In 1789 the French colony of Saint Domingue was the wealthiest and most flourishing of the Caribbean slave colonies. The slave revolt of 1791 set in motion the colony's struggle for independence as Haiti. Carolyn Fick argues that the slaves were the principal architects both of their own freedom and of the successful movement toward independence. Preface xi(2) Acknowledgments xiii Introduction 1(14) PART ONE Background to Revolution 15(76) 1 Slavery and Slave Society 15(31) 2 Slave Resistance 46(30) 3 The Coming of the Black Revolution 76(15) PART TWO Revolts of 1791 91(46) 4 Slaves in the North 91(27) 5 The Mulattoes and the Free Blacks 118(19) PART THREE The South 137(100) 6 Port-Salut to Les Platons 137(20) 7 The Blacks React to Freedom 157(26) 8 From Freedom to Civil War 183(21) 9 From Civil War to Independence 204(33) Conclusion 237(14) APPENDIX A Interrogation of the Negress Assam 251(9) APPENDIX B Bois-Caiman and the August Revolt 260(7) APPENDIX C Declarations of the Slave Antoine and Sieur Fabvre 267(3) APPENDIX D Grande-Anse Movement Documents 270(3) Abbreviations 273(2) Notes 275(58) Bibliography 333(8) Index 341