBS. 13 September 2013. Accessed 26 March 2015. https://www.pbs.org/marieantoinette/timeline/reign.html {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170907080442/http://www.pbs.org/marieantoinette/timeline/reign.html |date=7 September 2017 }}.</ref> Total casualties for the French Revolution are estimated at 2 million.<ref>"French Revolutionary Wars." Find the Data. Accessed 26 March 2015. [https://archive.today/20150411221810/http://wars.findthedata.com/l/100/French-Revolutionary-Wars].</ref> In the Caribbean, total casualties totaled approximately 162,000.<ref>"Haitian Revolution." Find the Data. Accessed 26 March 2015. [https://archive.today/20150411221952/http://wars.findthedata.com/l/8/Haitian-Revolution].</ref> Violence in Haiti was largely characterized by military confrontations, riots, killing of slave owners and their families, and guerrilla warfare.<ref name="Ghachem, Malick W 2012">Ghachem, Malick W. ''The Old Regime and the Haitian Revolution''. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2012.{{page needed|date=August 2023}}</ref>

===Lasting change===
The Revolution in Haiti did not wait on the Revolution in France. The call for modification of society was influenced by the revolution in France, but once the hope for change found a place in the hearts of the Haitian people, there was no stopping the radical reformation that was occurring.<ref name="scholar.library.miami.edu">Rand, David. "The Haitian Revolution." The Haitian Revolution. Accessed 25 March 2015. http://scholar.library.miami.edu/slaves/san_domingo_revolution/{{dead link|date=October 2017 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} individual_essay/david.html.</ref> The Enlightenment ideals and the initiation of the French Revolution were enough to inspire the Haitian Revolution, which evolved into the most successful and comprehensive slave rebellion in history.<ref name="scholar.library.miami.edu"/> Just as the French were successful in transforming their society, so were the Haitians. On 4 April 1792, the French [[Legislative Assembly (France)|Legislative Assembly]] granted freedom to slaves in Saint-Domingue.<ref name="Ghachem, Malick W 2012"/> The revolution culminated in 1804; Haiti was an independent state solely of freed peoples.<ref name="haitianrevolutionfblock.weebly.com">Akamefula, Tiye, Camille Newsom, Burgey Marcos, and Jong Ho. "Causes of the Haitian Revolution." Haitian Revolution. 1 September 2012. Accessed 25 March 2015. {{cite web |url=http://haitianrevolutionfblock.weebly.com/causes-of-the-haitian-revolution.html |title=Causes of the Haitian Revolution – Haitian Revolution |access-date=2015-03-26 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150402133248/http://haitianrevolutionfblock.weebly.com/causes-of-the-haitian-revolution.html |archive-date=2 April 2015}}.</ref> The activities of the revolutions sparked change across the world. France's transformation was most influential in Europe, and Haiti's influence spanned every location that continued to practice slavery. John E. Baur honors Haiti as home of the most influential revolution in history.<ref>Baur, John. "International Repercussions of the Haitian Revolution." ''The Americas'' 26, no. 4 (1970).</ref>

==Historiographical debates==
While acknowledging the cross-influences, most contemporary historians{{Who|date=April 2018}} distinguish the Haitian Revolution from the [[French Revolution]]. Some{{Who|date=April 2018}} also separate it from the earlier armed conflicts by free men of color who were seeking expansion of political rights for themselves, but not the [[Abolitionism|abolition of slavery]]. These scholars show that if the [[Agency (sociology)|agency]] of the enslaved blacks becomes the focus of studies, the Revolution's opening and closing dates are certain. From this premise, the narrative began with the enslaved blacks' bid for freedom through armed struggle and concluded with their victory over [[Slavocracy|slavery powers]] and the creation of an independent state. In April 1791, a massive black insurgency in the north of the island rose violently against the [[Plantation economy|plantation system]], setting a precedent of resistance to racial slavery. In cooperation with their former mulatto rivals, blacks ended the Revolution in November 1803 when they decidedly defeated the [[French Army]] at the [[Battle of Vertières]]. The French had already lost a high proportion of their troops to [[yellow fever]] and other diseases.{{sfn|Girard|2011|p={{page needed|date=March 2020}} }} After acknowledging defeat in Saint-Domingue, Napoleon withdrew from North America, agreeing to the [[Louisiana Purchase]] by the United States.

