FORTUNATELY for the Prince of Peace, the world contained at that moment
one man for whom Bonaparte entertained more hatred and contempt, and
whom he was in still more haste to crush. The policy which Talleyrand
had planned, and into which he had drawn the First Consul, could not
be laid aside in order to punish Spain. On the contrary, every day
rendered peace with England more necessary, and such a peace was
inconsistent with a Spanish war. That Bonaparte felt no strong sympathy
with Talleyrand’s policy of peace in Europe and peaceful development
abroad, is more than probable; but he was not yet so confident of his
strength as to rely wholly on himself,--he had gone too far in the path
of pacification to quit it suddenly for one of European conquest and
dynastic power. He left Godoy and Spain untouched, in order to rebuild
the empire of France in her colonies. Six weeks after he had threatened
war on Charles IV., his agent at London, Oct. 1, 1801, signed with
Lord Hawkesbury preliminary articles of peace which put an end to
hostilities on the ocean. No sooner did Bonaparte receive the news[117]
than he summoned his brother-in-law Leclerc to Paris. Leclerc was
a general of high reputation, who had married the beautiful Pauline
Bonaparte and was then perhaps the most promising member of the family
next to Napoleon himself. To him, October 23, Napoleon entrusted the
command of an immense expedition already ordered to collect at Brest,
to destroy the power of Toussaint Louverture and re-establish slavery
in the Island of St. Domingo.[118]
The story of Toussaint Louverture has been told almost as often as
that of Napoleon, but not in connection with the history of the United
States, although Toussaint exercised on their history an influence
as decisive as that of any European ruler. His fate placed him at a
point where Bonaparte needed absolute control. St. Domingo was the
only centre from which the measures needed for rebuilding the French
colonial system could radiate. Before Bonaparte could reach Louisiana
he was obliged to crush the power of Toussaint.
The magnificent Island of St. Domingo was chiefly Spanish. Only its
western end belonged by language as well as by history to France; but
this small part of the island, in the old days of Bourbon royalty, had
been the most valuable of French possessions. Neither Martinique nor
Guadeloupe compared with it. In 1789, before the French Revolution
began, nearly two thirds of the commercial interests of France centred
in St. Domingo;[119] its combined exports and imports were valued at
more than one hundred and forty million dollars; its sugar, coffee,
indigo, and cotton supplied the home market, and employed in prosperous
years more than seven hundred ocean-going vessels, with seamen to the
number, it was said, of eighty thousand. Paris swarmed with creole
families who drew their incomes from the island, among whom were many
whose political influence was great; while, in the island itself,
society enjoyed semi-Parisian ease and elegance, the natural product
of an exaggerated slave-system combined with the manners, ideas, and
amusements of a French proprietary caste.
In 1789 the colony contained about six hundred thousand inhabitants,
five sixths of whom were full-blooded negroes held in rigid slavery.
Of the eighty or hundred thousand free citizens, about half were
mulattoes, or had some infusion of negro blood which disqualified them
from holding political power. All social or political privileges were
held by forty or fifty thousand French creoles, represented by the
few hundred planters and officials who formed the aristocracy of the
island. Between the creoles and the mulattoes, or mixed-breeds, existed
the jealousy sure to result from narrow distinctions of blood marking
broad differences in privilege. These were not the only jealousies
which raged in the colony; for the creoles were uneasy under the
despotism of the colonial system, and claimed political rights which
the home government denied. Like all colonists of that day, in the
quiet of their plantations they talked of independence, and thought
with envy of their neighbors in South Carolina, who could buy and sell
where they pleased.
When in 1789 France burst into a flame of universal liberty, the
creoles of St. Domingo shared the enthusiasm so far as they hoped to
gain by it a relaxation of the despotic colonial system; but they were
alarmed at finding that the mulattoes, who claimed to own a third of
the land and a fourth of the personalty in the colony, offered to make
the Republic a free gift of one fifth of their possessions on condition
of being no longer subjected to the creole tyranny of caste. The white
and mulatto populations were thus brought into collision. The National
Assembly of France supported the mulattoes. The creoles replied that
they preferred death to sharing power with what they considered a
bastard and despicable race. They turned royalists. Both parties took
up arms, and in their struggle with each other they at length dropped a
match into the immense powder-magazine upon which they both lived. One
August night in the year 1791 the whole plain of the north was swept
with fire and drenched with blood. Five hundred thousand negro slaves
in the depths of barbarism revolted, and the horrors of the massacre
made Europe and America shudder.
