Léger-Félicité Sonthonax
Léger-Félicité Sonthonax (7 March 1763 – 23 July 1813) was a French
abolitionist and
Jacobin before joining the
Girondist party, which emerged in 1791. During the
French Revolution, he controlled 7,000 French troops in
Saint-Domingue during part of the
Haitian Revolution. His official title was Civil Commissioner. From September 1792, he and Polverel became the ''
de facto'' rulers of Saint-Domingue's non-slave population. Because they were associated with Brissot’s party, they were put in accusation by the convention on July 16, 1793, but a ship to bring them back in France didn’t arrive in the colony until June 1794, and they arrived in France in the time of the downfall of Robespierre. They had a fair trial in 1795 and were acquitted of the charges the white colonists brought against them. Sonthonax believed that Saint-Domingue's whites were
royalists or
separatists, so he attacked the military power of the white settlers and by doing so alienated the
colonial settlers from their government. Many ''
gens de couleur'' (mixed-race residents of the colony) asserted that they could form the military backbone of Saint-Domingue if they were given rights, but Sonthonax rejected this view as outdated in the wake of the August 1791 slave uprising. He believed that Saint-Domingue would need ex-slave soldiers among the ranks of the colonial army if it was to survive. On August 1793, he proclaimed freedom for all slaves in the north province. His critics allege that he was forced into ending slavery in order to maintain his own power.
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