Although the series of events during these years is known under the name of "Haitian Revolution", alternative views suggest that the entire affair was an assorted number of coincidental conflicts that ended with a fragile truce between free men of color and blacks.<ref>{{Cite web|title = Haitian Revolution (1791–1804) {{!}} The Black Past: Remembered and Reclaimed|url = http://www.blackpast.org/gah/haitian-revolution-1791-1804|website = www.blackpast.org|access-date = 2015-12-03|date = 16 July 2007}}</ref>{{Failed verification|date=April 2018}} Historians debate whether the victorious Haitians were "intrinsically [a] [[revolution]]ary force".<ref>{{cite book | title=The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History | publisher=Hackett Publishing Company | author=Geggus, David | year=2014 | page=16 | isbn=978-1-62466-179-2}}</ref> One thing is certain: [[Haiti]] became an independent [[nation-state|country]] on 1 January 1804, when the council of generals chose [[Jean-Jacques Dessalines]] to assume the office of governor-general. One of the state's first significant documents was Dessaliness' "Liberty or Death" speech, which circulated broadly in the foreign press. In it, the new head of state made the case for the new nation's objective: the permanent abolition of slavery in Haiti.<ref>{{cite news | url=https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B_q6VhhkczIYMm1fQk9ab0JHcjA | title=Dessaliness Proclamation: Liberty or Death | work=News Article | date=24 March 1804 | agency=New York Commercial Advertiser | access-date=10 December 2015 | location=NY | page=3}}</ref>

The role of [[women in the Haitian Revolution]] was for a long time given little attention by historians, but has in recent years garnered significant attention.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Boisvert |first1=Jayne |title=Colonial Hell and Female Slave Resistance in Saint-Domingue |journal=Journal of Haitian Studies |date=2001 |volume=7 |issue=1 }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Braziel |first1=Jana Evans |title=Remembering Defilee: Dedee Baziles as Revolutionary Lieu de Memoire |journal=Small Axe: A Caribbean Journal of Criticism |date=2005 |volume=9 |issue=2 |pages=57–85 |doi=10.1215/-9-2-57 |url=https://read.dukeupress.edu/small-axe/article-pdf/9/2/57/473228/7-SA18+Braziel+(57-85).pdf }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Girard|first1=Philippe |title=Rebelles with a Cause: Women in the Haitian War of Independence, 1802–1804 |journal=Gender and History |date=2009 |volume=21 |issue=1 |pages=60–85 |doi=10.1111/j.1468-0424.2009.01535.x |s2cid=55603536 }}</ref>

==Contemporary press response==
The revolution of African slaves brought many fears to colonies surrounding Haiti and the Caribbean. Prominent wealthy [[Slavery in the United States|American slave owners]], reading about the revolution, also read speculation about what might come in their own states. Anti-abolitionist critics of the revolution dubbed it "the horrors of Santo Domingo".<ref name="Dubois 151">{{cite book |last1=Dubois |first1=Laurent |title=Haiti: The Aftershocks of History |date=2012 |publisher=Henry Holt and Company |location=New York |isbn=978-0-8050-9335-3 |page=151 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=drU3HlesN5kC&q=%22horrors+of+santo+domingo%22}}</ref> However, newspapers like the ''[[Columbian Centinel]]'' took extra steps to support the revolution, comparing it to the American Revolution.<ref name="columbiancentinelrevolution">Matthewson, Tim, 1996 ''Jefferson and the Nonrecognition of Haiti'', p. 30</ref> The French media also played an important role in the Haitian Revolution, with contributions that made many French upstarts quite interested in the young, passionate Toussaint's writings of freedom.

There were many written discussions about the events in Haiti during the revolution in both France and England, however, they were generally written by anonymous authors. These texts also generally fell into two camps—one being proslavery authors who warned of a repetition of the violence of St. Domingue wherever abolition occurred; and the other being abolitionist authors who countered that white owners had sown the seeds of revolution.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Clavin|first=Mall|date=2007|title=Race, Rebellion, and the Gothic – Inventing the Haitian Revolution|journal=Early American Studies|page=2}}</ref>

However, all was not simple in the press. A top critic who significantly drove Toussaint into fear of backlash from France was Sonthonax, who was responsible for many outlooks of Haiti in the French newspapers.<ref name="Beyond the Slave Narrative">Jenson, ''The Sonthonax Drama: Toussaint as Political Dramaturge'', p. 70</ref> Yet Sonthonax was one of the few contenders who truly pushed for the independence of the African slaves and became a major factor in Toussaint's decision of declaring independence from France.

