The Impact of the Haitian Revolution on 18th Century Philadelphia
Keysiah M. Middleton
John Bartram High School
Overview
Rationale
 Who’s Who in Saint Domingue
 The Small revolutions that Led to the Big Revolution
 So, What Was the Impact on Philadelphia?
Objectives
Strategies
Lesson Plans
Annotated Bibliography
Appendix
Content Standards
Overview
The civil war conflict on the island of Saint-Domingue1, although sometimes oversimplified as
just a slave uprising, is a very complex narrative. Beyond the slave revolt and the overthrow of
the French slave, merchant, and colonial economies, the details become rather difficult to
unpack. This may possibly explain why Western historiography has chosen to limit and, in some
cases, completely eliminate this epochal event from many student textbooks and film.2 Several
components make up the entire story of what actually occurred in Saint-Domingue. However,
my design here is to examine how the conflict in Saint-Domingue resulted in major economic,
political and social implications for 18th century Philadelphia and to provide students with
additional details of this historic revolution. In The Haitan Revolution: A Documentary History,
David Geggus asserts that “the key to understanding the Haitian Revolution’s complicated
narrative is to think of it as the pursuit of three political goals (freedom, equality, independence),
by three social groups (slaves, free coloreds, whites), in a colony whose North, West, and South
provinces produced three regional variants of the revolution.”3 Each of the three groups had their
own ulterior motives for their participation in the revolution, although ambiguous at the onset,
but nonetheless important, that by “August 1791 [they] had collectively rejected and dismantled
1
In various pieces of historical literature, Saint-Domingue may also appear as Santo Domingo, San Domingo, St.
Domingo, San Domingue, Saint Domingue/Haiti or simply as Haiti. Today, Santo Domingo is a city in the
Dominican Republic, Haiti’s eastern neighbor on the island.
2
Reinhardt, Thomas, “200 Years of Forgetting: Hushing Up the Haitian Revolution,” Journal of Black Studies,
March 2005, Vol 35, No 4, pp. 250
3
Geggus, David, ed., 2014, The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History, Indianapolis, Hackett Publishing
Company, Inc., pp. xv
the system of chattel slavery that sustained the colony’s plantation economy”4 making it “the
most unequivocally democratic of the revolutions of that age of democratic revolutions.”5
During the 18th century, the island of Saint-Domingue and the city of Philadelphia became
interlinked economically, socially, politically, and culturally. As a vibrant port city, Philadelphia
became home to over 3,000 French Saint-Dominguan refugees along with their African slaves as
a result of the 1791 Saint-Domingue slave revolution.6 The 1791 revolt in Saint-Domingue
would later become known as the Haitian Revolution. Philadelphia’s rich history includes a brief
period in time during the colonial era where it served as a city of refuge for white SaintDominguans seeking asylum, a center of major debate over issues involving philanthropy to
these fleeing Frenchmen, the enslavement, gradual emancipation, and indentured servitude of the
accompanying “French negroes,” and most essentially, as a vital metropolis of trade that
connected American merchants to the Caribbean. These Saint-Dominguan refugees and their
African slaves brought with them to the city their language, religion, culture and politics. This
unit will discuss how their sudden presence influenced the city of Philadelphia. In order to
ascertain a full understanding of how the slave revolution of a Caribbean island impacted the
citizenry of an American city, the history of race and class in Saint-Domingue and the events
leading up the revolution that caused them to make haste, must be briefly examined. The history
of Saint-Domingue goes as far back as 1492 with Christopher Columbus’ arrival. Since a 500year plus Haitian history is too lengthy a subject to adequately cover in this brief discourse, the
unit will begin with the period when tensions among the varied and diverse populace on the
island began to signal fire, which is sometime during the 1760s.
Rationale
“This wave of emigration, propelled by the warfare and consequent upheaval in the West Indian
colony, resulted in the creation of a large francophone community in the City of Brotherly
Love.”7 The fleeing French West Indians with their African slaves to Philadelphia can be
attributed partly to the class and racial diversity in Saint-Domingue which would be the very
thing that intensified the massive revolt on the island. Race and class in Saint-Domingue became
increasingly hostile and problematic as certain groups on the island grew more affluent and
appeared to have become more powerful than others. Race and class also carved the West Indian
islanders into the distinctive categories of grands blancs, petits blancs, gens de couleur libres
(affrachis) and the African slave populations. Distinguishing these groups can become quite
confusing, so we must begin by determining who was who in Saint-Domingue at the start of the
revolution. Scholars of the Haitian Revolution tend to categorize Saint-Domingue’s class and
race hierarchal stratification system differently.
4
Dun, Alexander, “Philadelphia Not Philanthropolis: The Limits of Pennsylvania Antislavery in the Era of the
Haitian Revolution,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, January 2011, Vol. 135, No. 1, pp. 73
5
Zuckerman, Michael, 1993, Almost Chosen: Oblique Biographies in the American Grain, Berkeley, University of
California Press, pp. 181 6
Nash, Gary B., 1988, “Reverberations of Haiti in the American North: Black Saint Dominguans in Philadelphia,”
Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies, Vol 65, Explorations in Early American Culture, pp. 4473.
7
Branson, Susan and Patrick, Leslie, “Estrangers in un Pays Estrange: Saint-Domingan Refugees of Color in
Philadelphia” in Geggus, Davis P., ed., 2001, The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World,
Columbia, University of South Carolina Press, pp. 193
Who’s Who in Saint Domingue
To gain an understanding of Saint-Domingue’s late seventeenth and early eighteenth century
racial and class system of distinction, I reviewed the work of three scholars of the Haitian
Revolution: C.L.R. James, Alfred N. Hunt, and Alex Dupuy. I saw that they each included the
grands blancs, petits blancs, affranchis, and the African slaves as Saint-Domingue’s essential
society. The first scholar, for example, C.L.R. James, in The Black Jacobins: Toussaint
L’Ouverture and the San Domingo Revolution, describes the Saint-Domingue population as
including the “big whites, small whites, free mulattoes and free blacks,” and, although not
specifically mentioned in this categorization, but is known to have made up the next group are
the African slaves. James explains the first group as the “big whites” which included the “great
merchants, maritime bourgeoisie, and the wealthy planters.” The plantation managers and
stewards of the absentee planters, along with the small lawyers, notaries, clerks, artisans, and
grocers, James places in the second group, the petits blancs. However, he mentions that “over
them both was the bureaucracy, composed almost entirely of Frenchmen from France, who
governed the island.”8 The bureaucracy made up the third group of the population. Imagining
myself as a resident of the island, members of the bureaucracy would fall into the grands blancs
category along with the maritime bourgeoisie, merchants, and wealthy planters. James points out
that a great majority of the grands blancs and members of the bureaucracy were the Frenchmen
that had been born in France. The “ultimate objective of French merchants, D’Auberteuil argued,
was to become rich as quickly as possible, and then to withdraw their wealth from circulation.”9
He goes on to reveal that the petits blancs population of the island was primarily island-born
Frenchmen or Creoles. James’ fourth and final group that he describes is the “free mulatto and
free black” population. James characterizes this group of wealthy free Africans and free mixedrace Saint-Dominguans as landowners and slaveholders. He says that this fragment of the SaintDominguan citizenry tended to be financially and intellectually stronger than the “small whites.”
A second scholar whose work, Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America: Slumbering Volcano
in the Caribbean, that helped me to better decipher Saint-Domingue’s varied population and how
this diversity of population, “in their practical effects, …..altered irrevocably the pattern of
American commerce and the direction of American development,”10 was Alfred N. Hunt. Hunt
also discusses these four distinctive groups of the Saint-Dominguan population, only more
concisely. The first group, he explains were the grand blancs who were the “notable officials”
and the wealthy planters. In this case, the “notable officials” would also incorporate C.L.R.
James’ members of the bureaucracy, merchants, and the maritime bourgeoisie. Next, are the
overseers, artisans, and unskilled laborers that make up the petits blancs group. Here, Hunt
excludes the small lawyers, notaries, and clerks that James had previously included. The third
group that Hunt classifies is the free people of color or “the affranchis.” This group he assorts
into what James calls the “free black and free mulatto” community. Distinctions here also
become a bit perplexing because this group of free people of color were made up predominately
of a mixed-race population of people of African and French descent as well as a smaller number
8
James, C.L.R., 1963, The Black Jacobins: Toussaint L’Ouverture and the San Domingue Revolution, New York,
Vintage Books, pp. 34
9
Dupuy, Alex, “French Merchant Capital and Slavery in Saint-Domingue,” Latin American Perspectives, Summer
1985, Vol 12, No 3, pp. 77-102
10
Zuckerman, 1993, Almost Chosen People, pp. 176
of free people of color of pure African descent. Prior to the revolution, the affranchis, also
referred to as gens de couleur libres, despite having affluence, property, and slaves, were not
considered French citizens and had no political and legal rights or social standing in the colony.
