Haiti's Influence on Antebellum America: Slumbering Volcano in the Caribbean

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LSU Press, Aug 1, 2006 - History - 216 pages

The Haitian Revolution began in 1791 as a slave revolt on the French colonial island of Saint Domingue and ended thirteen years later with the founding of an independent black republic. Waves of French West Indians -- slaves, white colonists, and free blacks -- fled the upheaval and flooded southern U.S. ports -- most notably New Orleans -- bringing with them everything from French opera to voodoo. Alfred N. Hunt discusses the ways these immigrants affected southern agriculture, architecture, language, politics, medicine, religion, and the arts. He also considers how the events in Haiti influenced the American slavery-emancipation debate and spurred developments in black militancy and Pan-Africanism in the United States. By effecting the development of racial ideology in antebellum America, Hunt concludes, the Haitian Revolution was a major contributing factor to the attitudes that led to the Civil War.

 

Contents

TWO St Domingan Refugees in the Lower South
37
THREE Toussaints Image in Antebellum America
84
FOUR The Southern Response to the Haitian
107
FIVE Blacks and Their Allies Respond
147
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About the author (2006)

Alfred N. Hunt is a professor of history at the State University of New York at Purchase.

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