Existing comment:
Toussaint Louverture:
"I would call him Napoleon, but Napoleon made his way to empire over broken oaths and through a sea of blood. This man never broke his word. "No RETALIATION" was his great motto and the rule of his life; and the last words uttered to his son in France were these: 'My boy, you will one day go back to St. Domingo; forget that France murdered your father.' I would call him Cromwell, but Cromwell was only a soldier, and the state he founded went down with him into his grave. I would call him Washington, but the great Virginian held slaves> This man risked his empire rather than permit the slave trade in the humblest village of his dominions."
-- Wendell Phillips, from "Toussaint L'Ouverture," a lecture given in New York and Boston, December 1861
A key figure in the series of campaigns that freed Haiti, Toussaint Louverture defeated armies of three world powers: Spain, France, and England. The success of the Haitian Revolution shook the institution of slavery when Haiti became the second independent republic in the Americas.
Details about the man himself are unclear. Names Toussaint Breda, he was born a slave in 1743. Some accounts claim he was a descendant of the royal family of Ardra in what is now the Republic of Benin. It is certain he was well educated in arithmetic, the classics and French philosophy. His knowledge of the writings of Julius Caesar describing his military campaigns served him well during the revolution. As a slave, Louverture worked as a coachman, a position of trust. As a freedman, he was a small landholder. Drawn into the fight for freedom, he was soon distinguished by his military skills, but the great leader attracted even more praise for his sense of ethics.
Louverture advocated for freedom without vengeance. His willingness to work toward fair solutions with different groups -- slaves, freemen, mulattos, and foreigners -- brought him both praise and criticism. In 1793 Toussaint took the surname of L'ouverture (French for "the opening") and later simplified it to Louverture. Several stories explain the name, such as his skill in finding openings of the battlefield of the gap in his teeth caused by a spent bullet.
Strangely, his signature remains the most direct visual record of the great hero. No portraits were made of him during his lifetime; drawings by his French enemies were apparently based on racism, not reality. In such images, Louverture is typically depicted as a short, apelike creature.
Betrayed and kidnapped by the French in 1802, Louverture was imprisoned at Fort de Joux in the mountains of eastern France. The poor conditions and cold led to "a malady of the lungs" and his death in 1803. Toussaint Louverture's grave was not marked and is now lost. |