“The French coloreds deeply resented the indignities and discriminations designed to reduce
them to an under-caste. And in actuality, it was this issue of rights and representation for free
coloreds that opened the way for slaves to free themselves.”11 After the start of the revolution,
they would be granted full citizenship and the rights of Frenchmen. The fourth and final group
that Hunt mentions is the African slave population that was obligated to both the grands blancs
and petits blancs as well as the free people of color.
Alex Dupuy was the third scholar who brought these varied classifications of race and class
into brighter perspective. In his essay, “Class, Race, and Nation: Unresolved Contradictions of
the Saint Domingue Revolution,” Dupuy also breaks down the Saint-Dominguan population’s
four groups, only he provides more extensive details. He places at the top of this race and class
hierarchy the white French absentee planters, merchant bourgeoisie, colonial administrators, and
Creole planters as the grands blancs or “large whites.” The Creole planters are the added group
to the grands blancs population. Hunt distinguished that “a Creole was a white Frenchmen born
in the Western Hemisphere” and that “the Creole was nevertheless regarded as slightly inferior to
the native-born Frenchman.”12 Instead of placing the petits blancs as the second group, Dupuy
places the affranchis and the free people of color directly beneath the grands blancs and labels
them the “middle class.” This categorization seems more accurate, in terms of class distinctions,
since this group although of mixed-race or black, was wealthier and more educated than their
rival petits blancs. Additionally, Dupuy includes the physicians, lawyers, retail merchants,
colonial military officers, administrators, shopkeepers, craftsmen, and artisans, all in this middle
class.
Dupuy’s third category is the petits blancs who he also identifies as “petty whites.” He
divides the petty whites into the middle class and the working class. He says that white skilled
and unskilled workers were comprised of the sailors, storekeepers, apprentice, coachmen, and
dockworkers to make up the middle and working class petits blancs community. This description
seems realistic, in that, it provides us with a more detailed breakdown of the class division
among the petty whites. This helps to not only explain the agitation within the Saint-Dominguan
community between the whites and the free people of color, but also the strife between the
grands blancs and the petits blancs. It also reminds us that the island’s class stratification system
included mixed-race people, blacks and whites in its middle class.
Dupuy’s fourth group also contains Saint-Domingue’s almost 500,000 African slave
population who, in essence, accumulated the wealth and created status for the grands blancs,
middle class people of color, and petits blancs as well as the Frenchmen and women of the
motherland. This would be the group that no one on the island paid much attention to and the
portion of the population that would be the least contentious, yet the most powerful during the
11
Davis, David Brion,“Impact of the French and Haitian Revolutions” in Geggus, Davis P., ed., 2001,The Impact of
the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World, Columbia, University of South Carolina Press, pp. 7
12
Hunt, Alfred N., 1988, Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America: Slumbering Volcano in the Caribbean, Baton
Rouge, Louisiana State University Press, pp. 11-12
revolution.13 “For decades in St. Domingue, in Louisiana, and other Caribbean colonies, French
and Spanish royal officials had nurtured the three-tiered societies of whites, free mulattoes, and
slaves, playing each group off the others as a strategy to strengthen their own imperial
authority.”14 It is important that students understand how residents of Saint-Domingue were
labelled because it will help them to better comprehend how this division of race and class
helped trigger revolution.
The Small revolutions that Led to the Big Revolution
There were many small revolutions that were occurring in Saint-Domingue that ultimately led
to the big revolution. These small revolutions did not just include the lesser rebellions that
literally occurred on the island, but the many discrepancies among the already divisive
population. One of the divisive issues and possibly the most important, that would help to spark
the fire on the island was the excessive envy the petty whites had for the free people of color,
who by the 1750s and 1760s had accumulated an enormous amount of wealth during the coffee
revolution when they “retreated into the interior and hilly areas of the colony where they were
able to acquire or take possession of unclaimed lands to cultivate coffee and other crops….. so,
that by 1791…..they owned up to one-third of the productive properties and one-fourth of the
slaves of the colony, thereby making them a significant bloc of property owners.”15 The poor
whites, already mistreated and disrespected by the rich whites, resented that the free people of
color were in a better economic situation than they were and did not want another class of people
over them.
Subsequently, “from 1791 through 1793 the Haitian Revolution had begun not as a slave
uprising but as a conflict between propertied slaveholding whites and propertied, slaveholding
mulattoes.”16 It was because their mixed-race rivals had been part black, were acquiring more
property, more education, were becoming wealthier and were consistently making demands for
equal rights that “by the late 176os, the affranchis were subject to discriminatory laws that not
only kept them out of the elite positions and professions but also excluded them from being
considered French citizens by white society.17” Some of this “malicious legislation” put into
place by the
whites, while adding increasingly to the number of mulattoes…..
excluded [them] from the naval and military departments, from
the practice of law, medicine, and divinity, and all public offices
or places of trust. No mulatto….whatever his number of white parts, was
not allowed to assume the name of his white father. Between 1758 and
the revolution the persecutions mounted. The mulattoes were forbidden
13
James, The Black Jacobins, pp. 33, 36, Hunt, Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America, pp. 13-14, and Dupuy,
Alex, “Class, Race, and the Nation: Unresolved Contradictions of the Saint-Domingue Revolution,” Journal of
Haitian Studies, Spring 2004, Vol 10, No 1, pp. 8-9
14
Dupuy, “Class, Race and Nation,” pp. 9
15
Ibid, pp. 9
16
Kukla, Jon, 2003, A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of America, New York,
Knopf
17
Hunt, Haiti’s Influence, pp. 14
to wear swords and sabres and European dress. They were forbidden to
buy ammunition. They were forbidden to meet together “on the pretext”
of weddings, feasts and dances. They were forbidden to stay in France.
They were forbidden to play European games. The priests were forbidden
to draw up any documents for them. In 1781…..they were forbidden to
take the titles of Monsieur or Madame. The only privilege the whites
allowed them was the privilege of lending white men money.18
The free mixed-race population had become a formidable force on the colony, hence much of the
contemptible legal measures put into place to subjugate them was largely the result of their
embodiment as “a class that applied pressure against white discrimination based on color instead
of legal and economic status”19 giving them the ability to send “representatives to Paris in 1780
to ensure that the “Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen” included them as well.”20
There were also several issues that separated the planters, merchants, and the metropolis. One
was the royal decrees that had been passed in the 1780s in France as measures to improve the
treatment of the African slaves. French administrators, for decades, had been aware of the
mistreatment of the slave population. Their mistreatment had been so horrendous that they were
unable to maintain the colony’s slave population through natural reproduction and had to be
taken regularly from Africa to continue this forced labor for Saint-Domingue’s plantation
economy.21 The decrees to be implemented would also provide reforms of the Code Noir
officially passed in 1685, although never complied to. Planters and merchants, alike, went into an
uproar. They felt disrespected since the French administrators had created legislation without
including the island’s white population. They now demanded to be self-governed. In fact, the
“petits blancs lobbied the National Assembly for a voice in colonial governance.”22
Aside from the class division within the Saint-Dominguan community and royal decrees from
France, “another bone of contention between planters and French officials was the economic
policies of the royal government”23 which resulted in “the conflict between merchants and
planters over the prices paid for colonial goods, as well as the ability to buy cheap and sell
dear.”24 Dupuy asserts that the royal administrators and merchant bourgeoisie held a monopoly
on trade and commerce as far back as the late 17th century. This became a considerable problem
for the smaller planters because according to Mims, Dupuy explains that “after the dissolution of
the West Indies Company in 1674, the entire French commerce with the colonies was taken over
by private merchant companies, which now possessed the same trade and reexport privileges, tax
exemptions, and free duties on exports as the national monopolies,”25 all at the expense of the
planters.
