Saint Dominicans

Saint Dominicans
Saint-Domingais

Flag of Saint-Domingue
Regions with significant populations
Saint-Domingue, Louisiana, France, United States, Haiti, Cuba, Puerto Rico, New York, Dominican Republic, Jamaica
Languages
French, Saint Dominican Creole French
Religion
Roman Catholic, Voodoo
Related ethnic groups
Haitians, Cajuns, Louisiana Creoles, Acadians, Dominicans, Puerto Ricans

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Saint Dominican Creoles

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Alexandre Dumas, novelist of Saint Dominican descent

Saint Dominicans (French: Saint-Domingais) are the people who lived in the French colony of Saint-Domingue before the Haitian Revolution. Saint Dominican Creoles formed an ethnic group native to Saint-Domingue, they were all of the people who were born in Saint Domingue. The Creoles were well educated, and they created much art, such as the famed Saint Dominican French Opera; their society prized manners, good breeding, tradition, and honor. During and after the Haitian Revolution, many Saint Dominicans fled to locations in the United States, other Antilles islands, New York City, Cuba, France, Jamaica and especially New Orleans in Louisiana, where they made an enormous impact on Louisiana Creole culture.

Although many Saint Dominican refugees remained where they had gained asylum, some returned to Haiti and became Haitian citizens.

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Classical composer Chevalier de Saint-Georges File:Saint-George - Les Caquets01.ogg

History

Origin of the Saint Dominican Creoles

Creoles had already become established in the Americas by the 17th century as a unique ethnicity originating from the mix of French, Indian, and African cultures. These French Creoles held a distinct ethno-cultural identity, and their civilization owed their existence to the overseas expansion of the French Empire. Martinique for a time was the center of French Creoles in the Caribbean.

French adventurers settled on Tortuga Island, which was close to the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo. As a result, in the late 17th century, the French had de facto control of the island close to the Spanish colony. The wars of Louis XIV of France in Europe finally convinced the Spaniards to give the western quarter of the island to the French under to the Treaty on Ryswick (1697). The French called their new colony Saint-Domingue. As the colony developed, a planter class emerged that created highly profitable plantations- these plantations generated so much wealth that Saint-Domingue soon became the richest colony in the world.

In the late 17th century, French colonists made up more than 90% of the population in Saint-Domingue. However, as demand for sugar in Europe grew, planters imported African slaves to meet the demand. The population of Africans grew quickly, and many French settlers intermarried with Africans, resulting in the growth of a multiracial Creole population. By the early 18th century, Saint Dominican Creoles and Africans came to compose the majority of the colony.

Throughout the 17th century, Creoles became established in the Americas as a unique ethnicity originating from the mix of French, Indian, and African cultures. These French Creoles held a distinct ethno-cultural identity, a shared antique language, the Creole French language, and their civilization owed its existence to the overseas expansion of the French Empire. Martinique for a time was the center of French Creoles in the Caribbean; its decline lead to Saint-Domingue becoming the capital of French Creole civilization.

Freedoms of the Saint Dominican Creoles

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Four Creole women posing in a window

In 1685, French administrators published a slave code based on Roman slave laws, the Code Noir, designed to protect the rights of slaves. Plantation discipline, the colonial government, and a rural police prevented slave uprisings in Saint-Domingue, unlike in British colonies such as Jamaica where a dozen large slave rebellions occurred in the 18th century alone. Saint-Domingue never had a slave rebellion until the beginning of the 1791 Saint Dominican French revolution.

The Code Noir based on Roman laws also conferred ex-slaves (affranchis) full citizenship and gave complete civil equality with other French subjects. Saint Domingue's Code Noir never outlawed interracial marriage, nor did it limit the amount of property a free person could give to ex-slaves. Many Saint Dominican Creoles of color used the colonial courts to protect their property and sue white Saint Dominicans.

During the 18th century Saint Domingue became home to the largest and wealthiest free population of African descent anywhere in the Americas. The existence of wealthy families of African descent challenged the ideas from which the plantation society emerged. For much of the 18th century, colonists used social class rather than genealogy to define position in Saint Dominican society. Saint Dominican census records show that families of African ancestry who owned property, were educated, and were legitimately married were listed as white Saint Dominicans by officials; racial identites were tied to wealth and culture rather than ancestry.

