The Present State of Hayti (Saint Domingo) with Remarks on its Agriculture, Commerce, Laws, Religion, Finances, and Population

I see nothing through the whole career of the rebellion to induce me to alter my opinion of the cause whence all these lamentable effects sprung; and I must again repeat, that it was not misconduct on the part of the proprietors which excited the first revolt, and induced the slaves to take up arms against those from whom, in innumerable instances, they had experienced kindness and indulgence. It was natural to expect that in a colony, the operations in which are entirely performed by slaves, some cases of oppression would occur which would justly deserve reprobation; but the rebellion became general, although I am not aware that any successful attempt has been made to shew that the conduct of the planters towards their slaves was generally harsh and oppressive.

De Vastey, in his remarks, would wish it to be inferred that the brute creation received infinitely more kindness and indulgence from their master than was shewn towards the slave: but De Vastey being a negro, it is natural that he should exhibit the worst side of the picture, without noticing its better one. He adduces no instances of that oppression which he wishes to prevail upon mankind to believe to have been inflicted: we have nothing from him but allegations and assertions, without proof to support them. It is true, that he puts forward some statements of cruelties inflicted on his negro brethren, but those were subsequent, even by his own account, to the revolt and to the emancipation; but he has forgotten that the first atrocities, the first acts of cruelty and indiscriminate murder, were committed by his very brethren (for whom he claims the pity of mankind for their sufferings and for their unmerited bondage) on the plantation Noé, and others in the vicinity. De Vastey, it is plain, is no authority on which the charge of cruelty on the part of the planter before the rebellion can be supported.

With regard to the mulattoes, or free men of colour, who were doubtless the chief instigators of the rebellion and of the first revolt of the slaves, although they cannot escape the condemnation justly due to them for their perfidy, yet the extreme disabilities under which they laboured in some measure might be adduced in mitigation of the censure which their faithless conduct so truly deserved. If they had not commenced the work of revolt, but had remained quiet observers of the proceedings of the national and colonial assemblies, and delayed their operations until the result of the deliberations and arrangements of those bodies had been promulgated, they would have called forth spontaneous expressions of approbation from all classes of people: but the eagerness which they manifested for civil feuds and for a preponderancy of power in the colony, without any conditions and without the least possible reservation, has called down upon them, and I think justly too, very severe reprobation. It has been observed, that this class of people were, from their education and from their general demeanour, as eligible members of society as the whites, and as such ought to have been admitted into all its rights and advantages. This, I believe, no one undertakes to deny; but it is no more than fair and equitable towards the white population to observe, that prior to every concession being made to them, something like a line of demarcation should have been drawn as to the limits to which those concessions should be carried, otherwise from their number and power the mulattoes might have obtained an overwhelming preponderancy in the colony, rendering the white colonists mere cyphers.

The decrees against the people of colour, as they appear on the records of the colony, are extremely harsh and impolitic, and a relaxation, if not a repeal of them, would have been only an act of justice. The government held them in no repute, but considered them as it were national property, and gave the public a right in them. They were subjected by the governors, when they had arrived at a particular age, to a military servitude of the most degrading kind, and for a time to labour on the public roads, the severity of which was almost too great to be borne. They were not permitted to hold any office of power or trust in the state, nor could they even follow the humble calling of a schoolmaster. The least possible taint in the blood excluded them, and the distinction of colour had no termination. Not so in the British colonies, where it is lost in the third generation. It is said also, that “the courts of criminal jurisdiction adopting the popular prejudices against them gave effect and permanency to the system. A man of colour, being a prosecutor, must have made out a strong case indeed, if at any time he obtained the conviction of a white person. On the other hand, the whites never failed to procure prompt and speedy justice against mulattoes. To mark more strongly the distinction between the two classes, the law declared that if a free man of colour presumed to strike a white person, of whatever condition, his right hand should be cut off; while a white man for a similar assault on a free mulatto was dismissed on the payment of an insignificant fine.”3

It is, I conceive, impossible for any one to be informed of the existence of such a system without exclaiming, that whatever might have been the proceedings of the people of colour in the work of rebellion, their grievances offered considerable extenuation of their conduct. This presents the most disgraceful and indefensible page in the colonial records of criminal jurisprudence. True it is that its severity, that its flagrant injustice, precluded the possibility of putting it in force; the abhorrence which it so generally excited among all orders of people, made it a dead letter; but it was notwithstanding a law in force, and might have been acted upon by an arbitrary and unmerciful judge.