18
James, The Black Jacobins, pp. 37-41
Hunt, Haiti’s Influence, pp. 13 20
White, Ashli, 2010, Encountering Revolution: Haiti and the Making of the Early Republic, Baltimore, The John
Hopkins University Press, pp. 4
21
Reinhardt, “200 Years of Forgetting,” pp.253
22
White, Encountering Revolution, pp. 4
23
Dubois, Laurent, 2004, Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution, Cambridge, The
Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, pp. 31
24
Dupuy, French Merchant Capital, pp. 86
25
Ibid, pp. 85-86
19
The royal government and merchant bourgeoisie’s monopoly or the exclusif, as they were
more commonly known, was implemented with the hopes that “French ships would buy slaves in
French ports in Africa, bring them to French colonies in the Caribbean, and bring back plantation
commodities to Europe to be sold by French merchants.”26 This ideology, that totally
disenfranchised Africa and Africans as well as the small planters, could have been successful had
all parties involved shared in the financial benefits. In actuality, the French ships were not able to
deliver significant amounts of goods or Africans, merchants paid less than demanded for colonial
products, and trade was prohibited, due to the exclusif, with neighboring colonies, for instance,
Jamaica and Cuba. This infuriated local planters of Saint-Domingue because they were not able
to make an adequate profit and as “individual merchants sought state protection from foreign
competition and state regulations for favorable terms of trade, they also demanded the freedom
to engage in trade.”27 Dupuy also states that Pares indicated that the “colonial settlers and
planters also complained bitterly against the national monopolies, and rose again and again with
the cry of “no companies.”28 French merchants simply had too much power over the planters.
Consequently, “the financial control that the merchant bourgeoisie exercised over the colonial
planters enabled the merchants to dominate the colonial market and directly influence the
productive activities of the planters.”29 This would serve as the other basis that invariably caused
acrimonious disputes between the two groups leading up to the revolution.
Race and class separations, the free people of color persistently demanding equal rights and
justice, and the unfair trading practices on behalf of the French merchants resulted in a series of
world changing events. These would include, first, Jacques Pierre-Brissot and other Girondists
forming the Societie des Amis des Noirs in 1788 and their applying pressure to the French
government to abolish slavery. Secondly, The Declaration of the Rights of Man are laid out in
1789. Thirdly, the 1789 outbreak of the French Revolution. “For two years the enslaved mainly
kept a low profile. They watched as tensions mounted between whites and free coloreds, and
they saw the divisions within the white population grow deeply as the French Revolution became
more radical.”30 This would be thing that the slave population would capitalize on when they
began organizing en masse for their revolution.
These three episodes established the foundation for the aftermath that would follow. “In
August 1791, slaves on the sugar plantations in the north of the colony launched the largest slave
revolt in history.”31 “The French Assembly had granted political rights to the free people of color
in 1792.”32 This concession made by the Girondists was “in response to the emergency created
by slave revolt and the doubtful loyalty of many colonial whites.”33 To solidify positions and
26
Dubois, Avengers, pp. 32 Dupuy, French Merchant Capital, pp. 85 28
Ibid, pp. 85
29
Ibid, pp. 88
30
Geggus, David, 2014, The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History, edited and translated, Indianapolis,
Hackett Publishing Company, Inc., pp. xix
31
Dubois, Laurent, 2012, Haiti: The Aftershocks of History, New York, Picador, pp. 5 32
Popkin, Jeremy D., 2010, You Are All Free: The Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of Slavery, Cambridge,
Cambridge University Press, pp. 13
33
Blackburn, Robin, “Haiti, Slavery, and the Age of Revolution,” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series,
October 2006, Vol 63, No 4, pp. 656
27
gain support, revolutionary commissioners Sonthonax and Polverel, along with the black general,
Toussaint Louverture, issued emancipation decrees in August 1793 granting freed slaves full
citizenship. However, the National Convention in Paris issued the decree of 16 Pluvose An II
(February 4, 1794) which essentially abolished slavery in France and in its French colonies.34
So, What Was the Impact on Philadelphia?
Many white French Saint-Dominguan refugees came to the city of Philadelphia to escape the
civil war in their French colony of Saint Domingue. However, it seems odd that so many of the
slaveholding colonists would choose Philadelphia as a city of refuge. After all, 18th century
Philadelphia in 1791 “was a free city in a free state and the center of an anti-slavery
movement”35 and “the site of the national capital, as well as the cultural and economic center of
the United States.”36 Many left their homes abruptly and with very little of their possessions.
Some left the colony in response to aid offered from nearby. For instance, “after hearing about
the destruction of Cap Francais in the summer of 1793, Philadelphia merchant Stephen Girard
wrote to associates in Le Cap, offering them passage to the United States.”37 This offer most
likely was the result of Stephen Girard, a transplanted Frenchman, who had once lived in Saint
Domingue, serving as Philadelphia’s most important connection to the sugar- and coffee-rich
French colony (Nash, 1998:46).
With the assistance of passage and the charitable benevolence of the Philadelphia community,
white French Saint-Dominguans came to enjoy their stay in Philadelphia, some as a consequence
of the French Revolution. By 1792, there had already been about 600 emigres to reach the ports
of Philadelphia. However, the mass exodus of French West Indians and their African slaves
arriving in Philadelphia, occurred in the summer of 1793 when the crisis of June 20, 1793
erupted in Cap Francais (Nash, 1998:45). Many would seek asylum in Philadelphia because they
knew of an existing French population of fellow Frenchmen who already resided in the city. John
Davies discusses the findings of Frances Sergeant Childs where she reveals that
many white refugees settled with other French-speaking exiles along
Second, Third, and Fourth streets, from Front Street out to Eighth Street.
They often lodged in boarding houses, which placed them in close
proximity to the French consulate and Roman Catholic churches, such as
St. Joseph’s, on Willings Alley just off Fourth Street, and St. Mary’s, at
Fourth between Locust and Spruce.38
Upon their arrival, the French refugees met established French societies that would be of
economic, social, and political significance to their well-being and quality of life in the city that
had been formed by fellow Saint Dominguans. Some of these organizations would include the
Societe Francaise de Bienfaisance de Philadelphie, the Societe de la Liberte et de l’Egalite, the
34
Popkin, You Are All Free, pp. 16-17 and Blackburn, Haiti, pp. 646
Lundy, Garvey F., “Early Saint Domingan Migration to America and the Attraction of Philadelphia,” Journal of
Haitian Studies, Spring 2006, Vol 12, No 1, pp. 76
36
Ibid, pp. 80
37
White, Encountering Revolution, pp. 87
38
Davies, John, “Saint-Dominguan Refugees of African Descent and the Forging of Ethnic Identity in Early
National Philadelphia,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, April 2010, Vol 134, No 2, pp. 115
35
Societe des Grivois and LaParfaite-Unis to name a few (Lundy, 2006:84). These organizations
were created for the sole purposes of providing financial and legal aid to as well as establishing a
French social community for white Saint Domiguan refugees in Philadelphia. In addition to their
institutions was their bilingual French-American Philadelphia newspaper, L’Etoile Americaine.
This paper not only carried French news, but also advertisements of runaway French slaves
(Nash, 1998: 57).
The largest impact would come in the form of the dialogue that emerged over the status of the
enslaved Africans that accompanied the white French refugees. Despite the National Convention
in Paris abolishing slavery in its French colonies in February 1794, French colonists felt they
were not obligated to comply with French law. Although, Pennsylvania had passed the Act for
the Gradual Abolition of Slavery in 1780, these French refugees continued to argue that they
were exempt from the French decrees that had freed all French slaves because they were
refugees in a neutral country and to make their point clear, they had petitioned the Pennsylvania
legislature for relief from the law (Nash, 1998: 54). The French refugees, in essence, sought to
maintain slavery in Philadelphia. To counterattack their claim was the Pennsylvania Abolitionist
Society (PAS) who would also pay close attention to the activities of white Saint Dominguans.
At any rate, they found a legal loophole that allowed them to circumvent the law and keep their
African slaves.
Although legally released from slavery after six months from when
an owner establishes residence, the law also allowed slaveholders to
immediately sign their former enslaved blacks to lengthy periods of
indenture. In this manner, French colonists could retain the labor of
their human property until they were 28 years old or, if they were
older than 21, for seven years.39
The white French refugees knew their way around Pennsylvania law and they knew that the “free
city” of Philadelphia, in a very real sense, was not truly free for people of African descent. In this
way, there presence negatively impacted Pennsylvania political and legal affairs regarding
slavery, emancipation and indentured servitude. Therefore, the decision of some to come to the
thriving port city of Philadelphia as opposed to other port cities along the coast was probably not
a consideration.