For several years afterward the colony was torn by convulsions; and
to add another element of confusion, the Spaniards and English came
in, hoping to effect its conquest. Feb. 4, 1794, the National Assembly
of France took the only sensible measure in its power by proclaiming
the abolition of slavery; but for the moment this step only embroiled
matters the more. Among its immediate results was one of great
importance, though little noticed at the time. A negro chief, who
since the outbreak had become head of a royalist band in Spanish pay,
returned, in April, 1794, within French jurisdiction and took service
under the Republic. This was Toussaint Louverture, whose father, the
son of a negro chief on the slave-coast of Africa, had been brought to
St. Domingo as a slave. Toussaint was born in 1746. When he deserted
the Spanish service, and with some four thousand men made the sudden
attack which resulted in clearing the French colony of Spanish troops,
he was already forty-eight years old.
Although Toussaint was received at once into the French service,
not until more than a year later, July 23, 1795, did the National
Convention recognize his merits by giving him the commission of
brigadier-general. Within less than two years, in May, 1797, he was
made General-in-Chief, with military command over the whole colony.
The services he rendered to France were great, and were highly
rewarded. His character was an enigma. Hated by the mulattoes with
such vindictiveness as mutual antipathies and crimes could cause, he
was liked by the whites rather because he protected and flattered
them at the expense of the mulattoes than because they felt any love
for him or his race. In return they flattered and betrayed him. Their
praise or blame was equally worthless; yet to this rule there were
exceptions. One of the best among the French officers in St. Domingo,
Colonel Vincent, was deep in Toussaint’s confidence, and injured his
own career by obstinate attempts to intervene between Bonaparte and
Bonaparte’s victim. Vincent described Toussaint, in colors apparently
unexaggerated, as the most active and indefatigable man that could
be imagined,--one who was present everywhere, but especially where
his presence was most needed; while his great sobriety, his peculiar
faculty of never resting, of tiring out a half-dozen horses and as
many secretaries every day; and, more than all, his art of amusing
and deceiving all the world,--an art pushed to the limits of
imposture,--made him so superior to his surroundings that respect and
submission to him were carried to fanaticism.[120]
Gentle and well-meaning in his ordinary relations, vehement in his
passions, and splendid in his ambition, Toussaint was a wise, though a
severe, ruler so long as he was undisturbed; but where his own safety
or power was in question he could be as ferocious as Dessalines and as
treacherous as Bonaparte. In more respects than one his character had
a curious resemblance to that of Napoleon,--the same abnormal energy
of body and mind; the same morbid lust for power, and indifference
to means; the same craft and vehemence of temper; the same fatalism,
love of display, reckless personal courage, and, what was much more
remarkable, the same occasional acts of moral cowardice. One might
suppose that Toussaint had inherited from his Dahomey grandfather
the qualities of primitive society; but if this was the case, the
conditions of life in Corsica must have borne some strong resemblance
to barbarism, because the rule of inheritance which applied to
Toussaint should hold good for Bonaparte. The problem was the more
interesting because the parallelism roused Napoleon’s anger, and
precipitated a conflict which had vast influence on human affairs. Both
Bonaparte and Louverture were the products of a revolution which gave
its highest rewards to qualities of energy and audacity. So nearly
identical were the steps in their career, that after the 18th Brumaire
Toussaint seemed naturally to ape every action which Bonaparte wished
to make heroic in the world’s eyes. There was reason to fear that
Toussaint would end in making Bonaparte ridiculous; for his conduct
was, as it seemed to the First Consul, a sort of negro travesty on the
consular _régime_.