Saint Dominican Creole preservation of African heritage

Because the Code Noir gave African freedmen civil equality with other French subjects, they preserved traditions from their African ethnic groups. Saint Dominican Creoles came from different African peoples; indeed, the vast majority of the African slaves in Saint-Domingue were war captives who had lost a war with another African ethnic group, many times coming from religious wars between pagans or Muslim-pagan interreligious wars. Many of the slaves who came to Saint-Domingue could not return to Africa, as their home was controlled by an opposing African ethnic group, and they stayed as affranchis in Saint-Domingue.

Jean-Baptiste Belley, an affranchi who became a rich planter, elected member of the Estates General for Saint-Domingue, and later Deputy of the French National Convention

R. Hé! hé! mô n'a pas pense ça, moi, qui mô va faire dans mo paye? mô n'a pas saclave?

Q. Ah! bin; quand vous arrive dans vous paye, vous n'a pas libe donc?

R. Non va; mô saclave la guerre; quand mô arrive là; zotte prend moi encore pour vendé moi. Quand mô fini mort, mô va allé dans mon paye, à v'là tout.

R. Hey! Hey! I don't think so, what am I going to do in my country? I won't be a slave anymore?

Q. Ah! well; when you you arrive in your country, you won't be free then?

R. Not at all; i'm a slave of war; when I arrive there, they will take me again and sell me. When I die, I will go to my country, that's all.

As African freedmen had civil equality with other French subjects, they took an interest in expanding the studies of each of their unique people's history. Africans contributed to the spiritual and mythological aspects of Saint-Domingue through their folklore, such as the widespread tales of Compère Lapin and Compère Bouqui.

Below is a list of different African peoples found in Saint-Domingue:

• The Dunkos, a tattooed people whose women cherished their men with the upmost respect.
• The Aradas, a tattooed people who used poison to kill their enemies. They worshipped the moon, mollusks, and serpents. Toussaint Louverture was reportedly of Arada heritage.
• The people of Fida, a tattooed people whose women were known to be extroardinarily flirtatious. The women of Fida wore a heavy ring inside of their bottom lip, and the skin of their throat was modified with cuts of a knife.
• The people of Essa who religiously worshipped the dead king of their people as a divinity. They place his body in a pagoda following the main route of their capital on a richly ornamented throne, and worship him until the reigning King of Essa dies. The cadavre is embalmed with palm oil which conserves the body's freshness for a long time. The body is dressed very extravagantly, and a guardian watches it day and night as travelers come to visit and pay respects.
• The people of Urba, a fierce people who are arbitrary in their resolutions of revenge. If a murder takes place, the dead's relatives do not search for the killer; rather, they will hide and will disembowel the first passer-by without fear of a judiciary backlash, offering the victim's life as a sacrifice to their god Brataoth. They prepare the funeral of their relative, leaving the corpse of their victim exposed to the air, and devoured by ferocious beasts. They dig a huge trench where the murder was committed, so that the spirit of the dead may not wander to other places. The cadaver is embalmed and exposed and placed in an iron cage, so that the body is touching the ground. For this reason the body is safe from carnivorous animals as they cannot get through the iron bars and the deepness of the trench. A little hut is constructed above the cage so that the weather does not interfere with the body.

The King of Urba often calls meetings of magic men that are called Makendals, whose purpose is to foresee the results of battles, and in the event of a defeat, to indicate which soldiers were responsible for the failure of the battle; the Makendals many times would arbitrarily call upon innocent men to face punishment for "criminal conduct" leading to the defeat.

When the King of Urba loses many of his people to war, he assembles the Makendal council, and consults the members on the way to repopulate his kingdom, where he is recommended to buy 1.one hundred gourde vases, 2.one hundred jugs, 3.one hundred slaves. The Makendals transport all of these on the major roadway, and order the slaves' bodies to be opened, where they pour red palm oil inside and specific shells, and bury all of these items at a specific location. This is the ritual of repopulation to gain favor from their gods.

• The Aminas who believed in metempsychosis, or the migration of the soul after death. When slaves from this ethnic group would arrive in Saint-Domingue, some would use suicide to return to the country of whence they came, believing that they would regain the rank, wealth, relatives, and friends that they lost after they were defeated in war.

