“The Slave Revolution”: how did slaves fight for their freedom, what was the result of slavery in the modern world?
23 August marks the International Day for the Remembrance of the Victims of the Slave Trade and its Elimination. This date was chosen by the UNESCO General Conference to commemorate the famous Haitian Revolution - a major slave uprising on the island of Santo Domingo on the night of 22 on August 23, which subsequently led to the emergence of Haiti - the first state in the world governed by liberated slaves and the first independent country in Latin America It is believed that before the slave trade in the XIX century was officially banned, at different times from the African continent only to the North American colonies of Great Britain were taken out with the aim of enslaving at least 14 millions of Africans. Millions of Africans were supplied to the Spanish, Portuguese, French, Dutch colonies. They marked the beginning of the black population of the New World, which today is especially numerous in Brazil, the USA and the islands of the Caribbean. However, these colossal numbers relate only to the very limited time and geography of the period of the transatlantic slave trade of the XVI-XIX centuries, carried out by Portuguese, Spanish, French, English, American, Dutch slave traders. The true extent of the slave trade in the world for all its history not amenable to exact calculation.
Slave Route to the New World
The transatlantic slave trade began its history in the middle of the XV century, with the beginning of the era of great geographical discoveries. Moreover, it was officially sanctioned by none other than Pope Nicholas V, who released a special bull in 1452, which allowed Portugal to seize land on the African continent and sell black Africans into slavery. Thus, at the origins of the slave trade was, among other things, the Catholic Church, which patronized the maritime powers of that time, Spain and Portugal, considered the stronghold of the papal throne. At the first stage of the transatlantic slave trade, it was the Portuguese who were destined to play a key role in it. This was due to the fact that it was the Portuguese before all European countries began the systematic development of the African continent.
Prince Heinrich the Navigator (1394-1460), who stood at the beginning of the Portuguese sea epic, set the goal of his military-political and shipping activity to search for the sea route to India. For forty years, this unique Portuguese political, military and religious figure has equipped numerous expeditions, sending them to find their way to India and to discover new lands.
- Portuguese Prince Heinrich got his nickname "Navigator", or "Navigator", because he devoted almost all of his adult life to researching new lands and extending the power of the Portuguese crown to them. He not only equipped and sent expeditions, but also personally participated in the capture of Ceuta, founded the famous school of navigation and navigation in Sagres.
The Portuguese expeditions, sent by Prince Henry, rounded the west coast of the African continent, conducting reconnaissance of coastal areas and, at strategic points, erecting Portuguese trading posts. The story of the Portuguese slave trade began with the work of Heinrich the Navigator and the expeditions he sent. The first slaves were taken from the west coast of the African continent and taken to Lisbon, after which the Portuguese throne obtained from the Pope the Roman permission for the colonization of the African continent and the removal of black slaves.
However, until the mid-17th century, the African continent, especially its west coast, was in the spectrum of interests of the Portuguese crown in secondary positions. In the XV-XVI centuries. The Portuguese monarchs considered their main task to be the search for a sea route to India, and then to ensure the safety of Portuguese forts in India, East Africa and the sea route from India to Portugal. The situation changed at the end of the 17th century, when plantation agriculture began to actively develop in Brazil, mastered by the Portuguese. Similar processes took place in other European colonies in the New World, which sharply increased the demand for African slaves, who were considered a much more acceptable labor force than the American Indians who could not and did not want to work on plantations. Increasing demand for slaves actualized the attention of the Portuguese monarchs to their trading posts on the West African coast. The main source of replenishment of slaves for Portuguese Brazil was the coast of Angola. By this time, Angola had begun to be actively mastered by the Portuguese, who had paid attention to its considerable human resources. If the Spanish, British and French colonies in the West Indies and North America brought slaves primarily from the coast of the Gulf of Guinea, then Brazil sent the main stream from Angola, although there were large shipments of slaves from the Portuguese trading posts to the Slave Coast.
Later, as the European colonization of the African continent developed, on the one hand, and the New World, on the other, Spain, the Netherlands, England, France joined the process of the transatlantic slave trade. Each of these states had colonies in the New World and African trading posts from which slaves were exported. It was on the use of slave labor over several centuries that the whole economy of "both Americas" was actually based. It turned out a kind of “slave trade triangle”. From the West African coast, slaves came to America, through the labor of which they planted crops on the plantations, obtained minerals at the mines, and then exported to Europe. This situation persisted as a whole until the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, despite numerous protests by supporters of the abolition of slavery, inspired by the ideas of French humanists or Quaker sectarians. The beginning of the end of the "triangle" was laid just by the events of the night of 22-23 in August 1791, in the colony of Santo Domingo.
Sugar Island
By the end of the 18th century 80, the island of Haiti, which was called Christopher Columbus Espanyola (1492 year) when it was opened, was divided into two parts. The Spaniards, who originally owned the island, officially recognized the rights of France to one-third of the island, which had been controlled by French pirates since 1697, in 1625. Thus began the history of the French colony of Santo Domingo. The Spanish part of the island later became the Dominican Republic, the French - the Republic of Haiti, but more on that later.
Santo Domingo was one of the most significant West Indian colonies. There were numerous plantations, which gave 40% of the total world sugar turnover of that time. The plantations belonged to Europeans of French origin, among whom, among others, were many descendants of Sephardic Jews who emigrated to the New World countries, fleeing from European anti-Semitic sentiments. At the same time, the French part of the island was the most economically significant.