When the difficulties between France and America became serious, after
Talleyrand’s demand for money and sweeping attacks upon American
commerce, Congress passed an Act of June 13, 1798, suspending
commercial relations with France and her dependencies. At that time
Toussaint, although in title only General-in-Chief, was in reality
absolute ruler of St. Domingo. He recognized a general allegiance
to the French Republic, and allowed the Directory to keep a civil
agent--the Citizen Roume--as a check on his power; but in fact Roume
was helpless in his hands. Toussaint’s only rival was Rigaud, a
mulatto, who commanded the southern part of the colony, where Jacmel
and other ports were situated. Rigaud was a perpetual danger to
Louverture, whose safety depended on tolerating no rival. The Act of
Congress threatened to create distress among the blacks and endanger
the quiet of the colony; while Rigaud and the French authority would
be strengthened by whatever weakened Louverture. Spurred both by fear
and ambition, Toussaint took the character of an independent ruler. The
United States government, counting on such a result, had instructed its
consul to invite an advance; and, acting on the consul’s suggestion,
Toussaint sent to the United States an agent with a letter to the
President[121] containing the emphatic assurance that if commercial
intercourse were renewed between the United States and St. Domingo
it should be protected by every means in his power. The trade was
profitable, the political advantages of neutralizing Toussaint were
great; and accordingly the President obtained from Congress a new
Act, approved Feb. 9, 1799, which was intended to meet the case. He
also sent a very able man--Edward Stevens--to St. Domingo, with the
title of Consul-General, and with diplomatic powers. At the same time
the British Ministry despatched General Maitland to the same place,
with orders to stop at Philadelphia and arrange a general policy in
regard to Toussaint. This was rapidly done. Maitland hurried to the
island, which he reached May 15, 1799, within a month after the arrival
of Stevens. Negotiations followed, which resulted, June 13, in a
secret treaty[122] between Toussaint and Maitland, by which Toussaint
abandoned all privateering and shipping, receiving in return free
access to those supplies from the United States which were needed to
content his people, fill his treasury, and equip his troops.
To this treaty Stevens was not openly a party; but in Toussaint’s eyes
he was the real negotiator, and his influence had more to do with the
result than all the ships and soldiers at Maitland’s disposal. Under
this informal tripartite agreement, Toussaint threw himself into the
arms of the United States, and took an enormous stride toward the goal
of his ambition,--a crown.
Louverture had waited only to complete this arrangement before
attacking Rigaud. Then the fruits of his foreign policy ripened.
Supplies of every kind flowed from the United States into St. Domingo;
but supplies were not enough. Toussaint began the siege of Jacmel,--a
siege famous in Haytian history. His position was hazardous. A
difficult war in a remote province, for which he could not bring the
necessary supplies and materials by land; a suspicious or hostile
French agent and government; a population easily affected by rumors
and intrigues; finally, the seizure by English cruisers of a flotilla
which, after his promise to abandon all shipping, was bringing his
munitions of war along the coast for the siege,--made Toussaint
tremble for the result of his civil war. He wrote once more to the
President,[123] requesting him to send some frigates to enforce the
treaty by putting an end to all trade with the island except such as
the treaty permitted. Stevens again came to his assistance. The United
States frigate, “General Greene,” was sent to cruise off Jacmel in
February and March, 1800, and was followed by other vessels of war.
Rigaud’s garrison was starved out; Jacmel was abandoned; and Rigaud
himself, July 29, 1800, consented to quit the country.
Toussaint’s gratitude was great, and his confidence in Stevens
unbounded. Even before the fall of Jacmel, Stevens was able to inform
Secretary Pickering that Toussaint was taking his measures slowly
but certainly to break connection with France.[124] “If he is not
disturbed, he will preserve appearances a little longer; but as soon
as France interferes with this colony, he will throw off the mask and
declare it independent.” Hardly was Rigaud crushed, when the first
overt act of independence followed. Toussaint imprisoned Roume, and
on an invitation from the municipalities assumed the civil as well as
military authority, under the title of governor. In announcing to his
Government that this step was to be taken, Stevens added:[125] “From
that moment the colony may be considered as forever separated from
France. Policy perhaps may induce him to make no open declaration of
independence before he is compelled.” A few days afterward Toussaint
took the Napoleonic measure of seizing by force the Spanish part of
the island, which had been ceded to France by the treaty of Bâle five
years before, but had not yet been actually transferred. In thus making
war on the ally of France, Toussaint had no other motive, as Stevens
explained,[126] than to prevent the French government from getting a
footing there. Bonaparte had given a new Constitution to France after
the 18th Brumaire. Toussaint, after the deposition of Roume, which was
his _coup d’état_ and 18th Brumaire, gave a new Constitution to St.