For an example, an account of this metempsychosis occurred on the plantation of Mr.Desdunes, who had purchased an Amina woman and her two children. The woman and children had barely arrived on the island, and the woman was witnessed observing the Ester river, stopping every moment to measure the depth of the river, and making sighs while lifting her eyes to the sky.

One morning, the Amina woman was found drowned with her two children attached on her belt. The childrens' screams for help, echoing the horrors of their soon-to-be death, were heard by African fishermen, but not knowing to what to attribute the cause, they didn't go to the location to render aid.

• The Igbos who also believed in metempsychosis.

• The people of Borno had women who took very great care in selecting a suitable partner. The Borno women were absolutely submissive to their men, and sought to be bodily clean at at all times. They would bathe three times a day and use palm oil to annoint there bodies.

In finding a partner, old women of Borno are chosen to examine the new wife, and they bring her to her nuptial bed playing instruments and singing chants of joy, if she is indeed found to be a virgin.

If, however, she is found not to be a virgin, she will be declared a prostitute. Prostitution in Borno was punished by enslavement; Borno prostitutes would be taken by order of the king, shipped to a coastal slave port to be sold to the first European slave ship that arrived.

During child birth, other Borno wise-women serve as nurses to provide aid to the soon-to-be mother. As the child is born and the umbilical cord is cut, the scissors used are placed carefully under the pillow of the baby. The scissors are not used again except for the purpose of cutting the umbilical cord.

New-born babies of Borno are tattooed eight days after their birth with the characteristics of their nation, which are placed on the face, the chest, on the arm, and elsewhere on the body. The designs are of a symmetrical sun, tongues of fire, diverse animals, of reptiles, and of prevalent architecture in their society.

The people of Borno do not eat meat unless it is sacrificed and blessed by their grand-priest, called an alpha. Pork is entirely banned from their diet.

A pilgrim to Borno will follow the main road with jugs filled with water, of which he offers to passer-byes or weary travelers.

Their common money is shells, and they have a great veneration for a prayer book that, if they touch it cannot leave before reading it, singing by memory. The people of Borno would rather sell all of their animals rather than diminish their piety for their sacred laws.

The Borno people have a code of laws for the punishment of crimes, following which require three witnesses to prosecute. Their good faith is so strong that if they are inclined to believe the witnesses, the accused will immediately be hung.

Every house in Borno is like small island surrounding a courtyard. At night, the whole family assembles in the home to avoid savage beasts like leopards & lions.

The King of Borno never leaves his palace, and if someone who enters into the palace dares to fix his eyes on him, he will be punished by death. While the king must make judgements in criminal proceedings, he is seated on a throne and hidden from the vision of the general population by a elegantly fashioned curtain. Any declaration he makes is echoed through the chamber by 7 pipes. The subject to whom the declaration is made indicates his submission to the judgement of the king by giving him his humble recognition, and he kneels, claps with his hands, and covers his head with ashes.

Thievery is abhorred in the society of Borno. If one is found guilty of thievery, the crime is not thought to be individual; indeed the whole family is charged with the crime. For example, if child of Borno takes something that doesn't belong to him, the courtiers of the king take the child and his whole family and sell them as slaves.

If a member of the royal court is found of adultery, he is punished with death. The woman will be drowned and the father and child are impaled and placed on the road to serve as an example.

The people of Borno can hunt once a year. They burn the grass in swamps to fetch the nests of aquatic fowl and take their eggs, and the turtles that hide in the area. As the people don't eat any meat except smoked, these provisions last for the whole year.

• The Mozambique people.

• The people of Dahomey.

• The Accrans.

• The Crepans.

• The Assianthees.

• The Popans.

• The Fulanis.

• The Gabonese.

• The Congos.

Development of Saint Dominican culture

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Saint Dominican Creole opera soprano, Alexandrine-Caroline Branchu

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Saint Dominican Creole architecture in Cap-Haïtien, previously Cap-Français

Saint-Domingue underwent a cultural awakening in the years after the French and Indian War, where France lost all of its continental New France territory (French Louisiana, French Canada, and Acadia). Imperial French policy makers worried that future conflicts could test the loyalty of their Saint Dominican subjects, and as Saint-Domingue was the richest colony in the world, they couldn't afford to lose it. The Bourbon Regime thus expanded the colonial bureaucracy, hired administrative personnel, built new infrastructure, and started a colonial mail service as well as a Saint Dominican printing press. Saint Dominican entrepreneurs also added to the colony's development by building cafés and clubs.