- oddly enough, the history of the French expansion on the island of Espanyol, later renamed Santo Domingo and Haiti, was started by the buccaneer pirates. Having settled on the west coast of the island, they terrorized the Spanish authorities, to whom the island belonged entirely and, ultimately, ensured that the Spaniards were forced to recognize French sovereignty over this part of their colonial possession.
The social structure of Santo Domingo for the time being described included three main groups of the population. The top floor of the social hierarchy was occupied by the French - first of all, the natives of France, who formed the backbone of the administrative apparatus, and the Creoles, descendants of French immigrants, who were already born on the island, and other Europeans. Their total number reached 40 000 people, in whose hands almost all the land ownership of the colony was concentrated. In addition to the French and other Europeans, there were also about 30 000 freedmen and their descendants living on the island. These were mostly mulattoes, descendants of the ties of European men with their African slaves, who received liberation. Of course, they were not the elite of colonial society and were recognized as racially inferior, but because of their free position and the availability of European blood, they were considered by the colonialists as a support for their power. Among the mulattoes were not only supervisors, police guards, minor officials, but also plantation managers and even owners of their own plantations.
At the bottom of the colonial society were 500 000 black slaves. At that time, it was actually half of all the slaves in the West Indies. Slaves in Santo Domingo were brought from the coast of West Africa - primarily from the so-called. Slave Coast, located on the territory of modern Benin, Togo and parts of Nigeria, as well as from the territory of modern Guinea. That is, Haitian slaves were descendants of African peoples living in those areas. At the new place of residence, people from various African tribes mingled, resulting in the formation of a special unique Afro-Caribbean culture, which absorbed elements of the cultures of both West African peoples and colonialists. By 1780. the importation of slaves into Santo Domingo reached peak levels. If 1771 brought thousands of slaves per year to 15, then 1786 thousands of Africans arrived annually in 28, and by the 1787, French plantations began to receive 40 thousands of black slaves.
However, as the number of the African population increased, social problems also increased in the colonies. In many ways, they turned out to be associated with the emergence of a significant stratum of “colored” - mulattoes, who, getting liberated from slavery, began to get rich and, accordingly, to claim the expansion of their social rights. Some mulattos themselves became planters, as a rule, living hard to reach and unsuitable for growing sugar mountainous areas. Here they created coffee plantations. By the way, by the end of the 18th century, Santo Domingo accounted for the export of 60% of coffee consumed in Europe. By the same time, a third of the plantations of the colony and a quarter of black slaves were in the hands of the mulattoes. Yes, yes, yesterday's slaves or their descendants did not disdain to use the slave labor of their darker tribesmen, being not less cruel masters than the French.
23 August Uprising and the Black Consul
When the Great French Revolution took place, the mulattoes demanded an equal rights with the French government from the White. The representative of the mulatto, Jacques Vincent Auger, went to Paris, from where he returned, imbued with the spirit of the revolution, and demanded that the mulattoes and whites be fully equalized, including in the area of granting electoral rights. Since the colonial administration was much more conservative than the Parisian revolutionaries, the governor Jacques Auger refused and the latter revolted at the beginning of 1791. Colonial troops managed to suppress the uprising, and the Auger itself to arrest and put to death. Nevertheless, the beginning of the struggle of the African population of the island for their liberation was laid. On the night of 22 on 23 on August 1791, the next major uprising began, led by Alejandro Bucman. Naturally, the first victims of the uprising were European settlers. In just two months, 2000 people of European descent were killed. Plantations were also burned - yesterday's slaves did not imagine any further prospects for the economic development of the island and were not going to engage in farming. However, initially the French troops, with the help of the British, who had come to the rescue from the neighboring British colonies in the West Indies, managed to partially suppress the uprising and execute Buckman.
However, the suppression of the first wave of the uprising, the beginning of which is now celebrated as the International Day of Remembrance of the Slave Trade and the Victims of the Slave Trade, only caused a second wave - more organized and, therefore, more dangerous. After the execution of Buckman, Francois Dominique Toussaint (1743-1803), better known to the modern reader as Toussaint-Louverture, led the rebel slaves. In Soviet times, the writer A.K. Vinogradov wrote the novel “The Black Consul” about him and about the Haitian revolution. Indeed, Toussaint Louverture was an extraordinary figure and in many respects a matter of respect even among his opponents. Toussaintus was a black slave, despite his status having received a good education by colonial standards. He worked as a doctor with his master, then in 1776, he received a long-awaited release and worked as a property manager. Apparently, out of gratitude to his master for his release, as well as his human decency, Toussaint soon after the start of the August 1791 uprising of the year helped the family of the former owner to escape and escape. After that, Toussaint joined the uprising and, by virtue of education, as well as outstanding qualities, quickly became one of its leaders.
- Toussaint Louverture was probably the most adequate leader of the Haitians in the entire history of the struggle for independence and the further sovereign existence of the country. He sent to European culture and his two sons, born of his mulatto wife, sent him to study in France. By the way, they later returned to the island with the French Expeditionary Force.
In the meantime, the French authorities have also demonstrated conflicting policies. If in Paris, the power was in the hands of revolutionaries, focused, among other things, on the abolition of slavery, in the colony the local administration, supported by planters, did not intend to lose their positions and sources of income. Therefore, there has been a confrontation between the central government of France and the governor of Santo Domingo. As soon as the abolition of slavery was officially proclaimed in France in 1794, Toussaint listened to the advice of the revolutionary governor of the island, Etienne Lavaux, and went over to the side of the rebellious slaves to the Convention. The rebel leader was given the military rank of brigadier general, after which Toussaint led military operations against the Spanish troops, who, using the political crisis in France, tried to seize the colony and put down the slave uprising. Later, Toussaint's units also clashed with British troops, also sent from the nearby British colonies to suppress the uprising of blacks. Showing himself an outstanding military leader, Toussaint was able to expel both the Spaniards and the British from the island. At the same time, Toussaint dealt with the mulatto leaders who tried to maintain their leading position on the island after the expulsion of the French planters. In 1801, the colonial assembly declared autonomy for the Santo Domingo colony. The governor was, of course, Toussaint Louverture.
