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<v Speaker 1>Hello, and welcome to Western CIV. Episode four ninety four.

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<v Speaker 1>Sandumong sun Damang is apparently, by the way, the correct

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<v Speaker 1>French pronunciation of the French colony, and I get it

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<v Speaker 1>wrong when I was talking about it earlier. Sorry about that.

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<v Speaker 1>I was using the English phrase, and I'm going to

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<v Speaker 1>use the correct French from now on. So the seventeen eighties,

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<v Speaker 1>let's introduce what we're talking about here, Francis colony of Sandomong,

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<v Speaker 1>occupying the western third of the island of Hispaniola, which

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<v Speaker 1>today is Haiti, and then the other half is the

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<v Speaker 1>Dominican Republic. This had become effectively the richest colony in

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<v Speaker 1>the world. Voltaire Ones quipped that it was quote the

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<v Speaker 1>pearl of the Antilles en quote, and indeed it's wealth

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<v Speaker 1>surpassed that of Britain's Jamaica or Spain's Cuba. Its prosperity

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<v Speaker 1>was built entirely on sugar, indigo, coffee, and cotton luxury goods,

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<v Speaker 1>seeming intent on feeding an insatiable European market. French merchants

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<v Speaker 1>grew rich from the trade, and the monarchy depended on

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<v Speaker 1>the colonies duties and taxes to pop up. For a time,

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<v Speaker 1>it's fragile finances, but Sandmong's prosperity restored on an extreme

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<v Speaker 1>and brutal system of labor African slavery. The island's population

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<v Speaker 1>of about five hundred thousand enslaved Africans dwarfed the thirty

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<v Speaker 1>thousand whites and roughly twenty five thousand free people of color.

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<v Speaker 1>It was a society in which the ruling minority clung

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<v Speaker 1>fiercely to privilege, while the enslaved majority endured staggering cruelty.

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<v Speaker 1>The structure of colonial society in sand Among was layered

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<v Speaker 1>and intense. The granz Blancs, the wealthy white planters and

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<v Speaker 1>merchants who owned vast sugar estates and dominated the colonial assembly,

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<v Speaker 1>were the elite, or top of the pyramid. They styled

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<v Speaker 1>themselves as an aristocracy, aspiring to autonomy and jealously guarding

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<v Speaker 1>any privilege that they had. The petite blanks, the poor whites,

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<v Speaker 1>who were often artisans, overseers, or small traders, made up

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<v Speaker 1>probably the smallest percentage of the overall population. They had

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<v Speaker 1>little wealth but valued their skin color as a badge

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<v Speaker 1>of superiority over non whites. Then there were the free

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<v Speaker 1>people of color, the gens de color libris. Many of

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<v Speaker 1>these were of mixed African and European sent often property

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<v Speaker 1>owners themselves, and some were even slaveholders. Despite their wealth,

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<v Speaker 1>they were barred from political rights by law and constantly

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<v Speaker 1>humiliated by a variety of racial codes. And then, of course,

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<v Speaker 1>there was the enslaved majority. These were Africans, many recently

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<v Speaker 1>arrived through the brutal Middle Passage, brought in to replace

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<v Speaker 1>the thousands who died each year from overwork, malnutrition, and disease.

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<v Speaker 1>Mortality rates were so high that planters calculated that it

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<v Speaker 1>was cheaper to import new captives than to sustain a

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<v Speaker 1>family born enslaved population. Now, what codified all of this

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<v Speaker 1>was the Code Noir, the French royal decree regulating slavery,

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<v Speaker 1>theoretically offering protections requiring masters to provide food, clothing, and

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<v Speaker 1>religious instructions, but in practice that aspect of the Code

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<v Speaker 1>was little more than paper. Enslaved people's endured grueling labor

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<v Speaker 1>in cane fields overseer violence and punishments ranging from the

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<v Speaker 1>whip to mutilation and death. The entire economy of San

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<v Speaker 1>Damong was dependent on the most important cash crop of

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<v Speaker 1>the eighteenth century, sugar. Sugar was the beating heart of

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<v Speaker 1>Sando Mung's colonial economy, and to understand the Haitian Revolution,

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<v Speaker 1>one must first understand the brutal machinery of sugar production.