There would also be a financial impact to the founding trustees of the African Church of
Philadelphia with regard to the sudden presence of the white Saint Dominguan refugees now
residing in Philadelphia. For two years Absalom Jones, Richard Allen and other leaders of the
black church had solicited small donations for the building of their church. The African Church
of Philadelphia was to be the first free black church in the United States. However, along with
the arrival of the Saint Dominguan refugees went the hopes of receiving those promised
donations to help with the construction of this first free black church. The wealthy donors had
shifted their attention and financial support to aid, instead, the fleeing French West Indian
slaveholders, planters and merchants in their moments of distress. Within a matter of days, these
wealthy donors had raised $12,000 to assist the refugees, while church members had spent two
39
Nash, “Reverberations of Haiti in the American North: Black Saint Dominguans in Philadelphia,” Pennsylvania
History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies, Explorations in Early American Culture, 1998, Vol 65, pp. 85
years trying to raise $3,500. The arrival of the city’s new inhabitants must have struck a mighty
blow to the black religious community in their time of need.40
Another impact resulting from the Haitian Revolution was the effect it had on mercantile
trade which contributed heavily to the ideal of nation and empire building. Using reports and
accounts from 18th century Philadelphia print media, James Alexander Dun gives an elaborate
description of the trading practices between the merchants of Saint Domingue and Philadelphia
during the colonial island’s civil war period. It seems likely that the amount of trade would
decline drastically during the slave revolution and as “the events on Saint Domingue caused the
trade between Philadelphia and the island to ebb and flow during this period,”41 the opposite was
true for this American city which maintained a steady amount of trade from 1789 up until 1802
when it began to taper off. This trade timeline covers the entire revolutionary period.
“Philadelphia’s mercantile community saw the island as an economic opportunity. Hundreds of
voyages were made to the troubled colony, even after various outbreaks of violence there.”42
This may account for the fact that “in 1791, 440 self-described merchants appeared in
Philadelphia directories.”43 Philadelphia residents read on a daily basis about the unceasing
turmoil on the colony, yet “by 1790, some 500 hundred ships were employed in this trade”44 and
“voyages to Saint Domingue in this period were conducted by more than three hundred captains
who sailed either on behalf of their merchant employer or in their own interest.”45 Dun goes on
to explain that from 1789 to 1793, what is actually considered the height of the slave revolution,
18% to 25% of the arriving vessels to Philadelphia’s ports were from foreign ports and from
1789 to 1792, 7% to 15% of all the imports to Philadelphia arrived from Saint Domingue
establishing Philadelphia as a significant import/export customer for French merchants. The
imported amounts alone attest to Philadelphia’s level of mercantile trading importance.
Approximately 20,000 tons Saint Domingue plantation products arrived in Philadelphia from
October 1792 to September 1793, all while a massive slave revolution is ensuing and residents
are fleeing the island by thousands. Although, not specifically mentioned, it is highly likely that
those hundreds of captains on those many merchant vessels delivering exorbitant amounts of
plantations products to Philadelphia, were bringing in sugar since by the 1790s, Saint Domingue
supplied the United States with practically all the sugar and molasses it imported (Hickey, 1982:
363). There is a possibility that Philadelphia’s boom in trade with Saint Domingue could be the
result of what historians attribute to colonial America’s inability to develop trade with France
and Vice President John Adams’ financial and military support to Toussaint Louverture, since
trade fell off dramatically when Jefferson took office and implemented trade embargoes that
would last until 1810 on the island.
40
Nash, “Reverberations in Haiti,” pp. 44-45
Dun, James Alexander, “What Avenues of Commerce, Will You, Americans, Not Explore!”: Commercial
Philadelphia’s Vantage onto the Early Haitian Revolution,” The William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, The
Atlantic Economy in the Era of Revolution, July 2005, Vol 62, No 3, pp. 480
42
Ibid, pp. 476
43
White, Encountering Revolution, pp. 63
44
Hickey, Donald R., “America’s Response to the Slave Revolt in Haiti, 1791-1806”, Journal of the Early Republic,
Winter 1982, Vol 2, No 4, pp. 363
45
Dun, “What Avenues of Commerce,” pp. 479
41
Lastly, the most noticeable impact of the Haitian Revolution would be the actual presence of
the enslaved Africans who accompanied their white French slaveholders. As mentioned earlier,
their presence dredged up extensive discussion about them as slaves in the city of Philadelphia,
their emancipation and/or indentured servitude. From the 1790s through the Civil War, ideas
about rebellious “French negroes” shaped American arguments about slavery and abolition.”
And while this was taking place, nearly 800 black Saint Dominguans46 would try to eke out an
existence in this new and foreign land. Their presence caused many white Philadelphians to
associate them with the Jacobins and become fearful of rebellion that “concern grew as the
numbers of refugees swelled in 1793.”47 This fear became so great that by “1798 Governor
Mifflin of Pennsylvania, upon hearing that shiploads of Saint Dominguans had arrived in
Philadelphia’s harbor, issued a proclamation that prohibited “French negroes” from landing.”48
Many of the benevolent societies created were distinctively for white Saint Dominguans, “black
refugees were denied the relief supplied by both the French and the United States.”49 For this
reason, many were left to their devices, struggling to meet basic sustenance.
Gary Nash, discusses some of the immediate effects of the black Saint Dominguans to include
their adding to the African American population, their later impact on the economic life of the
city as successful entrepreneurs, and their diverse language patterns to the community. Although
many spoke French, they brought a plethora of African languages as many slaveholders
identified the African slaves as “Mina, Congo, Myaca, Nago, Ibo, Senegalais, Mozambique and
Gambary.”50 It was common to meet many trilingual black Saint Dominguans in Philadelphia.
The black Saint Dominguan community tended to have residents on Shippen Street (now
Bainbridge), Gaskill Street, Lombard Street, and on Fifth and Sixth Streets near St. Joseph’s as
well as on a number of alleys and smaller streets. In the mid-1820s, small clusters of black Saint
Dominguans could be found throughout the city, but with concentrations of black households in
Cedar, New Market, and Locusts wards, as well as Southwark (Davies, 2010: 117-118)
A few Saint Dominguan entrepreneurs found entry into Philadelphia’s black elite community.
These included members of the Augustin, Baptiste, and Dutrieuille families. Pierre Augustin was
a high profile caterer. The catering business he began in eighteenth century Philadelphia
continues to thrive today on 15th Street between Walnut & Locusts Streets run by Clara Augustin
and Tillie Baptiste. Eugene Baptiste, Sr. was a prominent cabinetmaker and ran a catering
business as well. Eugene Dutrieuille was a well-known shoemaker. Other Saint Dominguan
members of the Philadelphia elite and African American community would also include
members from the Duterte, Dupee, Appo and Depee families. Francis A. Duterte and John Dupee
were active members in Philadelphia’s African American social and political movements. John
Appo and Thomas Depee had become members of the African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas.
Thomas Deppe had served as a member and officer of Philadelphia’s African Lodge. (Davies,
2010: 114-115, 117-119) The Saint Domingue refugee free people of color established The
Citoyens de Couleur de Philadelphie as a political group that would engage in political activity
46
Nash, “Reverberations of Haiti,” pp. 47
White, Ashli, “The Politics of “French negroes” in the United States,” Slavery and Citizenship in the Age of the
Atlantic Revolutions, Historical Reflections/Reflexions Historiques, Spring 2003, Vol 29, No 1, pp. 108
48
Ibid, pp. 110
49
Lundy, “Early Saint Domingan Migration,” pp. 86
50
White, “The Politics of French negroes,” pp. 115
47
to address the national Assembly in France to plead their case for equal rights as citizens during
the eighteenth century. (Childs 1940: 142-146)
Black Saint Dominguans also impacted the Catholic Church in the city. Of the three 18th
century Philadelphia Catholic Churches, St. Mary’s Church, St. Joseph’s and Holy Trinity, “St.
Joseph’s and Holy Trinity…..became the religious and social gathering places of Saint
Domingue’s former slaves, and it appears that many of them married former island-mates.”51
While their presence invoke fear, legislative debate, and the creation of new proclamations, black
Saint Dominguans found their niche in the Philadelphia social, economic, political, and religious
communities by maintaining their cultural and traditional identity. This impact would have a
lasting effect on Philadelphia in the 21st century.