The fate of the slave of the day before yesterday, yesterday’s rebel leader and the current black governor, was unenviable and became the complete opposite of the 1790's triumph. This was due to the fact that the metropolis, where Napoleon Bonaparte was in power by that time, decided to stop the “unrest” that was taking place in Santo Domingo and sent expeditionary forces to the island. Yesterday's closest associates of the “black consul” switched over to the French. The very father of Haitian independence was arrested and taken to France, where he died two years later in the Fort-de-Zhou prison. The dreams of the “black consul” of Haiti as a free republic of yesterday’s slaves did not come true. That which replaced French colonial rule and plantation slavery had nothing to do with the true ideas of freedom and equality. In October, the 1802 of the year, the mulatto leaders revolted against the French Expeditionary Force, and the 18 of November, the 1803 of the year, were able to finally defeat it. 1 January 1804 was proclaimed the creation of a new independent state - the Republic of Haiti.
Haiti's sad fate
In two hundred and ten years of sovereign existence, the first independence colony has evolved from the most economically developed region of the West Indies into one of the poorest countries in the world, shaken by constant upheavals, with an overwhelming crime rate and terrible poverty of the overwhelming majority of the population. Naturally, it is worth telling how it happened. 9 months after the proclamation of independence of Haiti, 22 of September 1804, the former associate of Toussaint-Louverture, Jean Jacques Dessaline (1758-1806), also a slave in the past, and then the rebel commander, declared himself Emperor of Haiti Jacob I.
- the former slave Dessaline before his release was named in honor of the master Jacques Duclos. Despite the fact that he became the initiator of this genocide of the white population on the island, he saved his master, following the example of Toussaint-Louverture, from death. Obviously, Dessalina was not allowed to rest by Napoleon’s laurels, but the Haitian’s talent as a great Corsican was absent.
The first decision of the new monarch was the total massacre of the white population, as a result of which there was practically no one left on the island. Accordingly, there are practically no specialists left able to develop the economy, heal and teach people, build buildings and roads. But among yesterday's rebels appeared a lot of those who want to become kings and emperors themselves.
Two years after the proclamation of himself emperor of Haiti, Jean-Jacques Dessaline was brutally murdered by yesterday's comrades. One of them, Henri Christophe, was appointed head of the provisional military government. At first, he was quite long, five years old, tolerated this modest title, however, in 1811, he could not stand it and proclaimed himself King of Haiti Henri I. We note that he was clearly more modest than Dessaline and did not claim imperial regalia. But from its supporters formed the Haitian nobility, generously endowing them with aristocratic titles. Yesterday's slaves became dukes, counts, viscounts.
In the southwest of the island, after the assassination of Dessalines, mulatto planters lifted their heads. Their leader, Mulatto Alexander Petion, turned out to be a more adequate man than his former comrades in the fight. He did not declare himself emperor and king, but was approved as the first president of Haiti. Thus, until 1820, when King Henri Christophe shot himself, fearing more terrible reprisals from the participants in the uprising against him, there were two Haiti - the monarchy and the republic. A universal education was proclaimed in the republic, the distribution of land to yesterday’s slaves was organized. In general, for the country it was almost the best of times in its history. At least, Petion tried to somehow contribute to the economic revival of the former colony, while not forgetting to support the national liberation movement in the Spanish colonies of Latin America - to help Bolivar and other leaders in the struggle for sovereignty of Latin American countries. However, Pétion died before Christophe’s suicide - in 1818. Under the rule of the successor of Pétion Jean Pierre Boyer, both of Haiti were united. Boyer reigned until 1843, after which a black line in the history of Haiti was overthrown and continued until the present.
The reasons for the serious socio-economic situation and the constant political confusion in the first state of African slaves are largely due to the specifics of the social system that has developed in the country after the pre-colonization. First of all, it should be noted that the planters that were cut out or fled were replaced by equally cruel exploiters from the number of mulattoes and blacks. The economy in the country practically did not develop, and the constant military coups only destabilized the political situation. The twentieth century was even worse for Haiti in the nineteenth century. It was marked by the American occupation of 1915-1934, which aimed to protect the interests of American companies from constant unrest in the republic, by the cruel dictatorship of “Papa Duvalier” in 1957-1971, whose punitive forces - “tonton-makuta” - received worldwide fame, a series of uprisings and military coups. The latest large-scale news about Haiti is the 2010 earthquake that killed 300 thousands of people and caused the most severe damage to the country's already frail infrastructure, and the cholera epidemic in the same 2010 year that cost 8 thousands of Haitians.
Today, the numbers can most clearly be said about the socio-economic situation in Haiti. Two-thirds of the Haitian population (60%) are unemployed and have no regular sources of income, but those who work do not have adequate income - 80% of Haitians live below the poverty line. Half of the country's population (50%) is completely illiterate. The epidemic of AIDS continues in the country - 6% of the population of the republic are infected with the immunodeficiency virus (and this is according to official data). In fact, Haiti, in the truest sense of the word, has turned into a real “black hole” of the New World. In the Soviet historical and political literature, the socio-economic and political problems of Haiti were explained by the intrigues of American imperialism, the island and the population interested in the exploitation of the territory. In fact, although it is impossible to disregard the role of the United States in the artificial cultivation of backwardness in the countries of Central America, the history of the country is the cause of many ills. Starting with the genocide of the white population, the destruction of beneficial plantations and the destruction of infrastructure, the leaders of yesterday’s slaves could not build a normal state and themselves doomed it to the dire situation in which Haiti has existed for two centuries. The old slogan "destroy everything to the ground, and then ..." worked only in the first half. No, of course, many of those who were nobody really became “everything” in sovereign Haiti, but thanks to their management methods, the new world was never built.
