Document 1

Source: Excerpts from the Code Noir [Black Code], document which defined the conditions of
enslavement in all French colonies, issued by King Louis XIV of France, 1685

Article XVIII. We forbid slaves from selling sugar cane, for whatever reason or occasion, even with the
permission of their master, at the risk of a whipping for the slaves and a fine of ten pounds for the
masters who gave them permission, and an equal fine for the buyer.

Article XIX. We also forbid slaves from selling any type of commodities, even fruit, vegetables, firewood,
herbs for cooking and animals either at the market, or at individual houses, without a letter or a known
mark from their masters granting express permission. Slaves shall risk the confiscation of goods sold in
this way, without their masters receiving restitution for the loss, and a fine of six pounds shall be levied
against the buyers….

Article XXXIII. The slave who has struck his master in the face or has drawn blood, or has similarly
struck the wife of his master, his mistress, or their children, shall be punished by death….

Article XXXVIII. The fugitive slave who has been on the run for one month from the day his master
reported him to the police, shall have his ears cut off and shall be branded…on one shoulder. If he
commits the same infraction for another month, again counting from the day he is reported, he shall have
his hamstring cut and be branded…on the other shoulder. The third time, he shall be put to death.

Article XXXIX. The masters of freed slaves who have given refuge to fugitive slaves in their homes shall
be punished by a fine of three hundred pounds of sugar for each day of refuge.

Document 2

Source: Parisian free citizens of color, address to the National Assembly, written after their collection of
grievances and proposed reforms were rejected by a group of wealthy absentee planters, 1789

Our lords, the free citizens and landowners of color of the French islands and colonies are honored to
inform you that there still exists in one of the lands of this empire a species of men scorned and degraded,
a class of citizens doomed to rejection, to all the humiliations of slavery: in a word, Frenchmen who
groan under the yoke of oppression…

In this strange system, the citizens of color find themselves represented by the white colonists’ deputies,
although they have still never been included in their partial assemblies and they have not entrusted any
power to these deputies. Their opposing interests, which sadly are only too obvious, make such
representation absurd and contradictory.

You, our lords, must weigh these considerations; you must return to these oppressed citizens the rights
that have been unjustly stripped from them; you must gloriously complete your work, by ensuring the
liberty of French citizens in both hemispheres.

The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen has awakened the colonists of color to their past
condition; they have shown themselves worthy of the dignity that you have assigned to them; they have
learned their rights and they have used them….

The citizens of color are clearly as qualified as the whites to demand this representation.
 Document 3

Source: “Fire in St.-Domingo,” German copper engraving, unknown author, 1791.

Caption (translated from German) reads, “On the French colony of St. Domingo, black slaves – through
unending brutality – think to win conceited French democratic freedoms. They ruin many hundreds of
coffee and sugar plantations and burn the mills, they indiscriminately slaughter all of the whites which fall
into their hands, even using a white child as their flag, disgrace women and drag them away to miserable
prisons. Created 1791. However, their intentions came to nothing.”
 Document 4

Source: Bramante Lazzary, leader of enslaved insurgents, written shortly after French commissioners
issued an emancipation decree granting freedom to all enslaved persons in Saint-Domingue, 1793

Can there be any greater happiness for us than to see ourselves all united together and enjoying a good
and sweet natural liberty that France has given us?

At last, my friends, general liberty has been proclaimed on the island; it has given us our well-being and
made us all children of the law. It is to them, the civil commissioners, to whom France gave its power, it
is to them, my brothers, that we owe our legitimate happiness; it is to them and only to them that France
had confided it to grant it to us. As soon as you receive my letter, you must gather together and present
yourself to the representatives of the nation, and swear to be loyal to the nation and to die for the safety
of our country, to march under the national flag, which is the sign of our union, which finally announces
the reunion of the three colors.

Our flag makes it clear that our liberty depends on these three colors; white, mulatto*, black. We are
fighting for these three colors. The nobility and the Spaniards want us to have only the white in order to
bring us back to the old order. But no, we are French; we are fighting for our freedom; we want to live
free or die, that is the motto of all good French republicans.

*a racial classification – now considered offensive – for a person of both white and Black ancestry

Document 5

Source: Toussaint Louverture, Haitian general and leader of the Haitian Revolution, letter to the
Directory (the five men who ruled France prior to Napoleon’s rise to power), 1797

Do they (the planters) think that men who have been able to enjoy the blessing of liberty will calmly see it
snatched away? But no, the same hand which has broken our chains will not enslave us anew. France will
not revoke her principles, she will not withdraw from us the greatest of her benefits…But if, to re-
establish slavery in San Domingo, this was done, then I declare to you it would be to attempt the
impossible; we have known how to face dangers to obtain our liberty, we shall know how to brave death
to maintain it. This, Citizen Directors, is the morale of the people of San Domingo, those are the
principles that they transmit to you by me.
 Document 6

Source: Transatlantic Slave Trade – Estimates, SlaveVoyages.org

The chart below indicates the total number of enslaved persons who embarked on slave ships for French
colonies in the Caribbean from 1626-1850. It does not include the number of enslaved persons who
disembarked when these ships reached their destinations.

Colonies in the French Caribbean

Year Saint-Domingue Martinique Guadeloupe French Guiana unspecified
1626-1650 0 628 0 0 0
1651-1675 0 3,090 1,517 351 1,812
1676-1700 6,415 11,776 351 1,872 5,052
1701-1725 52,671 38,459 1,414 1,614 853
1726-1750 167,751 78,566 738 2,914 643
1751-1775 283,268 22,456 6,687 3,466 0
1776-1800 388,719 8,317 11,531 4,973 326
Total 898,824 163,292 22,238 15,190 8,686

Document 7

Source: The Haitian Declaration of Independence, proclaimed by Jean-Jacques Dessalines, leader of the
Haitian Revolution after Toussaint Louverture’s capture and death, who became the first ruler of the
nation of Haiti, 1804

Today, January 1st 1804, the general in chief of the native army, accompanied by the generals of the army,
assembled in order to take measures that will insure the good of the country;

After having told the assembled generals his true intentions, to assure forever a stable government for the
natives of Haiti, the object of his greatest concern, which he has accomplished in a speech which declares
to foreign powers the decision to make the country independent, and to enjoy a liberty consecrated by the
blood of the people of this island; and after having gathered their responses has asked that each of the
assembled generals take a vow to forever renounce France, to die rather than live under its domination,
and to fight for independence until their last breath.

The generals, deeply moved by these sacred principles, after voting their unanimous attachment to the
declared project of independence, have all sworn to posterity, to the universe, to forever renounce
France, and to die rather than to live under its domination.