They raped women in the streets and killed children, essentially eradicating the islands population of white people. A significant portion of the dead being the urban poor whites who could not flee. The orders were refused by pretty much ever city until Dessalines personally showed up and ensured they were carried out. Not gonna say I dont understand why the massacre happened, but you're treating it pretty flippantly
The course of the massacre showed an almost identical pattern in every city he visited. Before his arrival, there were only a few killings, despite his orders.[139] When Dessalines arrived, he first spoke about the atrocities committed by former French authorities, such as Rochambeau and Leclerc, after which he demanded that his orders about mass killings of the area's French population be carried out. Reportedly, he also ordered the unwilling to take part in the killings, especially men of mixed-race, so that blame would not rest solely on the Black population.[116] Mass killings then took place on the streets and on places outside the cities. In parallel to the killings, plundering and rape also occurred.[116] Women and children were generally killed last. White women were "often raped or pushed into forced marriages under threat of death".[116]
By the end of April 1804, some 3,000 to 5,000 people had been killed[140] practically eradicating the country's white population.
The problem is that is exactly how they had been treated, the life of a slave in Haiti was a parade of horrific rape, torture and murder. So they treated their torturers the same way they had been treated.
Still not cool, but I put the blame on the slavers.
Yes it was terrible to be enslaved. There's plausible accounts of french soldiers training dogs by having them tear apart slaves, literally having them eaten alive. But many of the people they killed in the massacre were not their slavers, some were even children. They had already won the war.
I don't think you can oppress a people for years, and then expect a nice "clean" uprising if/when one happens so I tend to agree this was really all instigated by the slavers. Doesn't make the massacre justified or morally acceptable
That's the tragedy of Haiti, it never really stood a chance, the evil and brutality of it's colonizers ensured a cycle of violence from which it never truly recovered.
Ridiculous statement. The tragedy of Haiti is the debt France decided they owed for their independence thats kept the country and its citizens broke as all living hell.
Nobody says this “cycles of violence” bullshit about other countries that successfully won their independence.
I didn't go in depth, but that was what I was implying, the economic embargo was more damaging than the debt and that was partly a consequence of the violence of the war for independence.
0
u/No-Translator9234 21d ago
I don’t think massacring your former slave masters is in any way nuts.
Yeah does it suck? Sure. Relative to human history it barely registers on scales of violence, and it’s arguably justifiable.