==In popular culture==
{{more citations needed section|date=August 2018}}<!--most entries are not cited-->
* Cuban writer [[Alejo Carpentier]]'s second novel, ''[[The Kingdom of This World]]'' (1949), (translated into English 1957), explores the Haitian Revolution in depth. It is one of the novels that inaugurated the Latin American renaissance in fiction beginning in the mid-20th century.
* [[Madison Smartt Bell]] wrote a trilogy called ''All Souls' Rising'' (1995) about the life of Toussaint Louverture and the slave uprising.
* C. Richard Gillespie, former [[Towson University]] professor, wrote a novelization of Louverture's life in the Revolution titled ''Papa Toussaint'' (1998).
* Though not referred to by name, Haiti is the backdrop for the 1990 Broadway musical ''[[Once on This Island]]'' by [[Lynn Ahrens]] and [[Stephen Flaherty]]. The musical, based on the novel ''My Love, My Love'' by [[Rosa Guy]], describes the social stratification of the island, and contains a song that briefly outlines the history of the Haitian Revolution.
* 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.<ref>{{cite web|last1=Melbourne|first1=Kamali|title=Caribbean Passion: Haiti 1804|url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/nottingham/content/articles/2005/10/28/caribbean_passion_haiti_1804_event_feature.shtml|website=BBC Nottingham|access-date=22 August 2016|date=31 October 2005}}</ref>
* In 2010, author [[Isabel Allende]] wrote a historical novel entitled ''[[Island Beneath the Sea]]'', which documents the Haitian Revolution through the eyes of a slave woman living on the island.
* [[William Dietrich (novelist)|William Dietrich]] set his 2012 novel, ''The Emerald Storm'' during the Haitian Revolution.
* The television mini-series [https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0255730 ''The Feast of All Saints''] features the Haitian Revolution in its opening scene.
* Philippe Niang directed the 2012 French two-part television film ''[[Toussaint Louverture (film)|Toussaint Louverture]]'', with [[Jimmy Jean-Louis]] playing the title role.
* The film [[Top Five]] refers to a fictional film within the film called "Uprize", ostensibly about this revolution.
* The role of Bois Caiman, Boukman, and Vodou generally, would become the subject of a controversial, discredited neo-evangelical theology in the 1990s that insisted that Haiti was pledged to the devil during the Revolution.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=McAlister|first=Elizabeth|date=2012-06-01|title=From Slave Revolt to a Blood Pact with Satan: The Evangelical Rewriting of Haitian History|url=http://wesscholar.wesleyan.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1112&context=div2facpubs|journal=Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses|volume=41|issue=2|pages=187–215|doi=10.1177/0008429812441310|issn=0008-4298|s2cid=145382199|url-access=subscription}}</ref>
* [[Jacobin (magazine)|Jacobin]], an American [[Socialism|socialist]] periodical, uses an image of Toussaint Louverture for its logo.

==Literature about the Haitian Revolution==
* ''[[An Unbroken Agony: Haiti, From Revolution to the Kidnapping of a President]]''
* ''[[Bug-Jargal]]''
* ''[[The Crime of Napoleon]]''
* ''[[The Black Jacobins]]''

==See also==
{{columns-list|colwidth=22em|
* [[Cécile Fatiman]]
* [[Charles Rivière-Hérard]]
* [[Dédée Bazile]]
* [[End of slavery in Haiti]]
* [[Faustin Soulouque]]
* [[Jean-François Papillon]]
* [[Joseph Balthazar Inginac]]
* [[Lamour Desrances]]
* [[Marie-Claire Heureuse Félicité]]
* [[Marie-Jeanne Lamartinière]]
* [[Marie-Louise Coidavid]]
* [[Marie-Madeleine Lachenais]]
* [[Pauline Bonaparte]]
* [[Peace of Basel]]
* [[Philippe Guerrier]]
* [[Pompée Valentin Vastey]]
* [[Quasi War]]
* [[Suzanne Simone Baptiste Louverture]]
* [[Sanité Bélair]]
* [[War of the South]]
* [[Women in the Haitian Revolution]]
}}

==References==
:<big>*</big>Please note that the URL in a footnote whose link is followed by an asterisk may occasionally require special attention.<ref name="metanote">Web pages for FRD Country Studies are subject to changes of URL. If a page linked from a footnote that cites the Haiti study bears a title different from that cited next to the link, consult [http://lcweb2.loc.gov/frd/cs/httoc.html A Country Study: Haiti] for the revised URL.</ref>