The Haitian Revolution is an amazing story of world history that all students need to be
exposed to. The Haitian Revolution tells the story of how ‘Saint Domingue became the first
major slave-owning society to abolish slavery and the first to outlaw racial discrimination. Haiti
was the first modern state in the tropics and the first after the United States to throw off
European rule.”52 This narrative reveals the accounts of a dejected and oppressed population that
would defeat not only the French, but also the Spanish and British armies using guerilla warfare
tactics to
challenge the premises of the colonial, slave, and white supremacy
systems, and declared that the ideas of liberty, equality, justice, and
self-determination championed by the two previous revolutions and
embodied in the philosophies of the Enlightenment belonged to all
of humanity and not only those privileged by the skin color or social
position.53
Objectives
The principle objective of “The Impact of the Haitian Revolution on 18th Century Philadelphia”
is to provide students with some background knowledge of the events that led to the Haitian
Revolution, in addition to how a relationship between the city of Philadelphia and the colony of
Saint Domingue developed as a result of the revolution that would last for 13 years, from 1791 to
1804. The unit is intended for high school students, but can be modified to meet the social
studies curriculum goals of middle school students. This unit can be taught in the American
History, World History, Global Studies, Pennsylvania History, and African American History
classrooms. If utilized in the English classroom, the novels All Souls Rising: A Novel of Haiti by
Madison Smartt Bell and Island Beneath the Sea: A Novel by Isabel Allende can be used as the
instructional text to teach the revolutionary period, specifically the Haitian Revolution. This unit
incorporates the Pennsylvania Common Core Standards for Reading and History. The unit will
focus on content comprehension, building background knowledge, and critical thinking skills.
This interdisciplinary unit can be used to discuss the events leading up the Haitian Revolution
51
Nash, “Reverberations of Haiti,” pp. 59 Geggus, The Haitian Revolution, pp. xi 53
Dupuy, “Class, Race, and Nation,” pp. 6
52
that include the many race, class, and social classifications that contributed to the many divisions
on the colony, the “small revolutions” in connection to the “big revolution,” and how the
revolution impacted 18th century Philadelphia and its residents. Additional areas that can be
explored include, 21st century race and class issues as they relate to events of today, the
economic, social, political, and cultural implications of the revolution on the United States as a
whole, a 3-ring Venn Diagram analysis of the American Revolution, the French Revolution, and
the Haitian Revolution, the use of agency in the black community in acquiring their freedom,
Haitian-American relations, then and now, the differences in presidential support or lack thereof
during the revolutionary cause, and an examination of Philadelphia’s Haitian community today.
An additional objective will be to have students examine the various maps of the island
during the 17th through the 21st centuries to enhance mapping skills and to analyze the three
locations where the revolution occurred, map out the major port locations, and to determine how
designated areas change over periods of time. Students will also analyze various tables and
graphs that explain merchant and vessel trading patterns. One of two essays containing charts
and graphs that students will look at in detail is Gary B. Nash’s “Reverberations of Haiti in the
American North: Black Saint Dominguans in Philadelphia,” because it provides two tables
created from his research that provides details of (1) the numbers of French West Indians that
arrived in Philadelphia between 1791 to 1794 and (2) the age and gender of the African slaves
manumitted upon arriving to Philadelphia between 1794 to 1804. This will not only give students
information to aid in their understanding of how many people actually fled from Saint Domingue
to Philadelphia, but will also serve as a template to assist students in analyzing and creating their
own information tables for their own real life events.
The second essay to be incorporated to meet the objectives of the unit is “What Avenues of
Commerce, Will You, Americans, Not Explore!”: Philadelphia’s Vantage onto the Early Haitian
Revolution” by James Alexander Dun. From his archival research, Dun also developed three
tables and one graph that provides explicit details of the (1) total entries of vessels into
Philadelphia ports from Saint Domingue from1789 to 1805, (2) total tonnage from Saint
Domingue entering Philadelphia from 1789-1792, (3) a graph illustrating the years in which
arrivals from Saint Domingue ports to Philadelphia ports peaked and receded from 1789 to 1805,
and (4) entries to Philadelphia ports from Saint Domingue ports by province with percentages of
total arrivals from 1789 to 1805. These primary sources can be analyzed and checked against one
another to compare and contrast the accuracy of trade from Saint Domingue to Philadelphia
during the revolutionary period. Students can then draw their own conclusion about international
trade during the 18th century as well as the relationship of United States and Haitian trade during
a major war.
A final objective will be to have students create a culminating exercise that incorporates a
chronological order time line. Because there are so many events and various players that make
up the Haitian Revolution, placing events in chronological order will help students prioritize the
accounts of the revolution and assist in knowledge retention.
Strategies
“The Impact of the Haitian Revolution on 18th Century Philadelphia” will incorporate the
Common Core Standards for both History and English. The new common core offers greater
teacher flexibility in the classroom allowing for more teacher creativity. A diverse level of
pedagogical techniques and educational stratagem will be utilized to achieve the abovereferenced aims. In addition to text, technology, the use of films, music and high interest active
engaging activities will be integrated into student lessons. The Seven Step Lesson Plan is used by
the School District of Philadelphia and will be implemented in this unit.
This teaching strategy involves an Objective, Do Now, Direct Instruction, Guided Practice,
Independent Practice, Closure, and Exit Ticket. Homework is assigned daily as an extension of
the current lesson taught. These seven steps plus the homework is posted daily and referred to
repeatedly during the class period to drill students for lesson knowledge and comprehension. The
Objective states what knowledge or skill the lesson would like the students to achieve. The Do
Now is a brief exercise that precedes the lesson. It should relate to the lesson or be a review of
the previous lesson taught. Direct Instruction is the teacher-centered activity of the lesson. It is
during this time that lesson content material is introduced. Guided Practice allows the lesson to
be modelled for the students.
Although, lesson modelling occurs here, the lesson should be modelled for students as many
times as needed. Independent Practice allows students to work independently as evidence that
they actually understand the lesson that has been taught. There should be no teacher involvement
during the independent practice component. This is the opportunity for teacher notes to be taken
to determine student comprehension, if the lesson needs to be re-taught and if new pedagogical
strategies and techniques need to be incorporated to re-introduce the lesson. Students should be
able to answer a relevant question to the lesson. Closure allows teachers to conduct a mini preassessment with brief wrap-up questions. This portion also allows teachers to determine if the
lesson should be re-introduced to students.
The final piece of the steps is the Exit Ticket. Students should be able to summarize of cite
verbatim the objective and provide a brief synopsis of the knowledge they have acquired during
the class. This is typically a written piece completed before five –ten minutes before the closure
of the lesson. Homework is given daily as an extension of the lesson to improve mastery of the
skill or topic taught. Graphic organizers will be used to help organize information from the less,
primary and secondary source images and documents will be used as visual tools to help make
real life connections as well as dialogue and discussion to improve speaking and listening skills.
Modifications and accommodations are made during the implementation of the lessons to
address the many student learning styles.
Lesson Plans
The following lessons are brief opening lessons to introduce a skill set. Each lesson or student
activity needs to be modified during implementation to meet the student’s learning style and
academic level.
Lesson 1:
Lesson 2:
Lesson 3:
SWBAT describe the essential population of Saint Domingue using a 4-Column
Chart Graphic Organizer.
Reading:
Teacher-Made Excerpts from Avengers of the New World:
The Story of the Haitian Revolution by Laurent Dubois
Vocabulary:
blancs, petits blancs, gens de couleur libres, affranchis,
bureaucracy, merchant, maritime bourgeoisie
Driving Questions:
Who are the grands blancs? Who are the petits blancs?
Who are the gens de couleur libres? Who are the
affranchis? Who was the bureaucracy? Who were the
maritime bourgeoisie? Why did Saint Domingue have
race/class classifications? How did this racial hierarchy
contribute to the civil war? Is use of the term “Mulatto”
politically correct to use in the 21st century? What else
would I like to know?
SWBAT describe the race, class, and social stratification system of Saint
Domingue and the role it played in helping to spark the Haitian Revolution using
a primary source document and a primary source document analysis worksheet.
Reading:
The Plantation Hierarchy, document 2 (pages 4-6) and
Racial Discrimination: Unofficial, document 7 (page 14)
from The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History
edited and translated by David Geggus.
Vocabulary:
hierarchy, viligance, egalitarian, estate-attorney,
perquisites, agriculturalist, quadroon, mulatto, debasement
Driving Questions:
What is the social hierarchy Charles Malenfant sketches
here? What are his discrepancies? How would the issues he
raises contribute the revolution? What else would I like to
know?
SWBAT describe the conflict between the petits blancs (petty whites) and the
gens de couleur (affranchis) and explain how this conflict was a component of the
revolution using a primary source document and a primary source document
analysis worksheet.
Lesson 4:
Lesson 5:
Reading:
Racial Discrimination: Official, document 6 (pages 12-13)
and Free Coloreds Petition the Assembly of the North, 10
November 1789, document 27 (pages 61-62) from The
Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History edited and
translated by David Geggus.