Modern "living dead"
Meanwhile, the problem of slavery and the slave trade remains relevant in the modern world. Although the 23 of the year has passed since the Haitian uprising of August 1791 of the year, a little less since slavery has been effected by the European colonial powers, slavery still exists today. Even if we don’t talk about all the well-known examples of sexual slavery, the use of labor by abducted people or by the force of people held there, there is slavery and, as they say, “on an industrial scale”. Human rights organizations, speaking of the scale of slavery in the modern world, refer to numbers up to 223 million people. However, the figure of the English sociologist Kevin Beylz, speaking about 200 to millions of slaves, is most likely closer to the truth. First of all, their work is used in the countries of the “third world” - in households, the agro-industrial complex, the mining and manufacturing industries.
Regions of the spread of mass slavery in the modern world — first of all, the countries of South Asia — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, some states of West, Central and East Africa, and Latin America. In India and Bangladesh, under slavery can be meant, in the first place, virtually unpaid child labor in enterprises of certain industries. Families of landless peasants, who, despite the lack of material wealth, differ in extremely high birth rates, sell their sons and daughters to despair in enterprises where the latter work virtually for free and in extremely difficult and dangerous conditions for life and health. In Thailand, there is a “sexual slavery” that has taken the form of a massive sale of girls from remote areas of the country to brothels in major resort cities (Thailand is the place of attraction for “sex tourists” from around the world). Child labor is widely used on plantations to collect cocoa beans and peanuts in West African countries, primarily in Côte d'Ivoire, which receives slaves from neighboring and more economically backward Mali and Burkina Faso.
In Mauritania, the social structure still recalls the phenomenon of slavery. As is known, in this country, one of the most backward and closed even by the standards of the African continent, the caste division of society remains. There is the highest military nobility - the “Hassans” from the Arab-Bedouin tribes, the Muslim clergy - the “Marabuts” and the pastoral nomads - the “Zenaga” - mainly of Berber origin, and also the “Haratins” - descendants of slaves and freedmen. The number of slaves in Mauritania is 20% of the population - this is certainly the highest in the world. Three times the Mauritanian authorities tried to ban slavery - and all without success. The first time is in 1905, under the influence of France. The second time is in 1981, the last time is quite recently, in 2007.
Whether the ancestors of the Moorish have any relation to slaves is simple enough to know - by skin color. The highest castes of the Mauritanian society are Caucasoid Arabs and Berbers, the lower castes are Negroids, descendants of African slaves captured by nomads from Senegal and Mali. Since status does not allow higher castes to perform “work duties”, all agricultural and handicraft work, caring for livestock, and household are on the shoulders of slaves. But in Mauritania, slavery is special - Eastern, also called “domestic”. Many such "slaves" live well, so they, even after the official abolition of slavery in the country, are in no hurry to leave their masters, living in the position of domestic servants. Indeed, in the event of care, they will inevitably be doomed to poverty and unemployment.
In Niger, slavery was officially abolished only in 1995, less than twenty years ago. Naturally, after such a short time, it is hardly possible to speak of the complete eradication of this archaic phenomenon in the life of the country. International organizations talk about at least 43 thousands of slaves in modern Niger. Their focus is, on the one hand, the tribal confederations of nomads, the Tuareg, where slavery is analogous to the Mauritanian, and on the other, the houses of the tribal nobility of the Hausa people, which also contain significant numbers of "domestic slaves." A similar situation exists in Mali, whose social structure is in many ways similar to the Moorish and Nigerian.
Needless to say, slavery persists in Haiti itself, from which the struggle for the liberation of slaves began. In modern Haitian society, a phenomenon called “restores” has become widespread. So called children and adolescents sold to domestic slavery to more prosperous fellow citizens. The overwhelming majority of families, given the total poverty of Haitian society and mass unemployment, are unable to provide even the food they give birth to; therefore, as a child grows to a more or less independent age, it is sold into domestic slavery. International organizations claim that there are up to 300 thousand “restores” in the country.
- The number of child slaves in Haiti increased even more after the catastrophic 2010 earthquake of the year, when hundreds of thousands of already impoverished families lost even their squalid homes and scarce property. Surviving children became the only commodity, due to the sale of which it was possible to exist for some time.
Given that the population in the country is about 10 million, this is not so small a figure. As a rule, restorers are exploited as domestic servants, and they are treated cruelly and, when they reach a young age, are most often driven out into the street. Deprived of education and having no profession, yesterday's "child slaves" join the ranks of street prostitutes, the homeless, petty criminals.
Despite the protests of international organizations, “restorations” in Haiti are so common that they are considered absolutely normal in Haitian society. A home slave can give a wedding to the newlyweds, can even sell to a relatively poor family. Most often, the social status and wealth of the owner is reflected in the little slave - in poor families the “restores” live even worse than in the wealthy. Very often, from a poor family living in a slum area of Port-au-Prince or another Haitian city, a child is sold into slavery into a family with about the same material wealth. Naturally, the police and authorities turn a blind eye to such a massive phenomenon in Haitian society.
