page_title: Slavery in Haiti
section_title: Revolutionary period (1789–1804)
hierarchical_section_title: Slavery in Haiti / History / Revolutionary period (1789–1804)
caption_attribution_description: Français&#160;: Incendie de la Plaine du Cap. - Massacre des Blancs par les Noirs. English: "Burning of the Plaine du Cap - Massacre of whites by the blacks". On August 22 1791, slaves set fire to plantations, torched cities and massacred the white population.
context_page_description: Slavery in Haiti started after the arrival of Christopher Columbus on the island in 1492 with the European colonists that followed from Portugal, Spain and France. The practice was devastating to the native population. Following the indigenous Tainos' near decimation from forced labor, disease and war, the Spanish, under advisement of the Catholic priest Bartolomeu de las Casas and with the blessing of the Catholic church, began engaging in earnest in the kidnapped and forced labor of enslaved Africans. During the French colonial period beginning in 1625, the economy of Haiti was based on slavery, and the practice there was regarded as the most brutal in the world. The Haitian Revolution of 1804, the only successful slave revolt in human history, precipitated the end of slavery not only in Saint-Domingue, but in all French colonies. However, this revolt has only merited a marginal role in the histories of Portuguese and Spanish America. This is a problem as it should hold a much more central place due to the fact that its contribution to independence in the Americas is indisputable.
context_section_description: It was so common for male masters to sexually assault female slaves in Saint-Domingue that a separate class had emerged consisting of the mixed-race children of these encounters.  It was standard for fathers to free these children, leading them to become a new class more privileged than slaves but less so than whites; they were called gens de couleur, "free people of color".  Some of these free people of color were quite wealthy and some owned slaves.
  The French Revolution in 1789 presented an opportunity for Haiti's middle class to organize a revolt, which was followed shortly thereafter by a general slave revolt. In 1791, slaves staged a revolt, massacring whites and torching plantations. By 1801, the revolt had succeeded, putting Toussaint Louverture into power as Governor General of Haiti.
  In 1794, the Revolutionary French government had abolished slavery throughout its empire. However, the Haitian Revolution represented the limitations of the enlightenment and how the ideals of liberté, equilté, and fraternité did not apply to everyone.
  Although slavery was outlawed, Louverture, believing that the plantation economy was necessary, forced laborers back to work on the plantations using military might.
  With a view toward re-establishing slavery, Napoleon Bonaparte sent his brother-in-law, Charles Leclerc, to regain control of Haiti, along with a fleet of 86 ships and 22,000 soldiers. The Haitians resisted the soldiers, but the French were more numerous and better positioned, until the rainy season brought yellow fever. As French soldiers and officers died, black Haitian soldiers who had allied themselves with the French began to defect to the other side.
caption: In 1791, slaves torched plantations and massacred whites.
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