The urban society of Saint-Domingue became rich and thrived. The French Opera was one of the most cherished arts in Saint-Domingue. Eight Saint Dominican towns had theaters, the largest being in the capital of Cap-Français that could hold 1,500 spectators. There were also Masonic lodges, and many universities espousing French Enlightenment ideas. Saint-Domingue was home to the Cercle des Philadelphes, a scientific organization of which the American scientist Benjamin Franklin was a member.

Saint-Domingue developed a highly specialized and differentiated economy that European art and entertainment was abundant on the island. Public festivals such as masquerade balls, the celebration of feasts & holidays, and charivaris became engrained in Saint Dominican culture. A transient population became present in Saint Dominican society, and tourists from different lands and classes would stream to the major city-centers of the island, such as Cap-Français and Port-au-Prince.

By 1789, Saint Dominican society was already old and refined, with its own customs, traditions, and values. The core of Saint Dominican civilization was transferred to New Orleans, Louisiana after the Haitian Revolution; more than half of all Saint Dominican refugees ultimately settled there.

Curtailment of Saint Dominican Creole rights

Saint Dominican Creole master fencer Jean-Louis Michel

Despite the cultural progress in Saint-Domingue, tensions between Saint Dominican Creole families and royal administrators escalated. In 1769, Saint Dominican planters rallied Creoles of color and lower class whites (petits blancs) to help fight an unpopular militia reform. The Bourbon government crushed the uprising, but could not stamp out all Saint Dominican dissent. Saint Dominicans of all classes and colors resented the "tyrannical" royal administration.

European born soldiers died rapidly in tropical locations such as Saint-Domingue, and royal officials preferred a native Creole militia; but the threat posed by the united forces of the Saint Dominican planter class, Creoles of color, and lower class whites (petits blancs) posed an enormous threat to Bourbon royalist control.

Starting in the early 1760s, and gaining much impetus after 1769, Bourbon royalist authorities began attempts to cut Saint Dominican Creoles of color out of Saint Dominican society, banning them from working in positions of public trust or as respected professionals. They began segregating theaters and other public spaces, and issued an edict preventing Creoles of color from dressing extravagantly and restricted their ability to ride in private carriages. They began referring to all Saint Dominican Creoles of color as affranchis, a term that means ex-slave, an insult to all Saint Dominican Creoles who came from long-standing free families. Militia companies also became segregated, and Saint Dominican Creoles of color who previously served in militias with white Saint Dominicans were transferred into "colored" units.

The Bourbon government spread rumors to destroy the Saint Dominican society's cohesiveness. Prior to the 1760s, visitors to Saint-Domingue frequently described the great beauty, romance, and allure of the mixed-race Saint Dominican Creole women. Afterwards, they became known as dangerous temptations. Mixed-race men who were known for passion, handsomeness, and chivalry became restereotyped as highly sexual, narcissistic, lazy, and physically weak. This new form of prejudice shattered the older idea of a Saint Dominican social continuum; mixed-race men and women were deemed inferior to both white and black Saint Dominicans- now, no matter their wealth they were morally and physically inferior to both groups.

The new color line drove the colony's wealthiest families of color into political action. In 1784, Julien Raimond, a Creole of color planter, traveled to France to lobby the naval administrator to reform racist colonial policy implemented by the Bourbon government. More than a dozen wealthy Saint Dominican Creole families supported Raimond's campaign, and continued supporting him in making Saint Dominican Creole rights and equality the most important colonial issue during the years before the French Revolution in Saint Domingue.

Downturn of the Saint Dominican economy

Further information: Slavery in Haiti § Saint Domingue (1625–1789)

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A portrait of Saint Domingue's landscape

As the social systems of Saint Domingue began eroding after the 1760s, the plantation economy of Saint-Domingue also began weakening. The price of slaves doubled between 1750 and 1780; Saint Dominican land tripled in price during the same period. Sugar prices still increased, but at a much lower rate than before. The profitability of other crops like coffee collapsed in 1770, causing many planters to go into debt. The planters of Saint Domingue were eclipsed in their profits by enterprising businessmen; they no longer had a guarantee on their plantation investment, and the slave-trading economy came under increased scrutiny.