It is significant that many migrants from archaic societies in Asia and Africa transfer their social relations to the “host countries” of Europe and America. Thus, the police of European states repeatedly revealed cases of “internal slavery” in the diasporas of Asian and African migrants. People from Mauritania, Somalia, Sudan or India may keep slaves in the “migrant quarters” of London, Paris or Berlin, without thinking about the relevance of this phenomenon in “civilized Europe”. Cases of slavery are frequent and widely covered in the post-Soviet space, including in the Russian Federation. Obviously, the possibilities for maintaining such a situation are dictated not only by social conditions in the Third World countries, condemning people from them to the role of guest workers and slaves in homes and enterprises of more successful compatriots, but also by the policy of multiculturalism, which allows for the existence of enclaves of completely alien cultures on European territory.
Thus, the presence of slavery in the modern world indicates that the theme of the struggle against the slave trade is relevant not only in relation to the long-standing historical events in the New World, to the transatlantic supply of slaves from Africa to America. It is poverty and powerlessness in the third world countries, the plundering of their national wealth by transnational corporations, the corruption of local governments become a favorable background for the preservation of this monstrous phenomenon. And, in some cases, as the example of the history of Haiti, given in this article, shows, the descendants of yesterday’s slaves themselves fertilize the soil of modern slavery.
Slave Route to the New World
The transatlantic slave trade began its history in the middle of the XV century, with the beginning of the era of great geographical discoveries. Moreover, it was officially sanctioned by none other than Pope Nicholas V, who released a special bull in 1452, which allowed Portugal to seize land on the African continent and sell black Africans into slavery. Thus, at the origins of the slave trade was, among other things, the Catholic Church, which patronized the maritime powers of that time, Spain and Portugal, considered the stronghold of the papal throne. At the first stage of the transatlantic slave trade, it was the Portuguese who were destined to play a key role in it. This was due to the fact that it was the Portuguese before all European countries began the systematic development of the African continent.
Prince Heinrich the Navigator (1394-1460), who stood at the beginning of the Portuguese sea epic, set the goal of his military-political and shipping activity to search for the sea route to India. For forty years, this unique Portuguese political, military and religious figure has equipped numerous expeditions, sending them to find their way to India and to discover new lands.
The Portuguese expeditions, sent by Prince Henry, rounded the west coast of the African continent, conducting reconnaissance of coastal areas and, at strategic points, erecting Portuguese trading posts. The story of the Portuguese slave trade began with the work of Heinrich the Navigator and the expeditions he sent. The first slaves were taken from the west coast of the African continent and taken to Lisbon, after which the Portuguese throne obtained from the Pope the Roman permission for the colonization of the African continent and the removal of black slaves.
However, until the mid-17th century, the African continent, especially its west coast, was in the spectrum of interests of the Portuguese crown in secondary positions. In the XV-XVI centuries. The Portuguese monarchs considered their main task to be the search for a sea route to India, and then to ensure the safety of Portuguese forts in India, East Africa and the sea route from India to Portugal. The situation changed at the end of the 17th century, when plantation agriculture began to actively develop in Brazil, mastered by the Portuguese. Similar processes took place in other European colonies in the New World, which sharply increased the demand for African slaves, who were considered a much more acceptable labor force than the American Indians who could not and did not want to work on plantations. Increasing demand for slaves actualized the attention of the Portuguese monarchs to their trading posts on the West African coast. The main source of replenishment of slaves for Portuguese Brazil was the coast of Angola. By this time, Angola had begun to be actively mastered by the Portuguese, who had paid attention to its considerable human resources. If the Spanish, British and French colonies in the West Indies and North America brought slaves primarily from the coast of the Gulf of Guinea, then Brazil sent the main stream from Angola, although there were large shipments of slaves from the Portuguese trading posts to the Slave Coast.
Later, as the European colonization of the African continent developed, on the one hand, and the New World, on the other, Spain, the Netherlands, England, France joined the process of the transatlantic slave trade. Each of these states had colonies in the New World and African trading posts from which slaves were exported. It was on the use of slave labor over several centuries that the whole economy of "both Americas" was actually based. It turned out a kind of “slave trade triangle”. From the West African coast, slaves came to America, through the labor of which they planted crops on the plantations, obtained minerals at the mines, and then exported to Europe. This situation persisted as a whole until the turn of the 18th and 19th centuries, despite numerous protests by supporters of the abolition of slavery, inspired by the ideas of French humanists or Quaker sectarians. The beginning of the end of the "triangle" was laid just by the events of the night of 22-23 in August 1791, in the colony of Santo Domingo.
Sugar Island
By the end of the 18th century 80, the island of Haiti, which was called Christopher Columbus Espanyola (1492 year) when it was opened, was divided into two parts. The Spaniards, who originally owned the island, officially recognized the rights of France to one-third of the island, which had been controlled by French pirates since 1697, in 1625. Thus began the history of the French colony of Santo Domingo. The Spanish part of the island later became the Dominican Republic, the French - the Republic of Haiti, but more on that later.
Santo Domingo was one of the most significant West Indian colonies. There were numerous plantations, which gave 40% of the total world sugar turnover of that time. The plantations belonged to Europeans of French origin, among whom, among others, were many descendants of Sephardic Jews who emigrated to the New World countries, fleeing from European anti-Semitic sentiments. At the same time, the French part of the island was the most economically significant.