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<v Speaker 1>It was a system of labor, land, and capital that

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<v Speaker 1>transformed cane stalks into white crystals prized in Europe. Yet

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<v Speaker 1>it consumed human lives at a staggering pace. A large

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<v Speaker 1>sugar plantation or habitacion was more than a farm. It

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<v Speaker 1>was an industrial complex. At its center stood the grand

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<v Speaker 1>mansion of the planter, surrounded by workshops, kitchens, and quarters

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<v Speaker 1>of enslaved laborers. The cane fields spread outward, covering thousands

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<v Speaker 1>of acres, divided into plots that had to be cut

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<v Speaker 1>in a relentless cycle. Near the grand mansion loomed the

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<v Speaker 1>suguri or sugar mill, the boiling house where the crop

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<v Speaker 1>was transformed from raw stocks into market ready sugar. It

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<v Speaker 1>was really basically vertical integration from plant all the way

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<v Speaker 1>to processed sugar. The plantations of Sandomong they did it

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<v Speaker 1>all now. Sugar production followed a punishing rhythm tied to

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<v Speaker 1>the seasons. During the planting season, cane cuttings were driven

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<v Speaker 1>into the soil by enslaved laborers who worked in gangs

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<v Speaker 1>under the overseers whip. The feeds had to be weeded

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<v Speaker 1>and irrigated constantly the harvesting season, about once every twelve

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<v Speaker 1>to eighteen months the cane was ready to be cut.

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<v Speaker 1>The harvest was, of course the most intense season of all.

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<v Speaker 1>Enslaved men and women worked from dawn until nightfall, hacking

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<v Speaker 1>cane with machetes. Each stalk had to be carried swiftly

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<v Speaker 1>to the mill before it could dry out, and then,

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<v Speaker 1>of course there was the milling. At the Sukari. Stocks

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<v Speaker 1>were fed between enormous rollers powered by horses, oxen or

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<v Speaker 1>later on water and wind. The juice ran out into troughs,

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<v Speaker 1>while the crushed stalks called legacy, were dried out and

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<v Speaker 1>used as fuel for the boiling process, which of course

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<v Speaker 1>then brought to boiling and refining. The juice was then

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<v Speaker 1>boiled in a series of great copper kettles, each hotter

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<v Speaker 1>than the last, tended constantly by enslaved workers. Timing was

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<v Speaker 1>crucial and the sugar would not crystallize too long and

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<v Speaker 1>it would burn. From here, it was poured into wooden molds,

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<v Speaker 1>hardened and then packed into hogsheads for shipment to Europe.

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<v Speaker 1>The human cost was staggering, The work was unrelenting, and

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<v Speaker 1>the conditions lethal cane knives and rollers mangled bodies, boiling

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<v Speaker 1>kettle's scalded skin. The heat of the boiling houses was

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<v Speaker 1>positively suffocating. Overseers drove the enslaved laborers, with the lash

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<v Speaker 1>demanding impossible speed. One contemporary observer rote quote, never is

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<v Speaker 1>the work done, for when the harvest ends, the planting

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<v Speaker 1>must begin again. Because mortality was so high, disease, overwork,

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<v Speaker 1>and malnutrition killed tens of thousands each year, planters did

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<v Speaker 1>not expect an enslaved laborer to live more than seven

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<v Speaker 1>years after arriving on the island. The system was sustained

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<v Speaker 1>by the constant importation of new captives from Africa, making

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<v Speaker 1>Sandomang one of the greatest consumers of the Transatlantic slave trade.

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<v Speaker 1>From all this machinery of death came immense profit. By

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<v Speaker 1>the eve of the French Revolution, Sandemang produced about forty

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<v Speaker 1>percent of the world's sugar and more than half of

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<v Speaker 1>all of Europe's coffee. Ships left its ports ladened with wealth,

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<v Speaker 1>and French merchants in Bordeaux and Nons built fortunes from it. Yet,

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<v Speaker 1>of course the system was very brittle. It required enormous

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<v Speaker 1>numbers of enslaved laborers kept in brutal subjugation, overseers, over

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<v Speaker 1>a watchful with the whip, and constant imports of fresh bodies.

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<v Speaker 1>It was a pyramid built on the narrowest of bases.

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<v Speaker 1>When revolt came finally in seven ninety one, the very

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<v Speaker 1>structure of sugar production, its dependence on concentrated labor, its

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<v Speaker 1>reliance on terror, its disregard for human survival made the

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<v Speaker 1>uprising all the more explosive. When news of the French

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<v Speaker 1>Revolution reached Sandeman in seventeen eighty nine, it threw this

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<v Speaker 1>fragile social order into turmoil. The grounds Blancs saw a

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<v Speaker 1>chance to push for more autonomy from Paris. The petite

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<v Speaker 1>Blanks demanded equality with their social betters, and of course,

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<v Speaker 1>the free people of Color, inspired by the Declaration of

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<v Speaker 1>the Rights of Man, petitioned for full citizenship, rights famously

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<v Speaker 1>championed by veniss Oge, who in seventeen ninety led a

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<v Speaker 1>short lived rebellion that ended with his execution by torture.