The only circumstance that contributed towards affording the coloured people some degree of security and protection under their disabilities was the power which they indirectly derived from the possession of property in the colony. They consequently had influence, because under a corrupt government money bought it, and many were the venal officers of the state who had stooped to be their pensioners. Many of these mulattoes held large estates, and possessed besides extensive available funds; these men in most cases evaded those exclusions from society, to which their brethren of less influence were obliged to submit. They were secure enough both in their persons and property, whilst the less wealthy among their coloured brethren had to submit to every species of insecurity and mortification.

I have now said as much as may be deemed necessary on the subject of the situation of the coloured people at the time of the first disturbances in St. Domingo, and I trust I have made it appear conclusive, that the cause of those disturbances did not proceed from the oppression and the tyranny practised over the slaves, but from the measures of the national assembly, the colonial assemblies, aided by that specious and intriguing body, the society of Amis des Noirs, and the coloured people then residing in France, who had been tainted with the pernicious doctrines then prevailing in that country.

CHAPTER IV

Effects of emancipating the slaves. – Arrival of the British forces. – Their subsequent operations. – Evacuation by General Maitland. – M. Charmilly negotiates with the English. – Views of the English cabinet. – Parties in the contest. – And insincerity of the French planters

Having, in the last chapter, arrived at the period when Santhonax and Polverel conferred freedom upon the slave population, and at the time also when the planters of the colony had solicited the aid of the British government to their cause, I shall now proceed in my detail of the effects produced by the former, and, in as succinct a manner as possible, notice a few of the operations of the latter, as well as the consequences arising from them.

No sooner had the abolition of slavery been promulgated, than it spread through the whole colony with remarkable rapidity, and the work of insubordination and destruction commenced. In the different parishes the slaves rose simultaneously, formed into bodies, took possession of the mountains, and secured themselves within those fastnesses which everywhere abound through the island. They then sallied forth into the plains, spreading devastation around them, setting fire to the cane fields, and demolishing every description of habitation within their range, murdering the unoffending white inhabitants wherever they met with them. In one part of the colony the insurgents amounted to nearly one hundred thousand, without any leader who had the least possible command over them. In the north their force in the first instance only amounted from about twenty to twenty-five thousand, but they quickly increased to forty thousand of a most desperate and sanguinary character.

The British force under Colonel Whitelocke made its appearance before Jeremie on the 19th of September 1793; it consisted only of about eight hundred and seventy rank and file. As this place was to be given up to the British force by stipulation, the town was taken possession of the next day, and the inhabitants all took the oath of allegiance with much eagerness. Cape St. Nicolas next followed; but here the inhabitants displayed some hostility, and most of them joined the standard of republicanism, although they had before strenuously adhered to the royal cause, and kept the white flag always hoisted. Tiburon was next tried, but here, notwithstanding the strongest pledges of cooperation on the part of the planters, their infidelity was so manifest, and the force of the enemy had become so formidable, that the troops were obliged to retreat with some loss, and this object of the expedition therefore unfortunately failed. From fatigue and from sickness, from the exposure to which they had been subjected, both in the sun and the noxious dews of night, the troops became much dispirited and discouraged, and further operations were suspended until a force from England arrived of sufficient magnitude to prosecute further offensive measures. This did not take place until the February following, when a British squadron arrived with troops, which were immediately landed, with Major (now Sir Brent) Spencer at their head, who most gallantly attacked the enemy, drove them back with considerable loss, and thereby retrieved that which before ended in a failure. The whole bight of Leogane was now commanded by the British squadron, and a further force being expected from England, it was anticipated that Port au Prince would fall an easy conquest, from the supposition that the people were mostly in favour of their cause. A considerable time elapsed before the reinforcements from England made their appearance; in the interim, many skirmishes took place in the vicinity of Leogane, as well as at Tiburon, and in the neighbourhood of Cape Nicolas Mole; in some instances the British were successful, and in others the enemy obtained advantages.

About this period it was that Andrew Rigaud first made his appearance at the head of the revolted slaves: he was a man of colour, and had the command at Aux Cayes. With about two thousand of the rebels he marched from his station and besieged Tiburon; but the fort which was manned by some British soldiers, who defended it with their usual intrepidity, and who afterwards sallied forth, attacked the besiegers in the field, and put them to the rout with great slaughter.

During the interval occasioned by the non-arrival of the reinforcement from England, the planters who were, in the first instance, favourable to the cause of the British, began to shew some symptoms of displeasure; and the tardiness with which the operations were carried on, and the absence of that decision which the urgency of their situation required, induced many very powerful individuals to relinquish all further adherence to the party in which they had engaged, and to join the republican standard.