The social structure of Santo Domingo for the time being described included three main groups of the population. The top floor of the social hierarchy was occupied by the French - first of all, the natives of France, who formed the backbone of the administrative apparatus, and the Creoles, descendants of French immigrants, who were already born on the island, and other Europeans. Their total number reached 40 000 people, in whose hands almost all the land ownership of the colony was concentrated. In addition to the French and other Europeans, there were also about 30 000 freedmen and their descendants living on the island. These were mostly mulattoes, descendants of the ties of European men with their African slaves, who received liberation. Of course, they were not the elite of colonial society and were recognized as racially inferior, but because of their free position and the availability of European blood, they were considered by the colonialists as a support for their power. Among the mulattoes were not only supervisors, police guards, minor officials, but also plantation managers and even owners of their own plantations.
At the bottom of the colonial society were 500 000 black slaves. At that time, it was actually half of all the slaves in the West Indies. Slaves in Santo Domingo were brought from the coast of West Africa - primarily from the so-called. Slave Coast, located on the territory of modern Benin, Togo and parts of Nigeria, as well as from the territory of modern Guinea. That is, Haitian slaves were descendants of African peoples living in those areas. At the new place of residence, people from various African tribes mingled, resulting in the formation of a special unique Afro-Caribbean culture, which absorbed elements of the cultures of both West African peoples and colonialists. By 1780. the importation of slaves into Santo Domingo reached peak levels. If 1771 brought thousands of slaves per year to 15, then 1786 thousands of Africans arrived annually in 28, and by the 1787, French plantations began to receive 40 thousands of black slaves.
However, as the number of the African population increased, social problems also increased in the colonies. In many ways, they turned out to be associated with the emergence of a significant stratum of “colored” - mulattoes, who, getting liberated from slavery, began to get rich and, accordingly, to claim the expansion of their social rights. Some mulattos themselves became planters, as a rule, living hard to reach and unsuitable for growing sugar mountainous areas. Here they created coffee plantations. By the way, by the end of the 18th century, Santo Domingo accounted for the export of 60% of coffee consumed in Europe. By the same time, a third of the plantations of the colony and a quarter of black slaves were in the hands of the mulattoes. Yes, yes, yesterday's slaves or their descendants did not disdain to use the slave labor of their darker tribesmen, being not less cruel masters than the French.
23 August Uprising and the Black Consul
When the Great French Revolution took place, the mulattoes demanded an equal rights with the French government from the White. The representative of the mulatto, Jacques Vincent Auger, went to Paris, from where he returned, imbued with the spirit of the revolution, and demanded that the mulattoes and whites be fully equalized, including in the area of granting electoral rights. Since the colonial administration was much more conservative than the Parisian revolutionaries, the governor Jacques Auger refused and the latter revolted at the beginning of 1791. Colonial troops managed to suppress the uprising, and the Auger itself to arrest and put to death. Nevertheless, the beginning of the struggle of the African population of the island for their liberation was laid. On the night of 22 on 23 on August 1791, the next major uprising began, led by Alejandro Bucman. Naturally, the first victims of the uprising were European settlers. In just two months, 2000 people of European descent were killed. Plantations were also burned - yesterday's slaves did not imagine any further prospects for the economic development of the island and were not going to engage in farming. However, initially the French troops, with the help of the British, who had come to the rescue from the neighboring British colonies in the West Indies, managed to partially suppress the uprising and execute Buckman.
However, the suppression of the first wave of the uprising, the beginning of which is now celebrated as the International Day of Remembrance of the Slave Trade and the Victims of the Slave Trade, only caused a second wave - more organized and, therefore, more dangerous. After the execution of Buckman, Francois Dominique Toussaint (1743-1803), better known to the modern reader as Toussaint-Louverture, led the rebel slaves. In Soviet times, the writer A.K. Vinogradov wrote the novel “The Black Consul” about him and about the Haitian revolution. Indeed, Toussaint Louverture was an extraordinary figure and in many respects a matter of respect even among his opponents. Toussaintus was a black slave, despite his status having received a good education by colonial standards. He worked as a doctor with his master, then in 1776, he received a long-awaited release and worked as a property manager. Apparently, out of gratitude to his master for his release, as well as his human decency, Toussaint soon after the start of the August 1791 uprising of the year helped the family of the former owner to escape and escape. After that, Toussaint joined the uprising and, by virtue of education, as well as outstanding qualities, quickly became one of its leaders.
In the meantime, the French authorities have also demonstrated conflicting policies. If in Paris, the power was in the hands of revolutionaries, focused, among other things, on the abolition of slavery, in the colony the local administration, supported by planters, did not intend to lose their positions and sources of income. Therefore, there has been a confrontation between the central government of France and the governor of Santo Domingo. As soon as the abolition of slavery was officially proclaimed in France in 1794, Toussaint listened to the advice of the revolutionary governor of the island, Etienne Lavaux, and went over to the side of the rebellious slaves to the Convention. The rebel leader was given the military rank of brigadier general, after which Toussaint led military operations against the Spanish troops, who, using the political crisis in France, tried to seize the colony and put down the slave uprising. Later, Toussaint's units also clashed with British troops, also sent from the nearby British colonies to suppress the uprising of blacks. Showing himself an outstanding military leader, Toussaint was able to expel both the Spaniards and the British from the island. At the same time, Toussaint dealt with the mulatto leaders who tried to maintain their leading position on the island after the expulsion of the French planters. In 1801, the colonial assembly declared autonomy for the Santo Domingo colony. The governor was, of course, Toussaint Louverture.
