TOUSSAINT

Toussaint L'Ouverture is born into slavery in 1743 on the Caribbean French colony of Saint Domingue (modern day Haiti). Son of an African tribal chief, Toussaint's innate intelligence and born leadership skills catch the attention of the (for his day) enlightened plantation owner who affords him a Jesuit education, later appointing him estate manager and eventually granting him his freedom.

Imbued with revolutionary fervor and ideals, Commissioner Santhonax arrives from France in 1793, proclaiming emancipation in return for law, order and stability. Ardent admirer of France and its revolution, Toussaint joins the cause and the pursuit of freedom for his people. Hedging his bets, he musters and trains a professional native army, maintaining uneasy alliances with both the French and (on the eastern half of the island) the Spanish authorities, pitting one against the other, all the while obtaining French intelligence from various sources, including an alluring Marquise, whose husband understandably detests Toussaint.

As Toussaint's stature and reputation rise, his subtle politicking infuriates friend and foe alike. The Mulattos, under the command of Andre Rigaud, rise up in a bloody insurrection from which Toussaint and his disciplined army of slaves, freed men and Jacobin French ultimately emerge victorious. The harsh discipline Toussaint imposes on his own troops (even executing his own nephew Moyse after he rises against him for prohibiting the locals' voodoo practices) and the compassion he shows to his vanquished enemies (whom he pardons in return for their submission) is a winning combination. However, tensions rise when Toussaint's right hand man General Dessalines' ruthless conduct clashes with Toussaint's restraint and his unfaltering faith in Napoleon and the French Revolution's refrain of "Liberté, Fraternité, Égalité".

Meanwhile, furious at the disruption to his colonial revenues, Napoleon sends an expedition lead by his brother-in-law Leclerc and his sister Pauline Bonaparte to retake the colony and restore slavery. Toussaint, finally recognizing Napoleon's deceit, decides that only complete independence from France will guarantee freedom for his people. At first rejecting Leclerc's disingenuous peace treatises, Toussaint is finally lured into what he believes are good faith negotiations, only to be taken prisoner and sent into captivity at a prison in the freezing mountains of France's Jura where he dies from deprivation. With Toussaint gone, Dessalines leads the Haitian army to victory, the French are expelled and Haiti, the first Black Republic, achieves its independence.