By Satish Sekar \u00a9 Satish Sekar (May 15th 2017)<\/p>\n
\nThe Origins of Strife<\/strong><\/p>\n As with many revolutions, the aims evolved in practice. Haiti\u2019s is no different. And like most it was full of contradictions. It was inspired the martyrdom of two Mulatto (mixed race) leaders Vincent Og\u00e9 and Jean-Baptiste Chavannes. They visited France, demanding liberty, equality and fraternity, but within limits. Their demands were just for \u2018gentlemen of colour\u2019. The negroes\u2019 woes did not concern them. Political rights and equality were for them, not blacks or even Mulatto slaves. While the black Voddoo Priest, Boukman is acknowledged as the Father of the Revolution, its Mother, C\u00e9cile Fatiman, also officiated at the ceremony at Bois Ca\u00efman. Fatiman was a Mulatto and a slave. Not for her the eitism of Og\u00e9. \nSome are More Equal Than Others<\/strong><\/p>\n And they had no articulate advocates championing their rights. The Mulattos wit notable exceptions such as Fatiman, didn\u2019t see them as brothers and sisters. They believed negroes were not deserving of rights, but they were. Liberty, fraternity and equality inspired Og\u00e9 and Chavannes to dream, but only for their race. Og\u00e9 addressed the President of the Assembly of the Cape as follows. It is an impassioned plea, but just for his people. It is perhaps the most grotesquely prejudiced plea for liberty ever. \nMartyrdom<\/strong><\/p>\n Og\u00e9 was accepted and supported in revolutionary France, and also by the British abolitionist Thomas Clarkson, but Haiti\u2019s expatriates were in no mood to concede a dilution of their power and rights, even to their children. In October 1790 he returned to Saint-Domingue, as Haiti was called then. Og\u00e9, veteran of the American War of Independence, Chavannes, and up to 300 men of colour began an armed rebellion. In November 1790, 25 of them, including Og\u00e9 and Chavannes, were captured in Santo Domingo \u2013 the Spanish part of the island of Hispaniola. Despite assurances to the contrary, they were handed over to the French colonial government of the western part, in December 1790. By Satish Sekar \u00a9 Satish Sekar (May 15th 2017) The Origins of Strife As with many revolutions, the aims evolved [\u2026]<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1654,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[19],"tags":[517,518,519,520,521,522,523,524],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1454"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1454"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1454\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1656,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1454\/revisions\/1656"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fittedin.org\/fittedinwp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThe free Mulattos like Og\u00e9 enjoyed wealth and privilege certainly compared to black slaves. Haiti was the jewel in France\u2019s colonial Crown. In 1787 $11m out of a total income from its colonies of $17m came from Haiti alone. It was the most productive colony in the world \u2013 based on coffee growth in particular, but that came at a high price.
\nWhile some slaves were educated \u2013 Toussaint Breda, for example \u2013 and experienced a different regime to most \u2013 the life of slaves in general was short and subject to great brutality. The severity of that regime sowed the seeds of destruction. New slaves had to be imported fairly regularly and that meant the slaves were not born into it with no memory of life other than as slaves to white men. They still had memories of a different life in Africa that they yearned to get back to. Rebellion and freedom were in their minds.<\/p>\n
\n\u201cGENTLEMEN: a prejudice, too long maintained, is about to fall. I am charged with a commission doubtless very honorable to myself. I require you to promulgate throughout the colony the instructions of the National Assembly of the 8th of March, which gives without distinction, to all free citizens, the right of admission to all offices and functions. My pretensions are just, and I hope you will pay due regard to them. I shall not call the plantations to rise; that means would be unworthy of me. Learn to appreciate the merit of a man whose intention is pure. When I solicited from the National Assembly a decree which I obtained in favour of the American colonists, formerly known under the injurious epithet of mulattos, I did not include in my claims the condition of the negroes who live in servitude. You and our adversaries have misrepresented my steps in order to bring me into discredit with honorable men. No, no, gentlemen! we have put forth a claim only on behalf of a class of freemen, who, for two centuries, have been under the yoke of oppression.<\/em> We require the execution of the decree of the 8th of March. We insist on its promulgation, and we shall not cease to repeat to our friends that our adversaries are unjust, and that they know not how to make their interests compatible with ours. Before employing my means, I make use of mildness; but if, contrary to my expectation, you do not satisfy my demand, I am not answerable for the disorder into which my just vengeance may carry me\u201d [my emphasis].
\nIt will be noted that Og\u00e9\u2019s concerns excluded black people. Rights for his race \u2013 the lighter-skinned race was all he was concerned with, and it cost him his life. But he predicted the Haitian Revolution even if he got its driving force wrong. A Mulatto would however rise to prominence and become one of Haiti’s greatest sons, Alexandre P\u00e9tion. Unlike Og\u00e9, P\u00e9tion never had time for slavery. He championed the rights of Mulattos, but was an implacable opponent of slavery \u2013 one of the giants of the struggle against that bestial institution \u2013 and played an important part in the triumph of the former slaves, once he realised that he and other Mulattos had been duped and that Napol\u00e9on’s plan was to restore French control over Haiti and slavery too. P\u00e9tion switched sides. The ultimate success of the Haitian Revolution was now assured, but that was still over a decade away from the martyrdom of Chavannes and Og\u00e9.<\/p>\n
\nOn February 6th 1791 the white colonialists took their brutal revenge on Og\u00e9, Chavannes and others were sentenced to be hammered to death and viciously executed in Le Cap, but breaking Og\u00e9 on the wheel and brutally martyring Chavannes on February 23rd backfired. Og\u00e9 became a symbol of resentment, not just of people of colour, but black slaves too. Chavannes protested the treatment of people of African descent to his death. Six months later ‘Dutty’ Boukman and C\u00e9cile Fatiman gave the call that began the Haitian Revolution.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"