The fate of the slave of the day before yesterday, yesterday’s rebel leader and the current black governor, was unenviable and became the complete opposite of the 1790's triumph. This was due to the fact that the metropolis, where Napoleon Bonaparte was in power by that time, decided to stop the “unrest” that was taking place in Santo Domingo and sent expeditionary forces to the island. Yesterday's closest associates of the “black consul” switched over to the French. The very father of Haitian independence was arrested and taken to France, where he died two years later in the Fort-de-Zhou prison. The dreams of the “black consul” of Haiti as a free republic of yesterday’s slaves did not come true. That which replaced French colonial rule and plantation slavery had nothing to do with the true ideas of freedom and equality. In October, the 1802 of the year, the mulatto leaders revolted against the French Expeditionary Force, and the 18 of November, the 1803 of the year, were able to finally defeat it. 1 January 1804 was proclaimed the creation of a new independent state - the Republic of Haiti.
Haiti's sad fate
In two hundred and ten years of sovereign existence, the first independence colony has evolved from the most economically developed region of the West Indies into one of the poorest countries in the world, shaken by constant upheavals, with an overwhelming crime rate and terrible poverty of the overwhelming majority of the population. Naturally, it is worth telling how it happened. 9 months after the proclamation of independence of Haiti, 22 of September 1804, the former associate of Toussaint-Louverture, Jean Jacques Dessaline (1758-1806), also a slave in the past, and then the rebel commander, declared himself Emperor of Haiti Jacob I.
The first decision of the new monarch was the total massacre of the white population, as a result of which there was practically no one left on the island. Accordingly, there are practically no specialists left able to develop the economy, heal and teach people, build buildings and roads. But among yesterday's rebels appeared a lot of those who want to become kings and emperors themselves.
Two years after the proclamation of himself emperor of Haiti, Jean-Jacques Dessaline was brutally murdered by yesterday's comrades. One of them, Henri Christophe, was appointed head of the provisional military government. At first, he was quite long, five years old, tolerated this modest title, however, in 1811, he could not stand it and proclaimed himself King of Haiti Henri I. We note that he was clearly more modest than Dessaline and did not claim imperial regalia. But from its supporters formed the Haitian nobility, generously endowing them with aristocratic titles. Yesterday's slaves became dukes, counts, viscounts.
In the southwest of the island, after the assassination of Dessalines, mulatto planters lifted their heads. Their leader, Mulatto Alexander Petion, turned out to be a more adequate man than his former comrades in the fight. He did not declare himself emperor and king, but was approved as the first president of Haiti. Thus, until 1820, when King Henri Christophe shot himself, fearing more terrible reprisals from the participants in the uprising against him, there were two Haiti - the monarchy and the republic. A universal education was proclaimed in the republic, the distribution of land to yesterday’s slaves was organized. In general, for the country it was almost the best of times in its history. At least, Petion tried to somehow contribute to the economic revival of the former colony, while not forgetting to support the national liberation movement in the Spanish colonies of Latin America - to help Bolivar and other leaders in the struggle for sovereignty of Latin American countries. However, Pétion died before Christophe’s suicide - in 1818. Under the rule of the successor of Pétion Jean Pierre Boyer, both of Haiti were united. Boyer reigned until 1843, after which a black line in the history of Haiti was overthrown and continued until the present.
The reasons for the serious socio-economic situation and the constant political confusion in the first state of African slaves are largely due to the specifics of the social system that has developed in the country after the pre-colonization. First of all, it should be noted that the planters that were cut out or fled were replaced by equally cruel exploiters from the number of mulattoes and blacks. The economy in the country practically did not develop, and the constant military coups only destabilized the political situation. The twentieth century was even worse for Haiti in the nineteenth century. It was marked by the American occupation of 1915-1934, which aimed to protect the interests of American companies from constant unrest in the republic, by the cruel dictatorship of “Papa Duvalier” in 1957-1971, whose punitive forces - “tonton-makuta” - received worldwide fame, a series of uprisings and military coups. The latest large-scale news about Haiti is the 2010 earthquake that killed 300 thousands of people and caused the most severe damage to the country's already frail infrastructure, and the cholera epidemic in the same 2010 year that cost 8 thousands of Haitians.
Today, the numbers can most clearly be said about the socio-economic situation in Haiti. Two-thirds of the Haitian population (60%) are unemployed and have no regular sources of income, but those who work do not have adequate income - 80% of Haitians live below the poverty line. Half of the country's population (50%) is completely illiterate. The epidemic of AIDS continues in the country - 6% of the population of the republic are infected with the immunodeficiency virus (and this is according to official data). In fact, Haiti, in the truest sense of the word, has turned into a real “black hole” of the New World. In the Soviet historical and political literature, the socio-economic and political problems of Haiti were explained by the intrigues of American imperialism, the island and the population interested in the exploitation of the territory. In fact, although it is impossible to disregard the role of the United States in the artificial cultivation of backwardness in the countries of Central America, the history of the country is the cause of many ills. Starting with the genocide of the white population, the destruction of beneficial plantations and the destruction of infrastructure, the leaders of yesterday’s slaves could not build a normal state and themselves doomed it to the dire situation in which Haiti has existed for two centuries. The old slogan "destroy everything to the ground, and then ..." worked only in the first half. No, of course, many of those who were nobody really became “everything” in sovereign Haiti, but thanks to their management methods, the new world was never built.
Modern "living dead"
Meanwhile, the problem of slavery and the slave trade remains relevant in the modern world. Although the 23 of the year has passed since the Haitian uprising of August 1791 of the year, a little less since slavery has been effected by the European colonial powers, slavery still exists today. Even if we don’t talk about all the well-known examples of sexual slavery, the use of labor by abducted people or by the force of people held there, there is slavery and, as they say, “on an industrial scale”. Human rights organizations, speaking of the scale of slavery in the modern world, refer to numbers up to 223 million people. However, the figure of the English sociologist Kevin Beylz, speaking about 200 to millions of slaves, is most likely closer to the truth. First of all, their work is used in the countries of the “third world” - in households, the agro-industrial complex, the mining and manufacturing industries.