Domingo in the month of May, 1801, by which he not only assumed all
political power for life, but also ascribed to himself the right of
naming his own successor. Bonaparte had not yet dared to go so far,
although he waited only another year, and meanwhile chafed under the
idea of being imitated by one whom he called a “gilded African.”
Perhaps audacity was Louverture’s best policy; yet no wise man would
intentionally aggravate his own dangers by unnecessary rashness,
such as he showed in Bonaparte’s face. He was like a rat defying a
ferret; his safety lay not in his own strength, but in the nature
of his hole. Power turned his head, and his regular army of twenty
thousand disciplined and well-equipped men was his ruin. All his acts,
and much of his open conversation, during the years 1800 and 1801,
showed defiance to the First Consul. He prided himself upon being
“First of the Blacks” and “Bonaparte of the Antilles.” Warning and
remonstrance from the Minister of Marine in France excited only his
violent anger.[127] He insisted upon dealing directly with sovereigns,
and not with their ministers, and was deeply irritated with Bonaparte
for answering his letters through the Minister of Marine. Throwing one
of these despatches aside unopened, he was heard to mutter before all
his company the words, “_Ministre!... valet!..._”[128] He was right in
the instinct of self-assertion, for his single hope lay in Bonaparte’s
consent to his independent power; but the attack on Spanish St.
Domingo, and the proclamation of his new Constitution, were unnecessary
acts of defiance.
When Jefferson became President of the United States and the Senate
confirmed the treaty of Morfontaine, had Louverture not lost
his balance he would have seen that Bonaparte and Talleyrand had
out-manœuvred him, and that even if Jefferson were not as French in
policy as his predecessor had been hostile to France, yet henceforth
the United States must disregard sympathies, treat St. Domingo as
a French colony, and leave the negro chief to his fate. England
alone, after the month of February, 1801, stood between Toussaint and
Bonaparte. Edward Stevens, who felt the storm that was in the air,
pleaded ill-health and resigned his post of consul-general. Jefferson
sent Tobias Lear to Cap Français in Stevens’s place, and Lear’s first
interview showed that Toussaint was beginning to feel Talleyrand’s
restraints. The freedom he had enjoyed was disappearing, and he chafed
at the unaccustomed limitations. He complained bitterly that Lear
had brought him no personal letter from the President; and Lear in
vain explained the custom of the Government, which warranted no such
practice in the case of consuls. “It is because of my color!” cried
Toussaint.[129] Justice to President Jefferson and a keener sense of
the diplomatic situation would have shown him that such a letter could
not be written by the President consistently with his new relations of
friendship toward France; and in fact almost the first act of Pichon,
on taking charge of the French Legation in Washington after the treaty,
was to remonstrate against any recognition of Toussaint, and to cause
Lear’s want of diplomatic character which offended Louverture.[130]
Rarely has diplomacy been used with more skill and energy than by
Bonaparte, who knew where force and craft should converge. That in this
skill mendacity played a chief part, need hardly be repeated. Toussaint
was flattered, cajoled, and held in a mist of ignorance, while one by
one the necessary preparations were made to prevent his escape; and
then, with scarcely a word of warning, at the First Consul’s order the
mist rolled away, and the unhappy negro found himself face to face
with destruction. The same ships that brought news of the preliminary
treaty signed at London brought also the rumor of a great expedition
fitting at Brest and the gossip of creole society in Paris, which made
no longer a secret that Bonaparte meant to crush Toussaint and restore
slavery at St. Domingo. Nowhere in the world had Toussaint a friend
or a hope except in himself. Two continents looked on with folded
arms, more and more interested in the result, as Bonaparte’s ripening
schemes began to show their character. As yet President Jefferson
had no inkling of their meaning. The British government was somewhat
better informed, and perhaps Godoy knew more than all the rest; but
none of them grasped the whole truth, or felt their own dependence on
Toussaint’s courage. If he and his blacks should succumb easily to
their fate, the wave of French empire would roll on to Louisiana and
sweep far up the Mississippi; if St. Domingo should resist, and succeed
in resistance, the recoil would spend its force on Europe, while
America would be left to pursue her democratic destiny in peace.
