Jean Saint-Vil: A Giant Step for Mankind Made in Haiti
[Jean Saint-Vil was born and raised in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, and currently lives in Canada. He hosts two radio programs in Ottawa and has been featured as political analyst by Canadian radio and television as well as by Embassy Magazine, ZNet and Rogers Ottawa Television.]
There was a time, not so long ago, when popes, kings and queens enriched themselves and built vast empires on the profits made with the sweat and blood of kidnapped men, women and children loaded on ships, stacked like sardines and reduced to slavery on plantations of coffee, sugar, cotton, cocoa, all over the Americas[1]...
...It is within such an atmosphere of unparalleled terrorism and human decadence that a remarkable gathering of men and women took place on the small Caribbean island of Haiti, the evening of August 14-15, 1791. Known as the Bwa Kay Iman Ceremony[4], it is said that this revolutionary meeting brought together representatives of twenty-one displaced African nations who vowed to revolt against the powers that had unleashed against their people such a relentless campaign of terror; a genocide that was expertly conceived and implemented, state-sponsored and financed, justified with numerous literary works and blessed by the most powerful and influential religious institutions of the day[5] .
The Bwa Kay Iman uprising of 1791 was not the first major revolt against racial slavery in the Americas. Rather, it was the culmination of years of organized struggle. Singular only in its successful conclusion, Bwa Kay Iman counts among its main leaders a lady named Cecile Fatiman[6] and a gentleman called Boukman[7]. The lady, herself a former slave and a Vodou Priest, was said to be born of an African mother and a European father (a Corsican Prince). Boukman, also a Vodou Priest, was said to have been formerly enslaved on the island of Jamaica, before being sold to a plantation in Haiti. The following prayer has been attributed to Boukman officiating at the Bwa Kay Iman ceremony: "The god who created the earth; who created the sun that gives us light. The god who holds up the ocean; who makes the thunder roar. Our God who has ears to hear. You who are hidden in the clouds; who watch us from where you are. You see all that the white has made us suffer. The white man's god asks him to commit crimes. But the god within us wants to do good. Our god, who is so good, so just, He orders us to revenge our wrongs. It's He who will direct our arms and bring us the victory. It's He who will assist us. We all should throw away the image of the white men's god who is so pitiless. Listen to the voice for liberty that speaks in all our hearts."[8]
Honoring their Bwa Kay Iman pledge, the Africans of Haiti launched an all out war against the armies of France, Britain and Spain which they would eventually defeat, thanks to the military savvy of the maroons and the apt leadership of Generals Toussaint Louverture, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Alexandre Pétion and Henry Christophe. The revolted Africans also counted among them fierce women warriors like Sanite Bélair, Marie-Jeanne Lamartinière and the aged Toya Mantou, aunt of General Jean-Jacques Dessalines.
Twelve years after the Bwa Kay Iman uprising, General Dessalines would outwit French Generals Leclerc (Napoleon Bonaparte's brother-in-law ) and his particularly unscrupulous successor Donatien Rochambeau[9]. Dessalines would successfully chase the last European slave makers out of the island, on November 18, 1803. The resounding victory achieved by the revolted Africans would force Napoleon to abandon his dream of building a French empire (fueled by racial slavery) in the Americas. It is no coincidence that in the very year Haiti defeated Napoleon's army, the United States of America was able to acquire Louisiana from the French, thus doubling its territory, for merely 81 million Francs. Three years later, fearing slave uprisings on its American colonies, the British would pass an act declaring it illegal to transport more kidnapped Africans into the Americas[10].
During a 2003 interview offered to the author of this article, esteemed American physician and author Paul Farmer commented that, more certainly so than for the 1969 moon landing, he considers the Haitian Revolution to be "a giant step for mankind". Indeed, the grave consequences that were to follow the climatic conclusion of Bwa Kay Iman, were not lost to the world at the beginning of the 19th century. Barely days after the creation of the Republic of Haiti, Jean-Jacques Dessalines published a decree in which he announced his intention to devote part of the nation's meager post-war budget to securing the emancipation of formerly enslaved human beings. Many American slave ship captains collected the 40 dollars payment Dessalines had reserved for the release of each formerly enslaved person who sets foot on Haitian soil [11]. Meanwhile, in 1805, French foreign minister Prince Charles Talleyrand wrote to U.S Secretary of State James Madison: "the existence of a Negro people in arms, occupying a country it has soiled by the most criminal acts, is a horrible spectacle for all white nations." The United States responded by banning trade with Haiti in 1806. The embargo was renewed in 1807 and 1809. Later, in 1825, with the help of other white powers of the time, France began extorting a ransom which would eventually amount to 90 million gold francs from the young Black Republic.[12] To justify the exorbitant Charles X Ransom, the French offered the same "logic" the British would use to justify compensating former White slave makers who were dispossessed of "their human property" following the emancipation proclamation.[13]...
