Haiti
Modern-day Léogane, a town in the southwest, is at the site of Xaragua's former capital.
Christopher Columbus landed at Môle Saint-Nicolas on 5 December 1492, and claimed the island for Spain. Nineteen days later, his ship the Santa María ran aground near the present site of Cap-Haïtien; Columbus was forced to leave behind 39 men, founding the settlement of La Navidad.
One of the earliest leaders to fight off Spanish conquest was Queen Anacaona, a princess of Xaragua who married Caonabo, the cacique of Maguana. The couple resisted Spanish rule in vain; she was captured by the Spanish and executed in front of her people.
To this day, Anacaona is revered in Haiti as one of the country's founders.* Map of Haiti
1510 pictograph telling a story of missionaries arriving in Hispaniola
The Spaniards exploited the island for its gold, mined chiefly by local Amerindians directed by the Spanish occupiers. Those refusing to work in the mines were killed or sold into slavery.
Europeans brought with them chronic infectious diseases that were new to the Caribbean, to which the indigenous population lacked immunity. These new diseases were the chief cause of the dying off of the Taíno, but ill treatment, malnutrition, and a drastic drop in the birthrate as a result of societal disruption also contributed.
The first recorded smallpox outbreak in the Americas occurred on Hispaniola in 1507.
The Laws of Burgos, 1512–1513, were the first nationally codified set of laws governing the behavior of Spanish settlers in America, particularly with regards to native Indians. They forbade the maltreatment of natives, endorsed their conversion to Catholicism, and legalized the colonial practice of creating encomiendas, where Indians were grouped together to work under colonial masters. The Spanish crown found it difficult to enforce these laws in a distant colony.
The Spanish governors began importing enslaved Africans for labor.
French settlers later called people of mixed African and Amerindian ancestry marabou. The mestizo were children born to relationships between native women and European – usually Spanish – men.
During French rule, children of mixed race, usually born of unions between African women and European men, were called mulâtres. John James Audubon, the renowned ornithologist and painter, was born in 1785 in Les Cayes, Saint-Domingue and painted, cataloged and described the birds of North America.
In 1779, more than 500 volunteers from Saint-Domingue, under the command of Comte d'Estaing, fought alongside American colonial troops against the British in the Siege of Savannah, one of the most significant foreign contributions to the American Revolutionary War.
17th century settlement
Bertrand d'Orgeron attracted many colonists from Martinique and Guadeloupe, such as the Roy family (Jean Roy, 1625–1707); Hebert (Jean Hebert, 1624, with his family) and Barre (Guillaume Barre, 1642, with his family).
It quickly became the richest French colony in the New World due to the immense profits from the sugar, coffee and indigo industries. The French-enacted Code Noir ("Black Code"), prepared by Jean-Baptiste Colbert and ratified by Louis XIV, established rigid rules on slave treatment and permissible freedom.
Most important was the revolution of the slaves in Saint-Domingue, starting in the heavily African-majority northern plains in 1791. Six months later, the National Convention led by the Jacobins endorsed abolition and extended it to all the French colonies.
Toussaint l'Ouverture, a former slave and leader in the slave revolt—a man who rose in importance as a military commander because of his many skills—achieved peace in Saint-Domingue after years of war against both external invaders and internal dissension.
In addition, the newly arrived slaves added to the city's African and multiracial culture.
Dessalines was proclaimed Emperor for life by his troops. He exiled or killed the remaining whites and ruled as a despot. In the continuing competition for power, he was assassinated on 17 October 1806. The country was divided then between a kingdom in the north directed by Henri I; and a republic in the south directed by Alexandre Pétion, an homme de couleur. Henri I is best known for constructing the Citadelle Laferrière, the largest fortress in the Western Hemisphere, to defend the island against the French.
In 1815, Simon Bolivar, the South American political leader who was instrumental in Latin America's struggle for independence from Spain, received military and financial assistance from Haiti.
Bolivar had fled to Haiti after an attempt had been made on his life in Jamaica, where he had unsuccessfully sought support for his efforts. In 1817, on condition that Bolivar free any enslaved people he encountered in his fight for South American independence, Haitian president Alexandre Pétion provided Bolivar with soldiers, weapons and financial assistance which were critical in enabling him to liberate Venezuela.
Jean-Pierre Boyer, one of the leaders of the Haitian Revolution, and President of Haiti from 1818 to 1843
Beginning in 1821, President Jean Pierre Boyer, also an homme de couleur and successor to Pétion, managed to reunify the two parts of St.
Its provisions sought to tie the peasant labourers to plantation land by denying them the right to leave the land, enter the towns, or start farms or shops of their own.
During Boyer's administration, his government negotiated with Loring D. They hoped to gain people with skills to contribute to the independent nation.
http:www.imf.org/external/pubs/ft/weo/2009/02/weodata/weorept.aspx?sy=2006&ey=2009&scsm=1&ssd=1&sort=country&ds=.&br=1&c=263&s=NGDPD%2CNGDPDPC%2CPPPGDP%2CPPPPC%2CLP&grp=0&a=&pr.x=47&pr.y=12. http:www.nytimes.com/2010/01/24/world/americas/24bodies.html?th&emc=th.
"Breath, Eyes, Memory" & "Krik? Krak!" as well as many other books. Pathologies of Power: Health, Human Rights, and the New War on the Poor.