Along with the establishment of a French abolitionist movement, the Société des amis des Noirs, French economists demonstrated that paid labor or indentured servitude were much more cost-effective than slave labor. In principle the widespread implementation of indentured servitude on plantations could have produced the same output as slave labor. However, the Bourbon King Louis XVI didn't want to change the labor system in his colonies, as slave labor was directly responsible for allowing France to surpass Britain in trade. Nevertheless, Saint-Domingue did increase its reliance on indentured servants ( known as petits blanchets or engagés) and by 1789 about 6 percent of all white Saint Dominicans were employed as labor on plantations along with slaves.

Despite signs of economic decline, Saint-Domingue continued to produce more sugar than all of the British Caribbean islands combined.

Saint-Dominicans in the American Revolutionary War

Further information: Saint-Domingue Volunteers–Chasseurs

Saint Dominican Creole general Thomas-Alexandre Dumas

Saint Dominican Creoles such as Vincent Ogé, Jean-Baptiste Chavannes, and André Rigaud fought with American rebel forces during the American Revolutionary War. The Saint-Domingue Volunteers–Chasseurs accompanied the Comte d'Estaing as part of the expeditionary force for service. The unit participated in the Siege of Savannah.

The expeditionary force under the command of d'Estaing and his lieutenant, Jean-Baptiste Bernard Vaublanc, left Cap-Français on 15 August 1779, and arrived on 8 September 1779, in Savannah, Georgia. After arriving they were tasked to help the American colonial rebels, who were intent on regaining control of the city which British forces captured in 1778.

The British Army sortied from their defenses on 24 September before dawn to engage their French and American besiegers. The Saint Dominican Chasseurs fought back and lost one man while seven others were wounded, along with Comte D'Estaing. The siege ended in failure on 9 October 1779.

The French did not disband the Saint Dominican Chasseurs, but instead continued to use the unit. The Chasseurs did not return to Saint-Domingue until 1780. Afterwards, the majority of the regiment served in Saint-Domingue as garrison troops.

The French Revolution in Saint-Domingue

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Saint Dominican Creole aristocrat Vincent Ogé

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Saint Dominican Creole Republican and abolitionist, Jean-Baptiste Chavannes

In 1791, Saint Dominican Creoles began the French Revolution in Saint-Domingue; Republican revolutionaries such as Vincent Ogé, Jean-Baptiste Chavannes, and the ex-governor of Saint-Domingue Guillaume de Bellecombe incited a slave rebellion aimed at overthrowing the Bourbon Regime. Their main goal was to establish Republican control of Saint-Domingue and enforce the social & political equality granted to Saint Dominican Creoles by the French National Convention as part of the decree of 15 May 1792. After defeating the Bourbon royalists, the Saint Dominican legislation declared Republican control of Saint-Domingue, and granted full citizenship and political equality to all Saint Dominican Creoles.

Although the Republican Saint Dominican Creole leaders defeated the Bourbon royalists, they soon lost control of the slave rebellion, and to make matters worse, Britain and Spain began to invade the colony. As the French Revolution in Saint-Domingue dragged on, it changed in nature from a political revolution to a racial war.

"The rebellion was extremely violent ... the rich plain of the North was reduced to ruins and ashes ..." After months of arson and murder, Toussaint Louverture, a Saint Dominican Jacobin, took charge of the leaderless slave revolt; he formed an alliance with Spanish invasion forces.

The Republican revolutionaries in France had written the Declaration of the Rights of Man in 1789, and they to saw that slavery would need to be abolished. They sent a Republican commission with 15,000 troops and tons of arms to Saint-Domingue to abolish slavery and defend from British and Spanish invasion forces.

Republican delegate Léger-Félicité Sonthonax arrived in Saint-Domingue and he made an emancipation proclamation: the proclamation granted specific freedoms to all the slaves, but ultimately, only slaves in the north and west of Saint-Domingue were granted freedom. He was committed to make drastic decisions to prevent Britain and Spain from succeeding in their attempts to assume control over Saint-Domingue.