Vocabulary:
descendant, comparatively, liberal, commandant, indigent,
magistrate, constable, emigrate, judiciary, parish, Vizir
Driving Question:
What is happening to the free people of color? Who are the
Amis des Noirs? What argument is Gregoire, the liberal
French priest, placing before the national Assembly on
their behalf? What else would I like to know?
SWBAT explain the events of the Haitian Revolution using primary source
documents and document analysis.
Readings:
The Bois Caiman Ceremony, document 35 (pages 78-79),
Vodou and Petro, document 11 (pages 20-22), Vodou and
the Underworld, document 12 (pages 22-24) The Uprising
Begins, document 36 (pages 79-81)
Vocabulary:
West African blood-oath ceremony, talisman, uncultivated,
benevolent, secrecy, Vodou, invariably, sorcerer, calabash,
sanctum, neophyte, sacralize, envoy, miscreant,
intransigent
Driving Questions:
What role did vodou play in the revolution? What do you
believe the African slaves invoked vodou at the start of the
revolution? How did the revolt unfold on the night of
August 22, 1791? How would these events look in a
sequence of events? What else would I like to know?
SWBAT gather and analyze information to explain the number of Saint
Dominguan arrivals into the city using a table, chart or graph.
Primary Source:
Table 1: French West Indies Arrival in Philadelphia, 17911794 form “Reverberations of Haiti in the American North:
Black Saint Dominguans in Philadelphia” by Gary B. Nash
(page 50) and Table 2: Age and Gender of Manumitted
French Slaves, 1791-1804 (page 51)
Vocabulary:
extant, extrapolated, Creole, manumission, median,
paucity, composition
Driving Questions:
Lesson 6:
Between 1790 and 1794, which year had the highest
percentage of Saint Dominguan refugee arrivals? Which
year represents the least? What percentage were white?
What percentage was black? What is the average age of
males manumitted? And girls? What else would I like to
know?
SWBAT gather and analyze information to explain the number of merchant
vessels arriving from Saint Dominguan into Philadelphia ports using a table, chart
or graph.
Primary Source:
Table I: Total Entries to Philadelphia From Foreign and
Ports in Saint Domingue, 1789-1805 from“What Avenues
of Commerce, Will You, Americans, Not Explore!”:
Commercial Philadelphia’s Vantage onto the Early Haitian
Revolution” by James Alexander Dun (page 478)
Vocabulary:
merchant, vessel, tonnage
Driving Questions:
From 1789-1805, how many vessels arrived from foreign
ports? And how many, in all, from Saint Dominguan ports?
Which year represents the greatest amount of Saint
Dominguan vessel arrivals? And the least? What other
ways can this information be charted to reveal information?
What else would I like to know?
Lesson 7:
SWBAT describe how the first and second generations of black Saint
Dominguans that arrived impacted 18th century Philadelphia using Teacher-Made
reading excerpts and graphic orgnizers.
Lesson 8:
SWBAT conduct research to learn about the 21st century Haitian community in
Philadelphia using technology and other traditional information gathering
methods. SWBAT compare and contrast their 21st century findings using graphic
organizers, tables, charts, etc. with the 18th century information acquired.
Annotated Bibliography
Suggested Teacher Reading List
1. Allende, Isabel, 2009, Island Beneath the Sea: A Novel, New York, Harper Collins
Publishers
Opening in Saint Domingue a few years before the Haitian revolution would tear it apart,
the story has at its center Zarité, a mulatto whose extraordinary life takes her from that
blood-soaked island to dangerous and freewheeling New Orleans; from rural slave life to
urban Creole life and a different kind of cruelty and adventure. Yet even in the new city,
Zarité can't quite free herself from the island, and the people alive and dead that have
followed her. The story discusses voodoo, medicine, European and Caribbean history,
Napoleon, the Jamaican slave Boukman, and the legendary Mackandal, a runaway slave
and master of black magic. Allende barely skims the surface.
2. Clavin, Matthew J., 2010, Toussaint Louverture and the American Civil War: The
Promise and Peril of a Second Haitian Revolution, Pennsylvania, University of
Pennsylvania Press
At the end of the eighteenth century, a massive slave revolt rocked French Saint
Domingue, the most profitable European colony in the Americas. Under the leadership of
the charismatic former slave François Dominique Toussaint Louverture, a disciplined and
determined republican army, consisting almost entirely of rebel slaves, defeated all of its
rivals and restored peace to the embattled territory. The slave uprising that we now refer
to as the Haitian Revolution concluded on January 1, 1804, with the establishment of
Haiti, the first "black republic" in the Western Hemisphere.
3. Dubois, Laurent, 2004, Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution,
Cambridge, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Laurent Dubois weaves the stories of slaves, free people of African descent, wealthy
whites, and French administrators into an unforgettable tale of insurrection, war, heroism,
and victory. He establishes the Haitian Revolution as a foundational moment in the
history of democracy and human rights.
4. Dubois, Laurent, 2012, Haiti: The Aftershocks of History, New York, Picador
Even before the devastating 2010 earthquake, Haiti was known as a benighted place of
poverty and corruption, blamed by many for its own wretchedness. But as acclaimed
historian Laurent Dubois demonstrates, Haiti's troubled present can only be understood
by examining its complex past. The country's difficulties are inextricably rooted in its
founding revolution---the only successful slave revolt in the history of the world; the
hostility that this rebellion generated among the surrounding colonial powers; and the
intense struggle within Haiti itself to define its newfound freedom and realize its promise.
5. Dubois, Laurent and Garrigus, John D., 2006, Slave Revolution in the Caribbean, 17891804: A Brief History with Documents, Boston, Bedford/St. Martin’s
This volume details the first slave rebellion to have a successful outcome, leading to the
establishment of Haiti as a free black republic and paving the way for the emancipation
of slaves in the rest of the French Empire and the world. Incited by the French
Revolution, the enslaved inhabitants of the French Caribbean began a series of revolts,
and in 1791 plantation workers in Haiti, then known as Saint-Domingue, overwhelmed
their planter owners and began to take control of the island. They achieved emancipation
in 1794, and after successfully opposing Napoleonic forces eight years later, emerged as
part of an independent nation in 1804.
6. Egerton, Douglas R., 1993, Gabriel’s Rebellion: The Virginia Slave Conspiracies of
1800-1802, Chapel Hill, The University of North Carolina Press
Gabriel's Rebellion tells the dramatic story of what was perhaps the most extensive slave
conspiracy in the history of the American South. Douglas Egerton illuminates the
complex motivations that underlay two related Virginia slave revolts: the first, in 1800,
led by the slave known as Gabriel; and the second, called the 'Easter Plot,' instigated in
1802 by one of his followers. According to Egerton, the social, political, and economic
disorder of the Revolutionary era weakened some of the harsh controls that held slavery
in place during colonial times.
7. Geggus, David P., 2001, The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World,
Columbia, University of South Carolina Press
Fifteen international scholars, including eminent historians David Brion Davis, Seymour
Drescher, and Robin Blackburn, explicate such diverse ramifications as the spawning of
slave resistance and the stimulation of slavery's expansion, the opening of economic
frontiers, and the formation of black and white diasporas. They show how the Haitian
Revolution embittered contemporary debates about race and abolition and inspired
poetry, plays, and novels.
8. Geggus, David Patrick, 2002, Haitian Revolutionary Studies, Bloomington, Indiana
University Press
David Patrick Geggus sheds new light on this tremendous upheaval by marshaling an
unprecedented range of evidence drawn from archival research in six countries. Geggus’s
fine-grained essays explore central issues and little-studied aspects of the conflict,
including new historiography and sources, the origins of the black rebellion, and relations
between slaves and free people of color. The contributions of vodou and marronage to the
slave uprising, Toussaint Louverture and the abolition question, the policies of the major
powers toward the revolution, and its interaction with the early French Revolution are
also addressed.
9. Geggus, David P., 2014, The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History, Indianapolis,
Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
A landmark collection of documents by the field's leading scholar. This reader includes
beautifully written introductions and a fascinating array of never-before-published
primary documents. These treasures from the archives offer a new picture of colonial
Saint-Domingue and the Haitian Revolution.