Bonaparte hurried his preparations. The month of October, 1801, saw
vast activity in French and Spanish ports, for a Spanish squadron
accompanied the French fleet. Not a chance was to be left for
Toussaint’s resistance or escape. To quiet English uneasiness,
Bonaparte dictated to Talleyrand a despatch explaining to the British
government the nature of the expedition.[131] “In the course which
I have taken of annihilating the black government at St. Domingo,”
he said, “I have been less guided by considerations of commerce and
finance than by the necessity of stifling in every part of the world
every kind of germ of disquiet and trouble; but it could not escape me
that St. Domingo, even after being reconquered by the whites, would
be for many years a weak point which would need the support of peace
and of the mother country; ... that one of the principal benefits of
peace, at the actual moment, for England was its conclusion at a time
when the French government had not yet recognized the organization of
St. Domingo, and in consequence the power of the blacks; and if it had
done so, the sceptre of the new world would sooner or later have fallen
into the hands of the blacks.”
No such explanations were given to the United States, perhaps because
no American minister asked for them. Livingston landed at Lorient
November 12, the day before Bonaparte wrote these words; Leclerc’s
expedition sailed from Brest November 22; and Livingston was presented
to the First Consul in the diplomatic audience of December 6. Caring
nothing for Toussaint and much for France, Livingston did not come
prepared to find that his own interests were the same with those of
Toussaint, but already by December 30 he wrote to Rufus King: “I know
that the armament, destined in the first instance for Hispaniola, is to
proceed to Louisiana provided Toussaint makes no opposition.”
While the First Consul claimed credit with England for intending to
annihilate the black government and restore slavery at St. Domingo, he
proclaimed to Toussaint and the negroes intentions of a different kind.
He wrote at last a letter to Toussaint, and drew up a proclamation
to the inhabitants of the island, which Leclerc was to publish. “If
you are told,” said this famous proclamation,[132] “that these forces
are destined to ravish your liberty, answer: The Republic has given
us liberty, the Republic will not suffer it to be taken from us!”
The letter to Toussaint was even more curious, when considered as a
supplement to that which had been written to the British government
only five days before. “We have conceived esteem for you,” wrote
Bonaparte to the man he meant to destroy,[133] “and we take pleasure in
recognizing and proclaiming the great services you have rendered to the
French people. If their flag floats over St. Domingo, it is to you and
to the brave blacks that they owe it.” Then, after mildly disapproving
certain of Toussaint’s acts, and hinting at the fatal consequences
of disobedience, the letter continued: “Assist the Captain-General
[Leclerc] with your counsels, your influence, and your talents. What
can you desire?--the liberty of the blacks? You know that in all the
countries where we have been, we have given it to the peoples who had
it not.” In order to quiet all alarms of the negroes on the subject of
their freedom, a pledge still more absolute was given in what Americans
might call the Annual Message sent to the French Legislature a week
afterward. “At St. Domingo and at Guadeloupe there are no more slaves.
All is free there; all will there remain free.”[134]
A few days afterward Leclerc’s expedition sailed; and the immense
fleet, with an army of ten thousand men and all their equipments,
arrived in sight of St. Domingo at the close of January, 1802.
Toussaint was believed to have watched them from a look-out in the
mountains while they lay for a day making their preparations for
combined action. Then Leclerc sailed for Cap Français, where Christophe
commanded. After a vain attempt to obtain possession of the town as a
friend, he was obliged to attack. February 5 Christophe set the place
in flames, and the war of races broke out.
The story of this war, interesting though it was, cannot be told here.
Toussaint’s resistance broke the force of Bonaparte’s attack. Although
it lasted less than three months, it swept away one French army, and
ruined the industry of the colony to an extent that required years
of repair. Had Toussaint not been betrayed by his own generals, and
had he been less attached than he was to civilization and despotic
theories of military rule, he would have achieved a personal triumph
greater than was won by any other man of his time. His own choice was
to accept the war of races, to avoid open battle where his troops
were unequal to their opponents, and to harass instead of fighting in
line. He would have made a war of guerillas, stirred up the terror and
fanaticism of the negro laborers, put arms into their hands, and relied
on their courage rather than on that of his army. He let himself be
overruled. “Old Toussaint,” said Christophe afterward, “never ceased
saying this, but no one would believe him. We had arms; pride in using
them destroyed us.”[135] Christophe, for good reasons, told but half
the story. Toussaint was not ruined by a few lost battles, but by
the treachery of Christophe himself and of the other negro generals.
