Untitled - African American History

ABOLITION OF SLAVERY IN HAYTI. clxxvii
battle for them. On the 2d September, an engagement
was had near Port au Prince, in which the mulattoes
obtained the advantage. On 23d October, a treaty of
peace was signed, acknowledging the political equality
of the mulattoes. Their armed slaves, however, were
banished from the island and sold in Jamaica. They
were driven thence by the English governor, who sent
them back to St. Domingo, where they were executed,
and their bodies cast into the bay. 1
This peace was of
short duration, as the Provincial Assembly declared
the treaty to be subversive of the colonial system.
The whites, being in open violation of the decree of the
Home Government, proposed to deliver the island to
the English Governor of Jamaica, which proposal he
declined to accept.
In the meantime, the National Assembly, by the
fickleness of their policy, only aggravated the state of
anarchy in the island. By a decree of the 24th September,
that of the 15th May was annulled, and power
was given to the Colonial Assembly to regulate the
political status of the free persons of color. This they
exercised on 2d November, by postponing indefinitely
their political emancipation.
Hostilities soon recommenced, and on 29th November
one-half of Port au Prince was reduced to ashes. The
whites accused the mulattoes of the deed, and to avenge
themselves massacred indiscriminately their women and
children who were within their reach. 3 With varying
success, this civil war continued until the Governor,
Blanchelande, joined his forces to the mulattoes, and
thus subdued the whites. This step of his was in con-
sequence of another decree of the vacillating National
Assembly, who, on the 4th April, 1792, revoked the
decree of 24th September, and declared all freemen to
be equal. To enforce this decree, they sent out three
1
Schoelcher, 102, 103.
2
Pamphile La Croix, torn, ch. 4.
i,
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