When the Republicans emancipated the slaves of Saint-Domingue, Toussaint Louverture decided to switch allegiances to the Republican Government and double-cross Spain; he was cautious and awaited French ratification of emancipation before officially changing sides. In September and October, emancipation was extended throughout the colony. On February 4, 1794, the French National Convention ratified this act, applying it to all French colonies. Toussaint Louverture and his corps of well-disciplined, battle-hardened former slaves came over to the French Republican side in early May 1794.

Soon after his betrayal, Louverture eradicated all Spanish supporters, and put an end to the Spanish threat to Saint-Domingue. Republican France signed the Treaty of Basel of July 1795 with Spain, ending hostilities between the two countries.

The Saint Dominican Civil War

Further information: War of Knives

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Governor-General-for-life of Saint-Domingue, Toussaint Louverture

For months, Louverture was in sole command of Saint-Domingue, except for a semi-autonomous state in the south, where general André Rigaud had rejected the authority of the Republican Government. Both generals continued harassing the British, whose position on Saint-Domingue was increasingly weak.

On 30 April 1798, Louverture signed a treaty with the British general Thomas Maitland, exchanging the withdrawal of British troops from western Saint-Domingue in return for a general amnesty for the Bourbon royalists in those areas. In May, Port-au-Prince was returned to French rule in an atmosphere of order and celebration.

In 1799, the tensions between Louverture and Rigaud came to a head. Louverture accused Rigaud of trying to assassinate him to gain power over Saint-Domingue. In June 1799, Louverture declared Rigaud a traitor and attacked the southern state. The resulting civil war, known as the War of Knives, lasted more than a year, with the defeated Rigaud fleeing to Guadeloupe, then France, in August 1800. Louverture delegated most of the campaign to his lieutenant, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, who became infamous, during and after the war, for massacring Saint Dominican Creole captives and civilians. During the civil war, Napoleon Bonaparte gained power in France.

After the civil war, in January 1801, Louverture invaded the Spanish territory of Santo Domingo, taking possession of it from the governor, Don Garcia, with few difficulties. The area was less developed and populated than the French section. Louverture brought it under French law, abolishing slavery and embarking on a program of modernization. He now controlled the entire island.

In March 1801, Louverture appointed a constitutional assembly, composed chiefly of planters, to draft a constitution for Saint-Domingue. He promulgated the Constitution on 7 July 1801, officially establishing his authority over the entire island of Hispaniola. It made him Saint-Domingue's governor-general for life with near absolute powers and the possibility of choosing his successor. However, Louverture did not declare Saint-Domingue's independence, acknowledging in Article 1 that it was a colony of the French Empire.

Many whites of Saint-Domingue had fled the island during the Saint Dominican Civil War. Toussaint Louverture, however, understood that they formed a vital part of the Saint Dominican economy, and in the hopes of slowing the impending economic collapse, he invited them to return. He gave property settlements and indemnities for war time losses, and promised equal treatment in his new Saint-Domingue; a good number of white Saint Dominican refugees did return. The refugees who believed in Toussaint Louverture's rule were later exterminated by Jean Jacques Dessalines.

Saint Dominican Creole physician and surgeon François Fournier de Pescay

The Haitian Revolution in Saint Domingue

Further information: Haitian Revolution

Louverture strove to convince Bonaparte of his loyalty. He wrote to Napoleon, but received no reply. Napoleon eventually decided to send an expedition of 20,000 men to Saint-Domingue to restore French authority. Given the fact that France had signed a temporary truce with Great Britain in the Treaty of Amiens, Napoleon was able to plan this operation without the risk of his ships being intercepted by the Royal Navy.

Napoleon dispatched troops in 1802 under the command of his brother-in-law, General Charles Emmanuel Leclerc, to restore French rule to the island. Louverture and Dessalines fought against the invading French forces, but after the Battle of Crête-à-Pierrot, Dessalines defected from his long-time ally Louverture and joined Napoleon's forces.

Eventually, a ceasefire was enacted between Louverture and the French expeditionary forces. During this ceasefire, Louverture was captured & arrested. Jean-Jacques Dessalines was at least partially responsible for Louverture's arrest, as asserted by several authors, including Louverture's son, Isaac. On 22 May 1802, after Dessalines learned that Louverture had failed to instruct a local rebel leader to lay down his arms per the recent ceasefire agreement, he immediately wrote to Leclerc to denounce Louverture's conduct as "extraordinary".

