page_title: 1804 Haiti massacre
section_title: Massacre
hierarchical_section_title: 1804 Haiti massacre / Massacre
caption_attribution_description: Español: Desalines - Huyes del valor francés, pero matando blancos English: Entitled simply "Desalines", it depicts the general, sword raised in one arm, while the other holds a severed head of a white woman
context_page_description: The 1804 Haiti massacre was carried out against the French population and French Creoles remaining in Haiti following the Haitian Revolution, by soldiers, mostly former slaves, under orders from Jean-Jacques Dessalines. He had decreed that all suspected of conspiring in the acts of the expelled army should be put to death. It has been described as a genocide.
  The massacre, which took place throughout Haiti, occurred from early January 1804 until 22 April 1804, and resulted in the death of 3,000 to 5,000 people. Squads of soldiers moved from house to house, torturing and killing entire families.
  Throughout the early-to-mid nineteenth century, these events were well known in the United States. In addition, many refugees had come to the U.S. from Saint-Domingue, settling in New Orleans, Charleston, New York, Baltimore and other coastal cities. These events polarized Southern U.S. public opinion on the question of the abolition of slavery.
context_section_description: During February and March, Dessalines traveled among the cities of Haiti to assure himself that his orders were carried out. Despite his orders, the massacres were often not carried out until he visited the cities in person.
  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. When Dessalines arrived, he first spoke about the atrocities committed by former white authorities, such as Rochambeau and Leclerc, after which he demanded that his orders about mass killings of the area's white population should be put into effect. Reportedly, he ordered the unwilling to take part in the killings, especially men of mixed race, so that the blame should not be placed solely on the black population. Mass killings took place on the streets and on places outside the cities. Eyewitness accounts of the massacre describe imprisonment and killings  even of whites who had been friendly and sympathetic to the black population. 
  In parallel to the killings, plundering and rape also occurred. Women and children were generally killed last. White women were "often raped or pushed into forced marriages under threat of death."
  Dessalines did not specifically mention that the white women should be killed, and the soldiers were reportedly somewhat hesitant to do so. In the end, however, the women were also put to death, though normally at a later stage of the massacre than the adult males. The argument for killing the women was that whites would not truly be eradicated if the white women were spared to give birth to new Frenchmen.
  Before his departure from a city, Dessalines would proclaim an amnesty for all the whites who had survived in hiding during the massacre. When these people left their hiding place however, most (French) were killed as well. Many whites were, however, hidden and smuggled out to sea by foreigners. However, there were notable exceptions to the ordered killings. A contingent of Polish defectors were given amnesty and bestowed Haitian citizenship for their renouncement of French allegiance and support of Haitian independence. Dessalines referred to the Poles as "the White Negroes of Europe", as an expression of his solidarity and gratitude.
  In Port-au-Prince, only a few killings had occurred in the city despite the orders. After Dessalines arrived on 18 March, the number of killings escalated. According to a merchant captain, about 800 people were killed in the city, while about 50 survived. On 18 April 1804, Dessalines arrived at Cap-Haïtien. Only a handful of killings had taken place there before his arrival, but the killings escalated to a massacre on the streets and outside the city after his arrival.
  As elsewhere, the majority of the women were initially not killed. Dessalines's advisers, however, pointed out that the white Haitians would not disappear if the women were left to give birth to white men, and after this, Dessalines ordered that the women should be killed as well, with the exception of those who agreed to marry non-white men. Sources created at the time stated that 3,000 people were killed in Cap-Haïtien; Philippe Girard writes that this figure was unrealistic as in the post-evacuation of the French people the settlement had only 1,700 white people.
  One of the most notorious of the massacre participants was Jean Zombi, a mulatto resident of Port-au-Prince who was known for his brutality. One account describes how Zombi stopped a white man on the street, stripped him naked, and took him to the stair of the Presidential Palace, where he killed him with a dagger. Dessalines was reportedly among the spectators; he was said to be "horrified" by the episode. In Haitian Vodou tradition, the figure of Jean Zombi has become a prototype for the zombie.
caption: An 1806 engraving of Jean-Jacques Dessalines. It depicts the general, sword raised in one arm, while the other holds the severed head of a white woman.
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