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There was a time, not so long ago, when popes, kings and queens enriched themselves and built vast empires on the profits made with the sweat and blood of kidnapped men, women and children loaded on ships, stacked like sardines and reduced to slavery on plantations of coffee, sugar, cotton, cocoa, all over the Americas[1]...
...It is within such an atmosphere of unparalleled terrorism and human decadence that a remarkable gathering of men and women took place on the small Caribbean island of Haiti, the evening of August 14-15, 1791. Known as the Bwa Kay Iman Ceremony[4], it is said that this revolutionary meeting brought together representatives of twenty-one displaced African nations who vowed to revolt against the powers that had unleashed against their people such a relentless campaign of terror; a genocide that was expertly conceived and implemented, state-sponsored and financed, justified with numerous literary works and blessed by the most powerful and influential religious institutions of the day[5] .
The Bwa Kay Iman uprising of 1791 was not the first major revolt against racial slavery in the Americas. Rather, it was the culmination of years of organized struggle. Singular only in its successful conclusion, Bwa Kay Iman counts among its main leaders a lady named Cecile Fatiman[6] and a gentleman called Boukman[7]. The lady, herself a former slave and a Vodou Priest, was said to be born of an African mother and a European father (a Corsican Prince). Boukman, also a Vodou Priest, was said to have been formerly enslaved on the island of Jamaica, before being sold to a plantation in Haiti. The following prayer has been attributed to Boukman officiating at the Bwa Kay Iman ceremony: "The god who created the earth; who created the sun that gives us light. The god who holds up the ocean; who makes the thunder roar. Our God who has ears to hear. You who are hidden in the clouds; who watch us from where you are. You see all that the white has made us suffer. The white man's god asks him to commit crimes. But the god within us wants to do good. Our god, who is so good, so just, He orders us to revenge our wrongs. It's He who will direct our arms and bring us the victory. It's He who will assist us. We all should throw away the image of the white men's god who is so pitiless. Listen to the voice for liberty that speaks in all our hearts."[8]
Honoring their Bwa Kay Iman pledge, the Africans of Haiti launched an all out war against the armies of France, Britain and Spain which they would eventually defeat, thanks to the military savvy of the maroons and the apt leadership of Generals Toussaint Louverture, Jean-Jacques Dessalines, Alexandre Pétion and Henry Christophe. The revolted Africans also counted among them fierce women warriors like Sanite Bélair, Marie-Jeanne Lamartinière and the aged Toya Mantou, aunt of General Jean-Jacques Dessalines.
Twelve years after the Bwa Kay Iman uprising, General Dessalines would outwit French Generals Leclerc (Napoleon Bonaparte's brother-in-law ) and his particularly unscrupulous successor Donatien Rochambeau[9]. Dessalines would successfully chase the last European slave makers out of the island, on November 18, 1803. The resounding victory achieved by the revolted Africans would force Napoleon to abandon his dream of building a French empire (fueled by racial slavery) in the Americas. It is no coincidence that in the very year Haiti defeated Napoleon's army, the United States of America was able to acquire Louisiana from the French, thus doubling its territory, for merely 81 million Francs. Three years later, fearing slave uprisings on its American colonies, the British would pass an act declaring it illegal to transport more kidnapped Africans into the Americas[10].
During a 2003 interview offered to the author of this article, esteemed American physician and author Paul Farmer commented that, more certainly so than for the 1969 moon landing, he considers the Haitian Revolution to be "a giant step for mankind". Indeed, the grave consequences that were to follow the climatic conclusion of Bwa Kay Iman, were not lost to the world at the beginning of the 19th century. Barely days after the creation of the Republic of Haiti, Jean-Jacques Dessalines published a decree in which he announced his intention to devote part of the nation's meager post-war budget to securing the emancipation of formerly enslaved human beings. Many American slave ship captains collected the 40 dollars payment Dessalines had reserved for the release of each formerly enslaved person who sets foot on Haitian soil [11]. Meanwhile, in 1805, French foreign minister Prince Charles Talleyrand wrote to U.S Secretary of State James Madison: "the existence of a Negro people in arms, occupying a country it has soiled by the most criminal acts, is a horrible spectacle for all white nations." The United States responded by banning trade with Haiti in 1806. The embargo was renewed in 1807 and 1809. Later, in 1825, with the help of other white powers of the time, France began extorting a ransom which would eventually amount to 90 million gold francs from the young Black Republic.[12] To justify the exorbitant Charles X Ransom, the French offered the same "logic" the British would use to justify compensating former White slave makers who were dispossessed of "their human property" following the emancipation proclamation.[13]...