10. Girard, Philippe, 2005, Haiti: The Tumultuous History-From Pearl of the Caribbean to
Broken Nation, New York, Palgrave Macmillan
Philippe Girard examines how colonialism and slavery have left a legacy of racial
tension, both within Haiti and internationally; Haitians remain deeply suspicious of white
foriegners' motives, many of whom doubt Hatians' ability to govern themselves. He also
examines how Haiti's current political instability is merely a continuation of political
strife that began during the War of Independence (1791-1804). Finally, Girard explores
poverty's devastating impact on contemporary Haiti.
11. Hunt, Alfred N., 1988, Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America: Slumbering Volcano in
the Caribbean, Baton Rouge, Louisiana State University Press
Alfred N. Hunt discusses the ways these Saint Dominguan immigrants affected southern
agriculture, architecture, language, politics, medicine, religion, and the arts. He also
considers how the events in Haiti influenced the American slavery-emancipation debate
and spurred developments in black militancy and Pan-Africanism in the United States.
By effecting the development of racial ideology in antebellum America, Hunt concludes,
the Haitian Revolution was a major contributing factor to the attitudes that led to the
Civil War.
12. James, C.L.R., 1963, The Black Jacobins: Toussaint Louverture and the San Domingo
Revolution, New York, Random House, Inc.
This powerful, intensely dramatic book is the definitive account of the Haitian
Revolution of 1791-1804. It is the story of the French colony of San Domingo, a place
where the brutality of master toward slave was commonplace and ingeniously refined.
And it is the story of a slave named Toussaint L'Ouverture, who led the black people of
San Domingo in a successful struggle against successive invasions by overwhelming
French, Spanish, and English forces and in the process helped form the first independent
nation in the Caribbean.
13. Kukla, Jon, 2003, A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of
America, New York, Knopf
Historian, Jon Kukla recounts the fascinating tale of the personal maneuverings, political
posturing, and international intrigue that culminated in the greatest land deal in history.
Spanning nearly two decades, Kukla’s book brings to life a pageant of characters from
Thomas Jefferson, James Monroe, and John Jay, to Napoleon and Carlos III of Spain and
other colorful figures. Employing letters, memoirs, contemporary documents, and a host
of other sources, Kukla creates a complete and compelling account of the Louisiana
Purchase.
14. Nesbitt, Nick, 2008, Toussaint L’ouverture: The Haitian Revolution, London, Verso
Books
In this collection of Toussaint L’Ouverture’s writings and speeches, former Haitian
politician Jean-Bertrand Aristide demonstrates L’Ouverture’s profound contribution to
the struggle for equality.
15. Popkin, Jeremy D., 2010, You Are All Free: The Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of
Slavery, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
You Are All Free provides the first complete account of the dramatic events that led to
these epochal decrees, and also to the destruction of Cap Francais, the richest city in the
French Caribbean, and to the first refugee crisis in the United States.
16. Smartt Bell, Madison, 2007, Toussaint Louverture: A Biography, New York, Pantheon
Books
Madison Smartt Bell combines a novelist’s passion with a deep knowledge of the
historical milieu that produced the man labeled a saint, a martyr, or a clever opportunist
who instigated one of the most violent events in modern history. The first biography in
English in over sixty years of the man who led the Haitian Revolution, this is an engaging
reexamination of the controversial, paradoxical leader.
17. Smartt Bell, Madison, 1995, All Souls’ Rising: A Novel of Haiti, New York, Vintage
Books
In this first installment of his epic Haitian trilogy, Madison Smartt Bell brings to life a
decisive moment in the history of race, class, and colonialism. The slave uprising in Haiti
was a momentous contribution to the tide of revolution that swept over the Western world
at the end of the 1700s. A brutal rebellion that strove to overturn a vicious system of
slavery, the uprising successfully transformed Haiti from a European colony to the
world’s first Black republic.
18. White, Ashli, 2010, Encountering Revolution: Haiti and the Making of the Early
Republic, Baltimore, The John Hopkins University Press
Encountering Revolution looks afresh at the profound impact of the Haitian Revolution
on the early United States. Historian Ashli White examines the ways Americans―black
and white, northern and southern, Federalist and Democratic Republican, pro- and
antislavery―pondered the implications of the Haitian Revolution.
19. Wood, Peter H., 1974, Black Majority: Negroes in Colonial South Carolina from 1670
Through the Stono Rebellion, New York, W.W. Norton & Company
20. Zuckerman, Michael, 1993, Almost Chosen People: Oblique Biographies in the American
Grain, Berkeley, University of California Press
Zuckerman’s essays in this collection range from early New England settlements to
modern Washington. Among his subjects are Puritans and Southern gentry, Benjamin
Franklin and Benjamin Spock, P. T. Barnum and Ronald Reagan. Collecting scammers
and scoundrels, racists and rebels, as well as the purest genius are also examined.
Suggested Student Reading List
1. Lake, Nick, 2012, In Darkness, New York, Bloomsbury Children’s Books
This is the story of "Shorty"-a 15-year-old boy trapped in a collapsed hospital during the
earthquake in Haiti. As he waits in darkness for a rescue that may never come, a mystical
bridge seems to emerge between him and Haitian leader Toussaint L'Ouverture, uniting
the two in their darkest suffering-and their hope. Yet in some strange way, the boy in the
ruins of Port au Prince and the man who led the struggle for Haiti's independence might
well be one and the same.
2. Bergeaud, Emeric, 1859, Stella: A Novel of the Haitian Revolution, New York, New
York University Press, edited and translated, 2015, Mucher, Christen, and Curtis, Leslie
Stella, first published in 1859, is an imaginative retelling of Haiti’s fight for
independence from slavery and French colonialism. Set during the years of the Haitian
Revolution (1791-1804), Stella tells the story of two brothers, Romulus and Remus, who
help transform their homeland from the French colony of Saint-Domingue to the
independent republic of Haiti. This new translation and critical edition of Émeric
Bergeaud’s allegorical novel. Considered the first novel written by a Haitian, Stella gives
a pro-Haitian version of the Haitian Revolution.
3. Smartt Bell, Madison, 1995, All Souls’ Rising: A Novel of Haiti, New York, Vintage
Books
In this first installment of his epic Haitian trilogy, Madison Smartt Bell brings to life a
decisive moment in the history of race, class, and colonialism. The slave uprising in Haiti
was a momentous contribution to the tide of revolution that swept over the Western world
at the end of the 1700s. A brutal rebellion that strove to overturn a vicious system of
slavery, the uprising successfully transformed Haiti from a European colony to the
world’s first Black republic.
4. Smartt Bell, Madison, 2000, Master of the Crossroads, New York, Vintage Books
Continuing his epic trilogy of the Haitian slave uprising, Madison Smartt Bell delivers a
stunning portrayal of Toussaint Louverture, former slave, military genius and liberator of
Haiti, and his struggle against the great European powers to free his people in the only
successful slave revolution in history. Toussaint is betrayed by his former allies and the
commanders of the Spanish army, he reunites his army with the French, wresting vital
territories and manpower from Spanish control. Toussaint eventually rises as the ultimate
victor as he wards off his enemies to take control of the French colony and establish a
new constitution.
5. Smartt Bell, Madison, 2004, The Stone that the Builder Refused, New York, Vintage
Books
The Stone that the Builder Refused is the final volume of Madison Smartt Bell’s
masterful trilogy about the Haitian Revolution–the first successful slave revolution in
history–which begins with All Souls' Rising and continues with Master of the
Crossroads. Each of these three novels can be read independently of the two others.
Works Cited/References
1. Blackburn, Robin, “Haiti, Slavery, and the Age of the Democratic Revolution,” The
William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, October 2006, Vol 63, No 4, pp. 643-674
2. Davies, John, “Saint-Dominguan Refugees of African Descent and the Forging of Ethnic
Identity in Early National Philadelphia,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and
Biography, April 2010, Vol 134, No 2, pp. 109-126
3. Dubois, Laurent, 2004, Avengers of the New World: The Story of the Haitian Revolution,
Cambridge, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
4. Dubois, Laurent and Garrigus, John D., 2006, Slave Revolution in the Caribbean, 17891804: A Brief History with Documents, Boston, Bedford/St. Martin’s
5. Dun, James Alexander, “What Avenues of Commerce, Will You, Americans, Not
Explore!”: Commercial Philadelphia’s Vantage onto the Early Haitian Revolution,” The
William and Mary Quarterly, Third Series, July 2005, Vol 62, No 3, pp. 473-504
6. Dun, James Alexander, “Philadelphia not Philanthropolis: The Limits of Pennsylvania
Anti-Slavery in the Era of the Haitian Revolution,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of
History and Biography, January 2011, Vol 135, No 1, pp. 73-102
7. Dupuy, Alex, “French Merchant Capital and Slavery in Saint-Domingue,” Latin
American Perspectives, Repression and Resistance, Summer 1985, Vol 12, No 3, pp. 77102
8. Dupuy, Alex, “Class, Race, and Nation: Unresolved Contradictions of the SaintDomingue Revolution,” Journal of Haitian Studies, Bicentennial Issue, Spring 2004, Vol
10, No 1, pp. 6-21
9. Gares, Albert J., and Girard, Stephen, “Stephen Girard’s West Indian Trade, 17891812,” The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography, October 1948, Vol 72, No
4, pp. 311-342
10. Garrigus, John, “Blue and Brown: Contraband Indigo and the Rise of a Free Colored
Planter Class in French Saint-Domnigue,” The Americas, October 1993, Vol 50, No 2,
pp. 233-263
11. Geggus, David P., 2001, The Impact of the Haitian Revolution in the Atlantic World,
Columbia, University of South Carolina Press
12. Geggus, David Patrick, 2002, Haitian Revolutionary Studies, Bloomington, Indiana
University Press
13. Geggus, David P., 2014, The Haitian Revolution: A Documentary History, Indianapolis,
Hackett Publishing Company, Inc.