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<v Speaker 1>The most radical of all were the enslaved themselves, a

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<v Speaker 1>voice they listened. Many had memories of freedom in Africa,

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<v Speaker 1>and a maroon community of escaped slaves already resisted French

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<v Speaker 1>power from the mountains. Whisted rumors of liberty began to

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<v Speaker 1>circulate among the plantations, mingled with the example of freemen

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<v Speaker 1>of color demanding rights and the fiery language of revolution

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<v Speaker 1>carried on ships from France. By the summer of seventeen

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<v Speaker 1>ninety one, Sandoman was a powder keg. The colony's rigid

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<v Speaker 1>social hierarchy. Whites, free people of color, and the enslaved

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<v Speaker 1>majority were fracturing under the pressures of the French Revolution.

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<v Speaker 1>Free Men like color, like Julian Ramond and Vincent Auger,

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<v Speaker 1>had already demanded the rights of citizenship, invoking the Declaration

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<v Speaker 1>of the Rights of Man and Citizen. Though Age was

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<v Speaker 1>captured and executed in seventeen ninety one, his rebellion stirred

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<v Speaker 1>deep anxieties whites and flickered like a signal to the

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<v Speaker 1>enslaved population. Reports from the period reveal how tense life

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<v Speaker 1>had become. In March of that year, a French administrator,

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<v Speaker 1>the Intendant Francois Barbe Marbeau, warned that Paris quote the

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<v Speaker 1>colonies are filled with a restless spirit. The enslaved grow

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<v Speaker 1>bold in their discourse, and every wind brings them rumors

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<v Speaker 1>of liberty end quote. Now oral tradition preserves the most

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<v Speaker 1>iconic moment in the start of the Haitian Revolution, the

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<v Speaker 1>voodoo ceremony at Boskaman on the night of August fourteenth,

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<v Speaker 1>seventeen ninety one. According to accounts passed down through generations,

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<v Speaker 1>leaders gathered in a forest clearing study Bokman, the enslaved

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<v Speaker 1>man from Jamaica, who had become a priest, invoked divine

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<v Speaker 1>justice and called for rebellion. Account by Antoine d'lmas, a

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<v Speaker 1>French doctor in Cape Francois, described how participants quote swore

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<v Speaker 1>to exterminate the whites and to be faithful to one

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<v Speaker 1>another end quote. Damas, writing in eighteen fourteen, so a

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<v Speaker 1>long time after these events, was horrified by what he

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<v Speaker 1>interpreted as superstitious rites. But for the enslaved, this was

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<v Speaker 1>nothing less than just a binding oath of freedom, their

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<v Speaker 1>own Tennis court oath in the Caribbean. In the Haitian

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<v Speaker 1>memory of the event, the priestess Selisee Fateman invoked the

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<v Speaker 1>spirits and offered a black pig as sacrifice its blood,

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<v Speaker 1>sealing the covenant. According to one quote, the god who

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<v Speaker 1>created the sun, who makes the storm, who gives us

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<v Speaker 1>the earth, commands us to seek liberty end quote. Whether

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<v Speaker 1>or not anyone actually uttered those words, we won't know,

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<v Speaker 1>but it's been passed down for generations now. Within a week,

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<v Speaker 1>this oath was set into action. On the night of

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<v Speaker 1>August the twenty first to twenty second, enslave laborers across

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<v Speaker 1>the Great Northern Plain Roses One. The plantation of Gallifet,

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<v Speaker 1>one of the largest in the colony, was among the

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<v Speaker 1>first to fall. Cane fields burned in sheets of fire,

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<v Speaker 1>their glow visible for miles. The planter Grows described the

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<v Speaker 1>shock quote, at midnight, we saw the horizon ablaze. By dawn,

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<v Speaker 1>the flames had reached within leagues of our house, and

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<v Speaker 1>bands of Negroes armed with cane knives, torches and clubs,

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<v Speaker 1>swept from plantation to plantation, sparing nothing. Hundreds of estates

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<v Speaker 1>were destroyed within days. The violence was indiscriminate. White planters

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<v Speaker 1>and their families were killed. Overseers were hacked down, Mills

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<v Speaker 1>and boiling houses were smashed. The enslaved carried with them machetes, clubs, hoes,

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<v Speaker 1>tools of toil, now all turned into weapons of liberation.