Leclerc originally asked Dessalines to arrest Louverture, but he declined. Jean Baptiste Brunet was ordered to do so, and he deported Louverture and his aides to France, claiming that he suspected the former leader of plotting an uprising. Louverture warned, "In overthrowing me you have cut down in Saint Domingue only the trunk of the tree of liberty; it will spring up again from the roots, for they are numerous and they are deep."

When it became clear that the French intended to re-establish slavery on Saint-Domingue, as they already had on Guadeloupe, Dessalines switched sides again in October 1802, to oppose the French. By November 1802, Dessalines had become the leader of the slave rebellion. Leclerc died of yellow fever, which also killed many French troops.

Dessaline's forces achieved a series of victories against the French. On 4 December 1803, the French expeditionary army of Napoleon Bonaparte surrendered its last remaining territory to Dessalines's forces. This officially ended the only slave rebellion in world history which successfully resulted in establishing an independent nation.

On 1 January 1804, from the city of Gonaïves, Dessalines officially declared the former colony's independence and renamed it "Haiti" after the indigenous Taíno name. He had served as Governor-General of Saint-Domingue since 30 November 1803. After the declaration of independence, Dessalines named himself Governor-General-for-life of Haiti and served in that role until 22 September 1804, when he was proclaimed Emperor of Haiti by the Generals of the Haitian Revolution Army.

Dessalines was crowned Emperor Jacques I of Haiti on 6 October in the city of Le Cap. On 20 May 1805, his government released the Imperial Constitution, naming Jean-Jacques Dessalines emperor for life with the right to name his successor. Dessalines declared Haiti to be an all-black nation and forbade whites from ever owning property or land there.

Genocide of the remaining whites in Saint-Domingue

Further information: 1804 Haiti Massacre

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The massacre of white Saint Dominicans in 1804

Between February and April 1804, Governor-General-for-life Jean-Jacques Dessalines ordered the genocide of all remaining whites in Haitian territory. He decreed that all those suspected of conspiring in the acts of the expeditionary army should be put to death. Dessalines gave the order to the cities of Haiti that all white people should be put to death. The weapons used should be silent weapons such as knives and bayonets rather than gunfire, so that the killing could be done more quietly, and avoid warning intended victims by the sound of gunfire and thereby giving them the opportunity to escape.

From early January 1804 until 22 April 1804, squads of soldiers moved from house to house throughout Haiti, torturing and killing entire families. Eyewitness accounts of the massacre describe imprisonment and killings even of whites who had been friendly and sympathetic to the Haitian Revolution.

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. When Dessalines arrived, he demanded that his orders about mass killings of the area's white population should be put into effect. Reportedly, he ordered the unwilling to take part in the killings, especially men of mixed race, so that the blame should not be placed solely on the black population. Mass killings took place on the streets and in places outside the cities.

In parallel to the killings, plundering and rape also occurred. Women and children were generally killed last. White women were "often raped or pushed into forced marriages under threat of death."

Dessalines did not specifically mention that the white women should be killed, and the soldiers were reportedly somewhat hesitant to do so. In the end, however, the women were also put to death, though normally at a later stage of the massacre than the adult males. The argument for killing the women was that whites would not truly be eradicated if the white women were spared to give birth to new Frenchmen.

Before his departure from a city, Dessalines would proclaim an amnesty for all the whites who had survived in hiding during the massacre. When these people left their hiding place however, they were murdered as well. Some whites were, however, hidden and smuggled out to sea by foreigners. However, there were notable exceptions to the ordered killings. A contingent of Polish defectors were given amnesty and granted Haitian citizenship for their renouncement of French allegiance and support of Haitian independence. Dessalines referred to the Poles as "the White Negroes of Europe", as an expression of his solidarity and gratitude.