On the 19th of May the force which had been so long looked for arrived under the command of General Whyte, who, with Commodore Ford, proceeded at once to deliberate on the measures which it would be adviseable to adopt for the capture of Port au Prince. On the 30th the ships of war, consisting of four ships of the line, three or four frigates, and several smaller vessels, anchored off the city. The land forces amounted to only about fifteen hundred men capable of doing duty. The next morning a flag was sent to summon the city to surrender, to which no attention was paid, and it is even said that the letter was returned unopened. The commissioners, Santhonax and Polverel, were known to be in the city with a considerable force; and it was expected that a powerful stand would be made, for the preservation of this important place. Fort Bizotton, which is situate on an eminence to the southward of the city, commands the Leogane road and the southern entrance in the harbour. The land-side was attacked by a body of troops under the gallant Major Spencer, whilst a simultaneous attack was made on the sea-side by two of the ships of war. Captain Daniel of the forty-first regiment, with about seventy or eighty men, took advantage of a thunder storm which happened about eight o’clock, entered the breach which had been rendered practicable, and carried the fort at the point of the bayonet. The captain was severely wounded, and some of his men and officers fell. The city soon surrendered, and the commissioners evacuated it on the fourth of June, the birth-day of the then sovereign of Great Britain, George the Third, when the British troops entered and took possession of it together with the shipping in the harbour. It was the intention of the republican commissioners to set fire to the city, but the prompt and decisive attack of the British gave them no time for carrying so destructive a design into effect.

This capture was of great consequence to the cause of the British as far as their proceedings had gone on; it gave confidence to the soldiers, and inspirited the colonial troops who had joined their standard; but it afterwards proved to be the grave of many a British officer and soldier: sickness began to rage amongst the troops to such an alarming extent, as is generally the case in the autumnal months, that it was found necessary, for the preservation of the post, to erect additional lines of defence, fearing that in their then condition the enemy might try to regain the position. To accomplish this, the troops were subjected to incessant toil, first in the sun, and then during the night exposed to all the pernicious vapours arising from heavy rains which fall during the rainy seasons. In point of booty the capture of Port au Prince was a very fine acquisition, although the commissioners carried off with them every thing valuable which it contained, consisting of upwards of two hundred mule loads. They were accompanied also by upwards of two thousand of the inhabitants, who followed in their career. Finding however that they had lost all their influence in the colony, and that Rigaud and Toussaint L’Ouverture had obtained possession of the whole, they thought it expedient to leave the island, and return to France, where they received the congratulations of the government, whose representatives they had been appointed to carry into operation the most injudicious decrees that could possibly have been framed for the internal government of any colonial appendage.

The value of the captured property has been variously estimated: a writer of some authority says, that “In the harbour were found two and twenty top-sail vessels, fully laden with sugar, indigo, and coffee, of which thirteen were from three to five hundred tons burthen, and the remaining nine from one hundred and fifty to three hundred tons, besides seven thousand tons of shipping in ballast; the value of all which at a moderate computation could not be far short of four hundred thousand pounds sterling. One hundred and thirty-one pieces of cannon regularly mounted in batteries were on the lines.”

After the reduction of Port au Prince, a further reinforcement arrived under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Lennox, consisting of about six hundred men, but on their passage from the windward islands to Jamaica, to which latter place they first sailed, sickness broke out amongst them, by which more than one hundred died on board, and a hundred and fifty were left at Port Royal in the last stage of disease. It is impossible to describe the mortality that prevailed amongst the troops in St. Domingo. When active operations were likely to be attended with a beneficial result, the commander-in-chief was prevented from taking advantage of the positions which he held, by the epidemic which at the time so lamentably raged. There could not be produced eight hundred British soldiers in a condition for the field, and many of them had only a short time previously been discharged from the hospitals; of course they were not equal to the fatigue of active service, nor were they in the least fit for a duty which rendered it necessary to expose them to the pernicious humidity of the night air. The commander-in-chief, General Whyte, was seized with this malignant fever; and his health was so much impaired by the effects of disease, and anxiety for the fate of his officers and men, who were daily dying around him, that he was compelled to leave the island and return to England, when the command devolved on Brigadier-General Horneck.

From the departure of General Whyte in September 1794, until the arrival of General Williamson in the month of May following, nothing of any material consequence ensued, except some skirmishes between the posts of the British and revolters, attended with no decisive result on either side. During this short period of inactivity on the part of the British, Rigaud, collecting a strong force, advanced towards Leogane, which at that time was defended by some colonial troops, and succeeding in his attack upon the place, he inhumanly murdered the French planters who fell into his power, and afterwards advanced upon Port au Prince; but in his attempt upon Fort Bizotton which commanded his advance, he failed, having been repulsed by the garrison, with great slaughter, whence he retreated, for the purpose of making another effort for the recovery of Tiburon. He left Aux Cayes with a force of three thousand men with four small armed vessels, and on the 25th of December they commenced the attack on the place. The fort, which consisted of only about four hundred and fifty men, defended it with great bravery; and after the loss of two-thirds of their number, the remainder sallied forth, cut their way through the revolters, and reached Irois in safety.

