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(1) Thousands of slaves found freedom by fleeing from their masters, forming communities of maroons, and raiding isolated plantations. The most famous was Mackandal, a one-armed slave, originally from Guinea, who escaped in 1751. A Vodou Houngan (priest), he united many of the different maroon bands. He spent the next six years staging successful raids and evading capture by the French, reputedly killing over 6,000 people while preaching a fanatic vision of the destruction of white civilization in St. Domingue.
(2) Saint-Domingue also had the largest and wealthiest free population of color in the Caribbean, the gens de couleur (French, "people of color"). The mixed-race community in Saint-Domingue numbered 25,000 in 1789. First-generation gens de couleur were typically the offspring of a male, French slaveowner, and an African slave chosen as a concubine. In the French colonies, the semi-official institution of "plaçage" defined this practice. By this system, the children were free people and could inherit property, thus originating a class of "mulattos" with property and some with wealthy fathers.
(3) Africans who attained freedom also enjoyed status as
gens de couleur.
(4) many [mixed race and Black people] accumulated substantial holdings and became slave owners themselves. By 1789, they owned one third of the plantation property and one quarter of the slaves of Saint-Domingue.
(5) in March 1790 the National Assembly granted full civic rights to the gens de couleur
(6) However, the mulatto rebels refused to arm or free their slaves, or to challenge the status of slavery, and their attack was defeated by a force of white militia and black volunteers (including Henri Christophe).
(7) Beginning in September, some thirteen thousand slaves and rebels in the south, led by Romaine-la-Prophétesse, freed slaves and took supplies from and burned plantations, ultimately occupying the area's two major cities, Léogâne and Jacmel...
In March 1792, a coalition of whites and conservative free blacks and forces led by another of the national commissioners, Edmond de Saint-Léger, put down Romaine-la-Prophétesse's revolt after André Rigaud, who led free black confederate forces based near Port-au-Prince, declined to ally with it.
(8) On 29 August 1793, Sonthonax took the radical step of proclaiming the freedom of the slaves in the north province (with severe limits on their freedom). In September and October, emancipation was extended throughout the colony. The French National Convention, the first elected Assembly of the First Republic (1792–1804), on 4 February 1794, under the leadership of Maximilien de Robespierre, abolished slavery by law in France and all its colonies.
The slaves did not immediately flock to Sonthonax's banner, however. Counter-revolutionary planters continued to fight Sonthonax, with support from the British. They were joined by many of the free men of color who opposed the abolition of slavery.
(9) In the meantime, Rigaud had set up a mulatto separatist movement in the south.
(10) By 1801, Toussaint was in control of all of Hispaniola, after conquering French Santo Domingo and proclaiming the abolition of slavery there. He did not, however, proclaim full independence for the country, nor did he seek reprisals against the country's former white slaveholders, convinced that the French would not restore slavery and "that a population of slaves recently landed from Africa could not attain to civilization by 'going it alone.'"
(11) Toussaint, however, asserted so much independence that in 1802, Napoleon sent a massive invasion force, under his brother-in-law Charles Leclerc, to increase French control... With a large expedition that eventually included 40,000 European troops, and receiving help from white colonists and mulatto forces commanded by Alexandre Pétion, a former lieutenant of Rigaud, the French won several victories after severe fighting.
(12) Unlike Toussaint, Dessalines showed little equanimity with regard to the whites. In a final act of retribution, the remaining French were slaughtered by Haitian military forces in a white genocide.
(13) As hopeful as the Haitians, many Poles were seeking union amongst themselves to win back their homeland. As a result, many Polish soldiers admired their enemy and decided to turn on the French army and join the Haitian former slaves, and participated in the Haitian revolution of 1804, supporting the principles of liberty for all the people.
(14) The nation of former slaves remained excluded from the hemisphere's first regional meeting of independent nations, held in Panama in 1826, largely due to the atrocities of the 1804 Haitian Genocide which targeted European men, women and children who resided in Haiti, including those who were favorable to the revolution.
(15) On 1 January 1804, Dessalines proclaimed Haiti an independent nation. Mid-February, Dessalines told some cities (Léogâne, Jacmel, Les Cayes) to prepare for mass massacres. On 22 February 1804, he signed a decree ordering that all whites in all cities should be put to death.