{{Reflist}}

==Sources==
* {{cite book|last=Bryan|first=Patrick E.|title=The Haitian Revolution and Its Effects|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=q9owdkOc0wgC|year=1984|publisher=Heinemann|isbn=978-0-435-98301-7}}
* {{cite book| last = Dubois| first = Laurent| title = Avengers of the New World| year = 2005| publisher = Harvard University Press| isbn = 978-0-674-01826-6 }}<!--Dubois, Laurent; ''The Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution'', Cambridge: Belknap Press, 2005.-->
* {{cite book |last1=Girard |first1=Philippe R. |title=The Slaves Who Defeated Napoleon: Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian War of Independence, 1801–1804 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=03XSP22p3kgC |year=2011 |publisher=University of Alabama Press |location=Tuscaloosa |isbn=978-0-8173-1732-4}}
* {{cite book| first = Cyril Lionel Robert |last=James | author-link=C. L. R. James | title = The Black Jacobins: Toussaint Louverture and the San Domingo Revolution| year = 1989| publisher = Vintage| edition = 2nd| isbn = 978-0-679-72467-4| url = https://archive.org/details/blackjacobins00clrj }}<!--[[C. L. R. James|James, C. L. R.]], ''[[The Black Jacobins]]: Toussaint Louverture and the San Domingo Revolution'', 1st ed. New York: Vintage Books, (original 1938, reprinted 1963, 1989)-->
* {{cite book| last = Leyburn | first = James| title =The Haitian People| year = 1961| publisher = Yale University Press |author-link=James G. Leyburn}}
* {{cite book| last = Perry| first = James| title =Arrogant Armies: Great Military Disasters and the Generals Behind Them| year = 2005 | publisher = Edison: CastleBooks }}
{{Library resources box|onlinebooks=yes}}
* {{cite book| author = Censer, Jack Richard|author2=Lynn Avery Hunt| title = Liberty, Equality, Fraternity Exploring the French Revolution| year = 2001| publisher = Penn State University Press| isbn = 978-0-271-02088-4 }}

==Further reading==
{{div col|colwidth=35em}}
* Baur, John. "International Repercussions of the Haitian Revolution." ''The Americas'' 26, no. 4 (1970).
* Blackburn, Robin. "Haiti, Slavery, and the Age of the Democratic Revolution", ''William and Mary Quarterly'' 63.4, 633–674 (2006)
* Fick, Carolyn. "The Haitian revolution and the limit of freedom: defining citizenship in the revolutionary era". ''Social History'', Vol 32. No 4, November 2007
* {{cite book |author=Garrigus, John D. |title=''Before Haiti Race and Citizenship in French Saint-Domingue'' |year=2006 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=978-1-4039-7140-1}}
* Geggus, David Patrick. ''The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World''. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press 2001. {{ISBN|978-1-57003-416-9}}
* Girard, Philippe. "Black Talleyrand: Toussaint Louverture's Secret Diplomacy with England and the United States," William and Mary Quarterly 66:1 (Jan. 2009), 87–124.
* Girard, Philippe. "Napoléon Bonaparte and the Emancipation Issue in Saint-Domingue, 1799–1803," French Historical Studies 32:4 (Fall 2009), 587–618.
* Joseph, Celucien L. ''Race, Religion, and The Haitian Revolution: Essays on Faith, Freedom, and Decolonizatio''n (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2012)
* Joseph, Celucien L. ''From Toussaint to Price-Mars: Rhetoric, Race, and Religion in Haitian Thought'' (CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2013)
* [https://library.oapen.org/bitstream/handle/20.500.12657/37837/9789004416451_webready_content_text.pdf  Koekkoek, René (2020) The Citizenship Experiment Contesting the Limits of Civic Equality and Participation in the Age of Revolutions. Studies in the History of Political Thought]
* Ott, Thomas O. ''The Haitian Revolution, 1789–1804.'' University of Tennessee Press, 1973.
* Peguero, Valentina. "Teaching the Haitian Revolution: Its Place in Western and Modern World History". ''History Teacher'' 32#1 (1998), pp.&nbsp;33–41. [http://www.jstor.org/stable/494418 online].
* {{cite book |author=Joseph Elisée Peyre-Ferry |title=Journal des opérations militaires de l'armée française à Saint-Domingue 1802–1803 sous les ordres des capitaines-généraux Leclerc et Rochambeau |year=2006 |publisher=Les Editions de Paris-Max Chaleil |isbn=978-2-84621-052-2}}
* Popkin, Jeremy D., ''You Are All Free: The Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of Slavery'' (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010)
* Jeffers, Jen (2016) {{cite news |url=https://theravenreport.com/2016/12/17/freedom-at-all-cost:-remembering-history's-greatest-slave-rebellion/ |work=The Raven Report |title=Freedom at All Cost: Remembering History's Greatest Slave Rebellion}}{{Dead link|date=July 2018|bot=InternetArchiveBot|fix-attempted=yes}}
* {{cite book |first=Julius S. |last=Scott |author-link=Julius S. Scott |title=The Common Wind: Afro-American Currents in the Age of the Haitian Revolution |date=2018 |publisher=[[Verso Books]] |isbn=978-1-78873-247-5 |title-link=The Common Wind}}
* {{cite journal |author=Manuel Barcia |title=From Revolution to Recognition: Haiti's Place in the Post-1804 Atlantic World |journal=The American Historical Review |volume=125 |issue=3 |date=June 2020 |doi=10.1093/ahr/rhaa240 |url=https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/159716/3/Barcia_AHR%20Forum.pdf}}
{{div col end|2}}
* {{Cite news |last1=Gamio |first1=Lazaro |last2=Méheut |first2=Constant |last3=Porter |first3=Catherine |last4=Gebrekidan |first4=Selam |last5=McCann |first5=Allison |last6=Apuzzo |first6=Matt |date=2022-05-20 |title=Haiti's Lost Billions |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2022/05/20/world/americas/enslaved-haiti-debt-timeline.html |access-date=2022-05-23 |issn=0362-4331}}
* {{Cite news |last1=Gebrekidan |first1=Selam |last2=Apuzzo |first2=Matt |last3=Porter |first3=Catherine |last4=Méheut |first4=Constant |date=2022-05-20 |title=Invade Haiti, Wall Street Urged. The U.S. Obliged. |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/05/20/world/haiti-wall-street-us-banks.html |access-date=2022-05-23 |issn=0362-4331}}
* {{Cite news |last1=Bilefsky |first1=Dan |last2=Porter |first2=Catherine |date=2021-07-10 |title=Who Paid for That Mansion? A Senator or the Haitian People? |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/10/world/canada/Haiti-Canada-Celestin-corruption.html |access-date=2022-05-23 |issn=0362-4331}}

