Prior to the invasion, war had broken out between the French Republic and Great Britain. The British government was contacted by French planter Louis-François Dubuc, who wished to place Martinique under British protection as the Republic's National Constituent Assembly was about to pass legislation which would abolish slavery in the French colonial empire; the legislation was passed the day before the British invasion of Martinique commenced. Fourteen days later, the British signed the Whitehall Accord on 9 February with counter-revolutionary French planters, which allowed them to keep their chattel property.