In the vicinity of St. Marc, Colonel Brisbane, who commanded there, had much to do in keeping the insurgents in check, who had at this time become exceedingly bold in their movements, and seemed determined on the most vigorous operations, both offensive and defensive. The colonel with a few British and some colonial troops, obtained advantages over them in several skirmishes in the plains of the Artibanite; but whilst he was engaged there the mulatto inhabitants of St. Marc, who had pledged themselves most solemnly to observe the strictest neutrality, violated their pledge, and in the most cowardly manner put to death all whom they found actively engaged against the French republic. The garrison defended themselves in the fort, from whence they were relieved in a short time by a vessel of war from Cape Nicolas Mole. The white inhabitants also of St. Marc, many of whom were the most forward to hail the arrival of the British and to place themselves under British protection, engaged in a plot for the destruction of Colonel Brisbane, but that officer, ever on the alert, discovered and successfully defeated their designs.

At Port au Prince a similar conspiracy was brought to light, the object of which was the destruction of the garrison and all the English people by those very French inhabitants who joined in hailing with acclamations the arrival of the British force before the city. Such abominable treachery did not go without its commensurate punishment; the conspirators were seized, and about twenty of the principal ones, amongst whom were several French officers of rank, were condemned by the sentence of a court-martial. Of these conspirators fifteen were shot on the 18th of February, 1795, and the remainder were sent off the island.

General Williamson, who had been previously appointed commander-in-chief in the West Indies, arrived in the island in May, and immediately proceeded to place every station in the best state of defence that his very limited means would allow. He endeavoured to strengthen the whole line of posts from St. Marc to Jeremie, and not having a force sufficient to enable him to secure all points by a strong cordon of British and colonial troops, he resorted to a measure which, although at the moment it might have been one of expediency, was not likely to be advantageous in the end. To augment his force he formed several corps of negroes, whom he purchased of the French planters, and placed them under the command of officers of the line; but their inefficiency was soon discovered, and they became not only a very unserviceable, but also a very ungovernable body. General Williamson retained the command but a very short time; his successor, General Forbes, completed the arrangements of his predecessor, and remained entirely on the defensive.

In the autumn of this year, 1795, intelligence had been received that the war between France and Spain had terminated, and that the Spanish part of the island had been ceded to the French republic in perpetuity. It was stipulated, however, that so many of the inhabitants as should feel disposed to depart from the island to reside in the dominions of the King of Spain, should be permitted to remove or dispose of their property, and that the space of one year should be granted to them for that purpose.

About the end of this year the termination of the operations in Flanders having placed troops at the disposal of the British government, Brigadier-General Howe arrived with about seven thousand men at Cape Nicolas Mole. From the extent of this force a great deal might have been accomplished had they arrived at an earlier stage of the proceedings in the island, but the subjugation of the colony had now become extremely difficult, if not altogether impracticable. They attempted but little, and becoming languid and spiritless from sickness and disease, whilst the enemy were increasing in numbers, as well as in vigour and activity, the little that was undertaken proved unsuccessful.

It was not until the month of March, 1797, that any active operations were recommenced; when General Simcoe landed to take the command, an officer who had been selected by his government for the important trust, from his known talents and tried experience. He began his arduous undertaking by examining the whole line of defence, and lost no time in making every judicious arrangement for resuming offensive operations. It was also about the same time that the negro Toussaint L’Ouverture appeared invested by the republican government of France with the high rank of General-in-Chief of the Armies of St. Domingo. To this very extraordinary personage the British general was destined first to be opposed; and from the system of insurrectional warfare which had been pursued, the general found he had to combat with an antagonist of no ordinary capacity and courage. Wary and exceedingly cautious, well acquainted with the strength of the British force and the experience of their commanders, Toussaint made no effort beyond that of menacing the position of Mirebalais, before which he appeared with an almost overwhelming force. The British force at that point not being sufficient to oppose his progress, retired thence through the plains of Cul de Sac into Port au Prince, abandoning the whole of the country through which they retreated, and from which, from its fertility, the enemy were enabled to obtain abundance of provisions. By this movement also all communication with the Spanish part of the island was cut off.

To the southward, however, the operations were more favourable to the British. The negroes were driven from every post which they had occupied in the neighbourhood of Port au Prince, and Rigaud at the head of his mulatto force was defeated at Irois. Nearly at the same time Toussaint attacked St. Marc’s, but was obliged to retire with considerable loss, leaving a great many of his followers prisoners.