==External links==
{{sister project links|d=Q689128|c=Category:Haitian Revolution|n=no|b=no|v=no|voy=no|m=no|mw=no|s=no|wikt=no|species=no}}
* [https://web.archive.org/web/20051103001454/http://www.thelouvertureproject.org/wiki/index.php?title=Main_Page The Louverture Project] – a wiki about the history of Haiti (archived 3 November 2005)
* [https://www.marxists.org/history/haiti/index.htm Archive on the History of the Haitian Independence Struggle 1791–1804] at [[marxists.org]]
* [http://bigthink.com/videos/haiti-history-of-a-shaken-country Haiti: History of Shaken Country] – Video interview with historian Laurent Dubois
* [http://www.hartford-hwp.com/archives/43a/index.html Haiti Archives]
* [https://www.pbs.org/egaliteforall/ "Égalité for All: Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution"]. {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110730105531/https://www.pbs.org/egaliteforall/ |date=30 July 2011 }}. Noland Walker. [[Public Broadcasting Service|PBS]] documentary. 2009.
* [http://www.democracynow.org/2010/8/17/france_urged_to_pay_40_billion France Urged to Pay $40&nbsp;Billion to Haiti in Reparations for "Independence Debt"] – video report by ''[[Democracy Now!]]''
* [https://www.brown.edu/Facilities/John_Carter_Brown_Library/haitian/index.html The Other Revolution: Haiti, 1789–1804] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150218133342/http://www.brown.edu/Facilities/John_Carter_Brown_Library/haitian/index.html |date=18 February 2015 }}, digital exhibition from [[Brown University]]
* [http://15minutehistory.org/2013/02/06/episode-11-the-haitian-revolution/ 15 Minutes History], [[University of Texas at Austin|UT at Austin]]
* [https://www.gilderlehrman.org/history-by-era/global-history-and-us-foreign-policy/essays/two-revolutions-atlantic-world-connection Two Revolutions in the Atlantic World: Connections between the American Revolution and the Haitian Revolution] [[Gilder Lehrman Center for the Study of Slavery, Resistance, and Abolition|Gilder Lehrman Center]], Laurent Dubois.
* [https://library.brown.edu/haitihistory/7.html"Upheavals in France and Saint-Domingue"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201114000543/https://library.brown.edu/haitihistory/7.html |date=14 November 2020 }} Brown University

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