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<v Speaker 1>European observers left accounts steeped in fear. The Abbe de Gregoras,

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<v Speaker 1>writing from Paris, after receiving the news, described quote, an

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<v Speaker 1>avenging army of the oppressed end quote sweeping through the colony.

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<v Speaker 1>A colonist named Moreau de Saint Marie, in his description

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<v Speaker 1>Topography Physique civile politique at history a de party Francis

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<v Speaker 1>de il de sant Deman later recalled quote, never has

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<v Speaker 1>a land been so suddenly and violently overturned In a

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<v Speaker 1>single night, fifty thousand blacks rose in a fury, destroyed

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<v Speaker 1>the plantations, and with fire and iron, shattered the power

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<v Speaker 1>of their masters and quote. Letters from refugees who fled

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<v Speaker 1>to North America also circulated. One printed in Philadelphia newspaper

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<v Speaker 1>in late seventeen ninety one told the readers that quote.

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<v Speaker 1>The Negroes proclaimed, they fight not for France, nor Spain

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<v Speaker 1>nor England, but for liberty, which they swear never to abandon.

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<v Speaker 1>By September, the revolt had engulfed the northern plane. Tens

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<v Speaker 1>of thousands of enslaved men and women had joined. Leaders emerged,

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<v Speaker 1>among them Georgies Bissau, Jean Francois Papilion, and soon tous

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<v Speaker 1>Saint l' vitour, who at first worked in the background.

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<v Speaker 1>The colonists appealed desperately to Paris for help, but the

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<v Speaker 1>sheer scale of the uprising stunned the capitol. A revolution

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<v Speaker 1>begun in France, now reverberated back upon its colonies, carried

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<v Speaker 1>on the blades and torches of those who had nothing

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<v Speaker 1>to lose but their chains. The events of August seventeen

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<v Speaker 1>ninety one were not merely a slave revolt. They were

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<v Speaker 1>the opening act of a revolution that would reshape the

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<v Speaker 1>Atlantic world. In the words of Abbe Gregorae, they have

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<v Speaker 1>confounded the prejudices of centuries. The slaves of Sandoman have

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<v Speaker 1>shown that they are men, and that their cry of

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<v Speaker 1>liberty is the most legitimate of all. It was a

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<v Speaker 1>fire that could not be put out. Caine fields had

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<v Speaker 1>fueled the fortunes of Europe. Now those same fields burned,

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<v Speaker 1>igniting the first successful slave revolution in history. After the

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<v Speaker 1>first wave of August seventeen ninety one uprising, the entire

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<v Speaker 1>northern plain of San de Main, France's most productive plantation

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<v Speaker 1>region was in gald in chaos. By September, at least

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<v Speaker 1>one thousand plantations lay in ruin, and nearly ten thousand

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<v Speaker 1>whites had either fled or been killed or taken refuge

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<v Speaker 1>in Cape Francois modern day Cape Hate, The governor Balanched

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<v Speaker 1>wrote in desperation to Paris that quote, the whole colony

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<v Speaker 1>is in flames. The Negroes rise in numbers like the

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<v Speaker 1>sea itself. End quote. The insurgents, often organized in bands

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<v Speaker 1>led by figures such as Jean Francois, Biseau and Geneau,

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<v Speaker 1>fought with remarkable coordination. Though armed mostly with machetes and

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<v Speaker 1>makeshift weapons, they quickly overwhelmed isolated plantations and seized European arms.

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<v Speaker 1>A French refugee later recalled they fought with the ferocity

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<v Speaker 1>that astonished US. Discipline was born in the midst of

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<v Speaker 1>the flames. These men who had been slaves yesterday were

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<v Speaker 1>soldiers today. But the rebellion was not a single unified force.

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<v Speaker 1>Some groups committed atrocities against captured whites, others tried to negotiate.

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<v Speaker 1>Leaders like Jens Francois styled themselves as generals of liberty.

