A Captivating Guide to How the Haitian Revolution Began
The slave rebellion that was to shake the western world started in the Northern Province. In the region with the most to lose, the slaves had the most to gain by rising against the people who hoped to turn the French Revolution to their own advantage. The wealthy and powerful plantation owners were so narrowly focused on how to turn the tide in their favor that they failed to recognize the swell of the people they had oppressed for over a century. Segregating their slaves from others had been meant to keep them from hearing anything that could be used as inspiration to rebel. Instead, it provided the slaves with the distance from their masters’ eyes required to plan their own freedom.
The Haitian Revolution began with a secret voodoo ceremony that has been called the Bois Caiman Ceremony. Held in Morne-Rouge in August 1791, the slaves converged to determine their best course of action. Their anger had been fueled by a rumor that the plantation owners were going to fight against equality for freemen and mulattoes. Following months of planning, they were now ready to determine when was the right time to enact their plan.
The actions of Mackandal and Oge were imitated, resulting in more than 200 slaves coming forward as leaders and coordinators of the effort that was to start the rebellion. All from the Northern Province, the leaders held higher positions on their plantations, giving them the necessary authority to persuade other slaves to agree to the revolution. Their positions also ranged across the numerous needs of slave owners. Some of the leaders worked in the fields, others in the homes, and some were free. This created the kind of network that Mackandal had tried to maintain during the six years of his resistance. Through that network, they were able to plan for the Bois Caiman ceremony, and the actions that they were to take to remove the plantation owners from power.
Similar to Mackandal’s use of African tradition and religion to bring the slaves together, the larger underground revolution brought the slaves together. The ceremony highlighted their shared heritage. Meeting in a heavily wooded area, the slaves participated in a solemn voodoo ritual performed by Dutty Boukman, a voodoo priest from Jamaica, and an unnamed high priestess.
Perhaps it is romanticizing the events of the night, but stories about that night have said that a tropical storm or hurricane punctuated the resolve of the participants. In the winds of the storm, the rebels were convinced that it was an omen that pointed to their success. Regardless of the weather, the emotional atmosphere was charged, creating a legend out of the night based on its own merits. There are many aspects on which histories disagree. Some say that the ceremony happened on August 14, while others say it was August 21 or 22. There are a few things on which they do agree. The banning of voodoo under the French had helped to spread it in secret among the slaves. It was a unifying factor that reminded the slaves both what they were fighting for and who the enemy was.
The result of the ceremony was that the slaves had the plan and the signal they needed to act against their oppressors.
History’s Sense of Irony
It is with historic irony that the French colonial elite were given a chance to quell the rebellion. Within days of the Bois Caiman ceremony, a smaller band of slaves acted early. It is possible that they did not understand the instructions provided during the ceremony, or it could have been through impatience, but the early participants were captured in the act of setting an estate on fire. Though it is unclear what caused them to execute the plan early, it was clear that during their interrogation, some of the slaves divulged the plan, as well as the leaders who were to oversee the plan.
The irony is that the plantation owners who oversaw the named leaders could not, or would not, believe that their slaves were involved. Thinking that their slaves were either incapable of such an organized effort or believing that their slaves were too loyal to rebel, the slave owners stood by the very leaders who plotted their demise. The same wealthy and powerful members of the French colony elite had already ignored the vague prognostication of Reynal. Now that they were faced with the reality, they chose to blindly trust in their own perceived superiority and ability to control their slaves than to acknowledge the threat that they had created. Not all of them, but enough slave owners ignored the imminent danger that was reported to them. Those who did believe the reports successfully escaped with their lives and little else.
Despite the fact that the plan had been revealed, the slaves decided to go ahead with the set course of action.
The Revolution Begins
Within ten days of the Bois Caiman ceremony, the Haitian Revolution began. The Northern Province erupted in violence as Boukman and those under him moved across the region, killing or imprisoning everyone of European descent. After taking control of a plantation, they set it on fire.
Slaves carried a wide range of weaponry on their march. Some carried the torches that burned everything that belonged to their oppressor. Some carried rifles or pistols. Many slaves were armed with whatever improvised weapons they could find. At each plantation, the mass of marchers swelled with the slaves from the plantation.
By sunrise the next morning, most of the slaves in the region where Boukman and his marchers went had joined them. With between 1,000 and 2,000 rebels, the group was too big to be efficient. Splintering off into smaller groups, each of the groups moved toward a specific plantation to continue the revolution.
The astounding organization and planning enacted by the uneducated slaves soon proved that they had been severely underestimated. Their numbers continued to swell so that the remaining plantation owners began to fear that the primary city in the north would be taken. The city of Le Cap was considered the cultural heart of the colony, and it was where the majority of the slave owners fled after the slave bands went unchecked. To further discourage the slave owners, any captured slave offered disheartening warnings about the city itself. As they were tortured the former slaves mocked their torturers with the knowledge that the slave rebellion numbers included people everywhere, including within the precious city of Le Cap. Both sides realized the importance that controlling the city would play in the overall revolution.
Those with power within the city set up a way of monitoring the city for any sign of fire, a signal that had come to be associated with the slave rebellion. By monitoring the skyline, they hoped to prevent the destruction of the city by the rebels who lived within it.
Away from the city, the slave rebellion continued to spread, killing those of European descent who had not fled and burning everything that could help the French colony return to its former oppression. However, the rebellion also began to change. Slaves and freemen who were not willing to participate in the revolution were killed. The rebellion would not allow for any potential betrayal based on misplaced loyalty to slave owners.
In less than 48 hours, the slave rebellion had destroyed the majority of the most profitable plantations in the Northern Province. The leaders had planned well beyond the plantations in the north. To succeed, they had to continue to press forward before the French colonists had time to respond. Having found success in the first 48 hours, the marchers rested for a day before beginning the next phase of the plan.
On the morning of August 24, they pressed forward, aiming to reach Port-Margot by the day’s end. This would mean they would reach the La Cap less than a week after the revolution began. Knowing that the rebellion would eventually target the city, the inhabitants prepared. They prepared cannons and station guards at every possible entrance into the city. For the first time since they began marching, the rebellion faced a real challenge. They were not adequately equipped to face such a heavily armed resistance. Even though they had taken little time to rest and had silenced anyone they thought might help the city, the French colonists had adequate incentive to quickly mobilize against them.
The first attempt to take the city failed, and the rebellion fell back to strategize a new plan of attack. Though they had initially succeeded in resisting the slaves, the resistance soon proved to be too short-sighted against the sheer numbers and planning of their former slaves. The same day that they were driven back, the former slaves regrouped and divided to take on different points of the city. Splitting into two different groups, they approached the city from two different locations and began a siege. Though they were not armed with the necessary tools to take the city, the former slaves were able to stop those in the city from gaining any more supplies, including food.
Over the next three weeks, the city’s inhabitants attempted to eliminate the former slaves. Though the city dwellers only had one place to hide, the former slaves had the luxury of time. Whenever the French colonists began to gain the upper hand, the slaves were able to retreat into the woods. The colonials gained nothing from this tactic, and the former slaves continued to wear them down as nothing could make it through the siege.
Slaves to the north east of the city soon joined the rebellion. Their success was swift, and soon all communication between the city and the North Plain was eliminated.
By the end of August 1791, more than 15,000 slaves had joined the rebellion. Le Cap sent out pleas to many of the surrounding islands and the United States asking for military assistance. It had taken the slaves one week and one day to obliterate the plantations in the Northern Province. More than 180 plantations were annihilated. As September 1791 began, there were no plantations within a 50-mile radius of Le Cap.
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