Haiti declares independence

After a 13-year revolution led by figures such as Toussaint Louverture and Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Haiti declared independence from France. It was the first nation founded by formerly enslaved people.

Context

Haiti was the French colony of Saint-Domingue, one of the richest in the world because of sugar and coffee produced by a very large enslaved population. An uprising began in August 1791 and grew into a long conflict involving enslaved people, free people of color, and French, Spanish and British forces.

Toussaint Louverture rose to command and helped secure the abolition of slavery in the colony, which the French government itself proclaimed in 1794. When Napoleon sent an expedition in 1802 to restore French control, Louverture was captured and taken to France, where he died in 1803.

Jean-Jacques Dessalines then led the final campaign, which ended with the defeat of the French army in late 1803. Independence was proclaimed on 1 January 1804 at Gonaives, and the country took the name Haiti.

Haiti paid a heavy price afterward. France recognized it in 1825 only in exchange for a large indemnity, and the debt burdened the country for generations.

Writers on the Revolution also point out that its influence reached beyond the Caribbean, since it alarmed slaveholding societies elsewhere and inspired people who opposed slavery, and it contributed to Napoleon's decision to sell Louisiana to the United States in 1803.