14. Girard, Philippee, “Trading Races: Joseph and Marie Bunel, a Diplomat and a Merchant
in Revolutionary Saint-Domingue and Philadelphia,” Journal of the Early Republic, Fall
2010, Vol 30 No 3, pp. 351-376
15. Hickey, Donald R., “America’s Response to the Slave Revolt in Haiti, 1791-1806,”
Journal of the Early Republic, Winter 1982, Vol 2, No 4, pp. 361-379
16. Hunt, Alfred N., 1988, Haiti’s Influence on Antebellum America: Slumbering Volcano in
the Caribbean, Baton Rouge, Louisiana State University Press
17. James, C.L.R., 1963, The Black Jacobins: Toussaint Louverture and the San Domingo
Revolution, New York, Random House, Inc.
18. Johnson, Ronald Angelo, “A Revolutionary Dinner: US Diplomacy toward SaintDomingue, 1798-1801,” Early American Studies, Winter 2011, Vol 9, No 1, pp. 114-141
19. Kukla, Jon, 2003, A Wilderness So Immense: The Louisiana Purchase and the Destiny of
America, New York, Knopf
20. Lundy, Garvey F., “Early Saint Dominguan Migration to America and the Attraction of
Philadelphia,” Journal of Haitian Studies, Spring 2006, Vol 12, No 1, pp. 76-94
21. Matthewson, Tim, “Abraham Bishop: “The Rights of Black Men,: and the American
Reaction to the Haitian Revolution,” The Journal of Negro History, Summer 1982, Vol
67, No 2, pp. 148-154
22. Matthewson, Tim, “Jefferson and the Nonrecognition of Haiti,” Proceedings of the
American Philosophical Society, March 1996, Vol 140, No., pp. 22-48
23. Nash, Gary B., “Reverberartions of the Haiti in the American North: Black Saint
Dominguans in Philadelphia,” Pennsylvania History: A Journal of Mid-Atlantic Studies,
Explorations in Early American Culture, 1998, Vol 65, pp. 44-73
24. Peguero, Valentina, “Teaching the Haitian Revolution: Its Place in Western and Modern
World History,” The History Teacher, November 1998, Vol 33, No 1, pp. 33-41
25. Popkin, Jeremy D., 2010, You Are All Free: The Haitian Revolution and the Abolition of
Slavery, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press
26. Reinhardt, Thomas, “200 Years of Forgetting: Hushing Up the Haitian Revolution,”
Journal of Black Studies, March 2005, Vol 35, No 4, pp. 246-261
27. White, Ashli, “The Politics of “French negroes” in the United States,” Historical
Reflections/Reflexions Historiques, Slavery and Citizenship in the Age of the Atlantic
Revolutions, Spring 2003, Vol 29, No 1, pp. 103-121
28. White, Ashli, 2010, Encountering Revolution: Haiti and the Making of the Early
Republic, Baltimore, The John Hopkins University Press
29. Zuckerman, Michael, 1993, Almost Chosen People: Oblique Biographies in the American
Grain, Berkeley, University of California Press
Appendix
1. The Common Core Standards for Social Studies/ History can be accessed using:
http://www.pdesas.org/Standard/Views#114|14125|0|0
2. The Common Core Standards for English can be accessed using:
http://www.pdesas.org/Standard/Views#114|14122|0|0
3. 3-Ring Venn Diagram (compare and contrast)
http://www.studenthandouts.com/1batch/graphic-organizers/venn-diagram-threeconcepts.pdf
4. 4-Column Chart (categorization)
https://www.eduplace.com/graphicorganizer/pdf/4column.pdf
5. Primary Source Analysis Worksheet
http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/worksheets/written_document_analysis_work
sheet.pdf
6. For extended readings, lessons, and activities on Haiti, download the free pdf 12 chapter,
43 page booklet “Teaching About Haiti” on the Teaching for Change website:
http://www.teachingforchange.org/books/our-publications/caribbeanconnections/teaching-about-haiti-pdf-and-resources
Content Standards
The Common Core Standards for Social Studies/History can be accessed using:
http://www.pdesas.org/Standard/Views#114|14125|0|0
CC.8.5.9-10.A: Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary
sources, attending to such features as the date and origin of the information.
CC.8.5.9-10.B: Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source;
provide an accurate summary of how key events or ideas develop over the course of the text.
CC.8.5.9-10.C: Analyze in detail a series of events described in a text; determine whether earlier
events caused later ones or simply preceded them.
CC.8.5.9-10.D: Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in a text,
including vocabulary describing political, social, or economic aspects of history/social science.
CC.8.5.9-10.E: Analyze how a text uses structure to emphasize key points or advance an
explanation or analysis.
CC.8.5.9-10.F: Compare the point of view of two or more authors for how they treat the same or
similar topics, including which details they include and emphasize in their respective accounts.
CC.8.5.9-10.G: Integrate quantitative or technical analysis (e.g., charts, research data) with
qualitative analysis in print or digital text.
CC.8.5.9-10.H: Assess the extent to which the reasoning and evidence in a text support the
author’s claims.
CC.8.5.9-10.I: Compare and contrast treatments of the same topic in several primary and
secondary sources.
CC.8.5.9-10.J: By the end of grade 10, read and comprehend history/social studies texts in the
grades 9–10 text complexity band independently and proficiently
The Common Core Standards for English can be accessed using:
http://www.pdesas.org/Standard/Views#114|14122|0|0
For use with the novels by Island Beneath the Sea: A Novel by Isabel Allende, Stella: A Novel of
the Haitian Revolution by Emeric Bergeaud (translated by Christen Mucher and Leslie Curtis),
In Darkness by Nick Lake and Madison Smartt Bell’s trilogy: All Souls’ Rising, Master of the
Crossroads, and The Stone that the Builder Refused.
CC.1.3: Reading Literature: Students read and respond to works of literature - with emphasis on
comprehension, making connections among ideas and between texts with focus on textual
evidence.
CC.1.3.9-10.A: Determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze in detail its development
over the course of the text, including how it emerges and is shaped and refined by specific
details; provide an objective summary of the text.
CC.1.3.9-10.B: Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text
says explicitly as well as inferences and conclusions based on an author’s explicit assumptions
and beliefs about a subject.
CC.1.3.9-10.C: Analyze how complex characters develop over the course of a text, interact with
other characters, and advance the plot or develop the theme.
CC.1.3.9-10.D: Determine the point of view of the text and analyze the impact the point of view
has on the meaning of the text.
CC.1.3.9-10.E: Analyze how an author’s choices concerning how to structure a text, order
events within it and manipulate time create an effect.
CC.1.3.9-10.F: Analyze how words and phrases shape meaning and tone in texts.
CC.1.3.9-10.G: Analyze the representation of a subject or a key scene in two different artistic
mediums, including what is emphasized or absent in each treatment.
CC.1.3.9-10.H: Analyze how an author draws on and transforms themes, topics, character types,
and/or other text elements from source material in a specific work.
CC.1.3.9-10.I: Determine or clarify the meaning of unknown and multiple-meaning words and
phrases based on grade 9-10 reading and content, choosing flexibly from a range of strategies
and tools.
CC.1.3.9-10.J: Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domainspecific words and phrases; gather vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase
important to comprehension or expression.
CC.1.3.9-10.K: Read and comprehend literary fiction on grade level, reading independently and
proficiently.