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<v Speaker 1>And soon began receiving covert encouragement from Spain across the

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<v Speaker 1>border in Santo Domingo. Meanwhile, in France, the revolution was

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<v Speaker 1>spiraling towards radicalization. The Nationally Assembly faced a dilemma how

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<v Speaker 1>to keep its most lucrative colony while also honoring its

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<v Speaker 1>ideals of liberty. In March seventeen ninety two, the Legislative

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<v Speaker 1>Assembly debated slavery and citizenship in the colonies. White planters

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<v Speaker 1>and their allies in Paris warned that granting rights to

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<v Speaker 1>people of color would destroy colonial authority, but abolitionist deputies,

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<v Speaker 1>including the Abbe Gregoray and the Amiste Noois Friends of

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<v Speaker 1>the Blacks, invoked the Declaration of the Rights of Man

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<v Speaker 1>and Citizen. Gregory argued, quote men of color have shed

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<v Speaker 1>their blood for France. How can we deny them the

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<v Speaker 1>title of citizen? End quote. A degree of April fourth,

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<v Speaker 1>seventeen ninety two granted full citizenship to all free people

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<v Speaker 1>of color and free blacks in the colonies. This radical

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<v Speaker 1>decision electrified san demand for the free peoples of color,

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<v Speaker 1>who had long fought for recognition. It was a legal victory,

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<v Speaker 1>but among the whites, especially the Petites blanc who resented

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<v Speaker 1>their rivals of color. The decree was seen as a

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<v Speaker 1>betrayal on the ground. In San Deman, the spring and

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<v Speaker 1>summer of seventeen ninety two brought open civil war between

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<v Speaker 1>whites and free people of color in towns. Armed clashes

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<v Speaker 1>erupted as white militias tried to exclude freemen of color

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<v Speaker 1>from political assemblies. One white colonist wrote bitterly back to Paris,

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<v Speaker 1>the decree of April has thrown oil on the fire.

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<v Speaker 1>The Mulattoes claim equality with the whites who resist, and

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<v Speaker 1>the Negroes rejoice at our division. At the same time,

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<v Speaker 1>the great slave revolt in the North continued, with insurgents

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<v Speaker 1>pressing now against the city of Ca Francaise. French commissioners

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<v Speaker 1>and colonial troops, weakened by infighting, struggled to contain the rebellion.

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<v Speaker 1>To restore order, the Legislative Assembly sent three commissioners, Sona Thax, Pulvrell,

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<v Speaker 1>and Ahad to Sandman, arriving in September of seventeen ninety two.

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<v Speaker 1>Their mission was delicate. Enforced the April decree, reconcile whites

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<v Speaker 1>and people of color free ones, and then suppress the

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<v Speaker 1>slave revolt, all while defending the colony for revolutionary France.

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<v Speaker 1>When they arrived, they found chaos. Sofa Nas later wrote, quote,

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<v Speaker 1>we set foot on soil divided against itself, Whites against Mulato's,

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<v Speaker 1>citizens against slaves, Republicans against Royalists. The commissioners quickly allied

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<v Speaker 1>with the free men of color, who had been fighting

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<v Speaker 1>both whites and rebel slaves. By recognizing their citizenship, the

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<v Speaker 1>commissioners gained a crucial base of support. Yet this policy

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<v Speaker 1>deepened the fury of the white planters, many of whom

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<v Speaker 1>leaned towards Royalism or even welcomed intervention by the nearby

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<v Speaker 1>Britain or Spain. By October of seventeen ninety two, the

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<v Speaker 1>situation had become essentially a three sided struggle. The white

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<v Speaker 1>colonists fractured between Republicans and Royalists, but united in fear

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<v Speaker 1>of both blacks and free people of color, the free

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<v Speaker 1>people of color who were now legally citizens of France,

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<v Speaker 1>who were fighting but really just for their place as equals.

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<v Speaker 1>And then, of course there were the enslaved insurgents still

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<v Speaker 1>in arms across the north, declaring that only full emancipation,

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<v Speaker 1>not compromise would satisfy them. One French officer stationed near

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<v Speaker 1>Camp Francois wrote that month every party fights for itself.

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<v Speaker 1>There is no colony, only factions. The flames consume what

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<v Speaker 1>once was the richest land in the world. By the

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<v Speaker 1>end of October seventeen ninety two, Sandaman was effectively in

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<v Speaker 1>civil war. The commissioners struggled to enforce the authority of

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<v Speaker 1>revolutionary France, but the reality on the ground was that

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<v Speaker 1>liberty had already been claimed by force of arms. Next week, though,

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<v Speaker 1>we turned back to France and witnessed the downfall of

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<v Speaker 1>Louis the sixteenth