Saint Dominicans after the Haitian Revolution

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Saint Dominican Creole Elisabeth Dieudonné Vincent with her granddaughter

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Saint Dominican Creole architecture in New Orleans, Louisiana

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Saint Dominican-American ornithologist John James Audubon, born Jean-Jacques Rabin Audubon

Saint Dominicans fled to many places in the United States, other Antilles islands, New York City, Cuba, France, Jamaica and especially New Orleans in Louisiana. More than half of all Saint Dominican refugees eventually settled in New Orleans.

Saint Dominicans established new sugar, coffee, and tobacco plantations in Cuba, jumpstarting the island's economy. More than 25,000 refugees settled the cities of Baracoa (Guantanamo Province) and Santiago de Cuba. Many of these Saint Dominicans were later expelled from Cuba to Louisiana.

Although Saint Dominicans brought slaves to Cuba, the scarcity of slaves made planters turn to Cuban and Saint Dominican peasants to supply manual labor; they complimented paid labor with slave labor. On many plantations, free people of color and whites toiled side-by-side with slaves. This multi-class state of affairs converted many minds to the abolition of slavery. High yields of the Saint Dominican refugees' plantations were partially obtained by better agricultural technology, but also by a more rational use of manual labor. The comparison of task completion rates between slave labor and paid labor proved that slave workers produced inferior quality work to paid employees. The maintenance of expensive slave labor then could only be justified by the social status that they conferred upon the proprietary planter.

In New York City, the famous French lawyer and gastronome Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin found Saint Dominican Creoles in Manhattan; he recounts an encounter with one such refugee:

"I sat next to a Creole one day at dinner, who had lived for two years in New York, and still did not know enough English to ask for bread. I expressed my astonishment at this; "Bah," he replied, "do you suppose I would ever trouble to learn the language of so dull a race?"

Jean Baptiste du Sable, believed to be a Saint Dominican Creole, founded Chicago.

In 1805, Republican Saint Dominican refugees such as Grandjean, a white Saint Dominican, attempted to incite a slave rebellion aimed at overthrowing the American government in Louisiana. The plan was foiled by New Orleanian Creoles of color who revealed the plot to American authorities. The Americans sentenced Grandjean and his accomplices to work on a slave chain-gang for the rest of their lives.

Anglo-Americans harbored much hostility towards the Saint Dominican refugees, as they would identify them with the history of their revolution. While Louisiana Creoles embraced the incoming population, Americans found white Saint Dominicans to be repulsive, as they would intermingle with people of color, frequenting taverns and drinking with Creoles of color and slaves.

There was chronic tension between the Louisiana Creoles and Anglo-Americans, and the reinforcement of the Creole culture by the refugees garnered a major negative reaction. The Americans had counted on their waves of immigration to replace the Creole population with an English-speaking majority. The hopes for rapid Americanization in Louisiana were dashed by the influx of refugees in 1809.

Culture

Language

Saint Dominican Creoles of all classes spoke Saint Dominican Creole French. There were different registers of Creole French, a lower and higher register depending on education & class. Lower class Saint Dominicans, i.e. slaves and peasants spoke in the lower register, and this evolved into today's Haitian Creole. The educated Saint Dominican middle class (the bourgeoisie) of the cities and the planter class spoke in the higher register. Creole French served as a Lingua franca throughout the Antilles islands.

L'Entrepreneur. Mo sorti apprend, Mouché, qué vou té éprouvé domage dan traversée.

Le Capitaine. Ça vrai.

L'Entr. Vou crére qué navire à vou gagné bisoin réparations?

Le C. Ly té carené anvant nou parti, mai coup z'ouragan là mété moué dan cas fair ly bay encor nion radoub.

L'Entr. Ly fair d'iau en pile?

Le C. Primié jours aprés z'orage, nou té fair trente-six pouces par vingt-quatre heurs; mai dan beau tem mo fair yo dégagé ça mo pu, et tancher miyor possible, nou fair à présent necqué treize pouces.

The Entrepreneur. I just learned, sir, that you garnered damages in your crossing.

The Captain. That's true.

The Entrepreneur. Do you believe that your ship needs repair?

The Captain. It careened before we left, but the blow from the hurricane put me in the position of getting it refitted again.

The Entrepreneur. Is it taking on a lot of water?

The Captain. The first days after the storm, we took on thirty six inches in twenty four hours; but in clear weather I made them take as much of it out as I could, and attached it the best we possibly could; we're presently taking on not even thirteen inches.