Jealous of Toussaint’s domination, and perhaps afraid of being sent to
execution like Moyse--the best general officer in their service--for
want of loyalty to his chief, Christophe, after one campaign, April 26,
1802, surrendered his posts and forces to Leclerc without the knowledge
and against the orders of Toussaint. Then Louverture himself committed
the fatal mistake of his life, which he of all men seemed least likely
to commit,--he trusted the word of Bonaparte. May 1, 1802, he put
himself in Leclerc’s hands in reliance on Leclerc’s honor.
Surprising as such weakness was in one who had the sensitiveness of a
wild animal to danger,--Leclerc himself seemed to be as much surprised
that the word of honor of a French soldier should be believed as any
bystander at seeing the negro believe it,--the act had a parallel in
the weakness which led Bonaparte, twelve years afterward, to mount the
deck of the “Bellerophon,” and without even the guaranty of a pledge
surrender himself to England. The same vacillations and fears, the same
instinct of the desperate political gambler, the same cowering in the
face of fate, closed the active lives of both these extraordinary men.
Such beings should have known how to die when their lives were ended.
Toussaint should have fought on, even though only to perish under the
last cactus on his mountains, rather than trust himself in the hands of
Bonaparte.
The First Consul’s orders to Leclerc were positive, precise, and
repeated.[136] “Follow exactly your instructions,” said he, “and the
moment you have rid yourself of Toussaint, Christophe, Dessalines,
and the principal brigands, and the masses of the blacks shall be
disarmed, send over to the continent all the blacks and mulattoes
who have played a _rôle_ in the civil troubles.... Rid us of these
gilded Africans, and we shall have nothing more to wish.”[137] With
the connivance and at the recommendation of Christophe, by a stratagem
such as Bonaparte used afterward in the case of the Duc d’Enghien and
of Don Carlos IV., Toussaint was suddenly arrested, June 10, 1802, and
hurried on ship-board. Some weeks later he was landed at Brest; then he
disappeared. Except a few men who were in the secret, no one ever again
saw him. Plunged into a damp dungeon in the fortress of Joux, high in
the Jura Mountains on the Swiss frontier, the cold and solitude of a
single winter closed this tropical existence. April 7, 1803, he died
forgotten, and his work died with him. Not by Toussaint, and still less
by Christophe or Dessalines, was the liberty of the blacks finally
established in Hayti, and the entrance of the Mississippi barred to
Bonaparte.
The news of Leclerc’s success reached Paris early in June,[138] and set
Bonaparte again in motion. Imagining that the blacks were at his mercy,
orders were at once issued to provide for restoring them to slavery.
The truth relating to this part of the subject, habitually falsified
or concealed by Bonaparte and his admirers,[139] remained hidden among
the manuscript records of the Empire; but the order to restore slavery
at Guadeloupe was given, June 14, by the Minister of the Marine to
General Richepanse, who commanded there, and on the same day a similar
instruction was sent to General Leclerc at St. Domingo, in each case
leaving the general to act according to his discretion in the time and
manner of proceeding.
“As regards the return of the blacks to the old _régime_,” wrote the
Minister to General Leclerc,[140] “the bloody struggle out of which
you have just come victorious with glory commands us to use the utmost
caution. Perhaps we should only entangle ourselves in it anew if we
wished precipitately to break that idol of liberty in whose name so
much blood has flowed till now. For some time yet vigilance, order,
a discipline at once rural and military, must take the place of the
positive and pronounced slavery of the colored people of your colony.
Especially the master’s good usage must reattach them to his rule.
When they shall have felt by comparison the difference between a
usurping and tyrannical yoke and that of the legitimate proprietor
interested in their preservation, then the moment will have arrived
for making them return to their original condition, from which it has
been so disastrous to have drawn them.”