Regions of the spread of mass slavery in the modern world — first of all, the countries of South Asia — India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, some states of West, Central and East Africa, and Latin America. In India and Bangladesh, under slavery can be meant, in the first place, virtually unpaid child labor in enterprises of certain industries. Families of landless peasants, who, despite the lack of material wealth, differ in extremely high birth rates, sell their sons and daughters to despair in enterprises where the latter work virtually for free and in extremely difficult and dangerous conditions for life and health. In Thailand, there is a “sexual slavery” that has taken the form of a massive sale of girls from remote areas of the country to brothels in major resort cities (Thailand is the place of attraction for “sex tourists” from around the world). Child labor is widely used on plantations to collect cocoa beans and peanuts in West African countries, primarily in Côte d'Ivoire, which receives slaves from neighboring and more economically backward Mali and Burkina Faso.
In Mauritania, the social structure still recalls the phenomenon of slavery. As is known, in this country, one of the most backward and closed even by the standards of the African continent, the caste division of society remains. There is the highest military nobility - the “Hassans” from the Arab-Bedouin tribes, the Muslim clergy - the “Marabuts” and the pastoral nomads - the “Zenaga” - mainly of Berber origin, and also the “Haratins” - descendants of slaves and freedmen. The number of slaves in Mauritania is 20% of the population - this is certainly the highest in the world. Three times the Mauritanian authorities tried to ban slavery - and all without success. The first time is in 1905, under the influence of France. The second time is in 1981, the last time is quite recently, in 2007.
Whether the ancestors of the Moorish have any relation to slaves is simple enough to know - by skin color. The highest castes of the Mauritanian society are Caucasoid Arabs and Berbers, the lower castes are Negroids, descendants of African slaves captured by nomads from Senegal and Mali. Since status does not allow higher castes to perform “work duties”, all agricultural and handicraft work, caring for livestock, and household are on the shoulders of slaves. But in Mauritania, slavery is special - Eastern, also called “domestic”. Many such "slaves" live well, so they, even after the official abolition of slavery in the country, are in no hurry to leave their masters, living in the position of domestic servants. Indeed, in the event of care, they will inevitably be doomed to poverty and unemployment.
In Niger, slavery was officially abolished only in 1995, less than twenty years ago. Naturally, after such a short time, it is hardly possible to speak of the complete eradication of this archaic phenomenon in the life of the country. International organizations talk about at least 43 thousands of slaves in modern Niger. Their focus is, on the one hand, the tribal confederations of nomads, the Tuareg, where slavery is analogous to the Mauritanian, and on the other, the houses of the tribal nobility of the Hausa people, which also contain significant numbers of "domestic slaves." A similar situation exists in Mali, whose social structure is in many ways similar to the Moorish and Nigerian.
Needless to say, slavery persists in Haiti itself, from which the struggle for the liberation of slaves began. In modern Haitian society, a phenomenon called “restores” has become widespread. So called children and adolescents sold to domestic slavery to more prosperous fellow citizens. The overwhelming majority of families, given the total poverty of Haitian society and mass unemployment, are unable to provide even the food they give birth to; therefore, as a child grows to a more or less independent age, it is sold into domestic slavery. International organizations claim that there are up to 300 thousand “restores” in the country.
Given that the population in the country is about 10 million, this is not so small a figure. As a rule, restorers are exploited as domestic servants, and they are treated cruelly and, when they reach a young age, are most often driven out into the street. Deprived of education and having no profession, yesterday's "child slaves" join the ranks of street prostitutes, the homeless, petty criminals.
Despite the protests of international organizations, “restorations” in Haiti are so common that they are considered absolutely normal in Haitian society. A home slave can give a wedding to the newlyweds, can even sell to a relatively poor family. Most often, the social status and wealth of the owner is reflected in the little slave - in poor families the “restores” live even worse than in the wealthy. Very often, from a poor family living in a slum area of Port-au-Prince or another Haitian city, a child is sold into slavery into a family with about the same material wealth. Naturally, the police and authorities turn a blind eye to such a massive phenomenon in Haitian society.
It is significant that many migrants from archaic societies in Asia and Africa transfer their social relations to the “host countries” of Europe and America. Thus, the police of European states repeatedly revealed cases of “internal slavery” in the diasporas of Asian and African migrants. People from Mauritania, Somalia, Sudan or India may keep slaves in the “migrant quarters” of London, Paris or Berlin, without thinking about the relevance of this phenomenon in “civilized Europe”. Cases of slavery are frequent and widely covered in the post-Soviet space, including in the Russian Federation. Obviously, the possibilities for maintaining such a situation are dictated not only by social conditions in the Third World countries, condemning people from them to the role of guest workers and slaves in homes and enterprises of more successful compatriots, but also by the policy of multiculturalism, which allows for the existence of enclaves of completely alien cultures on European territory.
Thus, the presence of slavery in the modern world indicates that the theme of the struggle against the slave trade is relevant not only in relation to the long-standing historical events in the New World, to the transatlantic supply of slaves from Africa to America. It is poverty and powerlessness in the third world countries, the plundering of their national wealth by transnational corporations, the corruption of local governments become a favorable background for the preservation of this monstrous phenomenon. And, in some cases, as the example of the history of Haiti, given in this article, shows, the descendants of yesterday’s slaves themselves fertilize the soil of modern slavery.
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