(first of two articles)

Looking at how Haiti’s history is presented in high-school textbooks in the United States gives an insight into why many North Americans know so little about Haiti and how this limited knowledge has been distorted, muffled, and hidden behind a veil of silence.

The successful revolution in Haiti against the French slave owners is a singular event in world history. It is the only time that slaves managed to rise up, smash their oppressors, and set up a new state and social order that reflected some of their hopes and aspirations.

In 1790, Saint Domingue was a French colony where 10,000 people made fabulous profits from owning almost all the land and from brutally oppressing 500,000 slaves, entirely African or of African descent, with some 40,000 people in intermediate positions. Fifteen years later, in 1805, the slave-owning colony was gone, replaced by the Republic of Haiti, whose citizens were mostly subsistence farmers who had their own weapons.

It was the first successful national liberation struggle in modern times. When Haiti declared its independence in 1804, it was the only state in the world to have a leader of African descent. In fact, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, the governor-in-general in 1804, was an ex-slave who had survived a cruel master.

One widely used U.S. high school text book, World History: Perspective on the Past, published by Houghton Mifflin Co., presents this struggle in just a few sentences: “Toussaint drove the French forces from the island. Then, in 1802, he attended a peace meeting where he was treacherously taken prisoner. He was then sent to France, where he died in prison. However, the French could not retake the island.” (p 536) About 30 pages later, when the subject of the Louisiana Purchase comes up, a little more is said about Haiti: “Toussaint’s fighters and yellow fever all but wiped out a French army of 10,000 soldiers. Discouraged, Napoleon gave up the idea of an American empire and decided to sell the Louisiana Territory.” (p 562). (Actually, the 10,000 soldier figure is an error according to C.L.R. James, The Black Jacobins, p 355).

Another common high school text book World History: Connections to Today, published by Prentis-Hall, devotes almost a page to Haiti, but sums up the struggle against the French attempt to re-enslave Haiti in 1802 in just a few words: “In 1804, Haitian leaders declared independence. With yellow fever destroying his army, Napoleon abandoned Haiti.”

On Feb. 3, 1802, Gen. Victor-Emmanuel Leclerc, Napoleon’s brother-in-law, arrived at Cap Français (currently Cap Haïtien) with five thousand men and demanded entrance. Toussaint’s commander, Henri Christophe, was out-numbered and out-gunned. Rather than surrender, Christophe burned down the city (starting with his own house), destroyed the gunpowder plant, and retreated into the mountains. Jean-Jacques Dessalines, under orders from Toussaint Louverture, seized the French fort called Crête-à-Pierrot in the center of the country with 1,500 troops, held off the 12,000 French troops that besieged it through two attacks, and then cut his way through the French forces to escape.

By the end of April, Louverture had been seized and sent to France, and all his lieutenants had either been deported or incorporated into the French army. But the popular resistance continued and intensified. The French continued losing large numbers of soldiers to yellow fever as well as small-scale but persistent attacks. Cultivators, fearing the reintroduction of slavery, continued to flee to the mountains as maroons and to form small armed bands.

By the end of July 1802, when news spread that the French had re-instituted slavery on Guadeloupe, reopened the slave trade, and forbade any person of color from claiming the title of citizen, resistance turned to insurrection.

French reprisals were terrible but only seemed to strengthen the conviction of the masses that they would rather die fighting than be re-enslaved. And they insisted on dying with dignity, no matter how cruel the French were. In one instance, when three captured Haitian soldiers were being burned to death, one started crying. Another said “Watch me. I will show you how to die.” He turned around to face the pole, slid down, and burned to death without a whimper. A French general watching the execution wrote to Leclerc: “These are the men we have to fight!”

In another case, a mother consoled her weeping daughters as they were marched to their execution: “Rejoice that your wombs will not have to bear slave children.” (Carolyn F. Frick, The Making of Haiti, p 221)

In September, shortly before he died of yellow fever, Leclerc wrote to Napoleon that the only way France could win was to destroy all the blacks in the mountains -- men, women, and children over 12 -- and half the blacks in the plains. “We must not leave a single colored person who has worn an épaulette.” (Officers wore épaulettes.) This means that the commander of the French expedition saw no other way to win other than genocide.

By the end of October 1802, the insurrection was so strong that Toussaint’s officers who had disingenuously joined the French, deserted and began a counter-attack. The struggle took a more organized military character, while the popular insurrection intensified.

By mid 1803, the French were being mopped up in the south. Jérémie was evacuated in August, and Cayes fell on October 17. Then Dessalines decided to move on the French in Cap Français.

Since he didn’t have enough artillery or the logistics to support a long siege, Dessalines decided to take le Cap by storm. He assigned a half-brigade, commanded by Capois La Mort, to storm the walls covered by the mutually supported positions, Butte de la Charrier and Vertières. Meanwhile, two other brigades maneuvered to seize batteries protecting the city from an attack from the sea. While grape-shot cut swaths through the brigade led by Capois, the soldiers kept pressing forward, clambering over their dead and shouting to each other “To the attack, soldiers.” On Nov. 18, their combined assault took Charrier, which opened the city to Haitian artillery. The French general agreed to leave immediately and was captured 10 hours later by the British. On Nov. 19, 1803, the French army left Haiti for good.

Those are the reasons why “the French could not retake the island” and why “Napoleon abandoned Haiti” -- the French were decisively defeated. The masses refused to return to slavery and their leaders organized a people’s army that crushed the French.