Toussaint L'Ouverture: A Biography and Autobiography

Written by John Relly Beard

Narrated by LibriVox Community

François-Dominique Toussaint L’Ouverture (1743-1803) rose to fame in 1791 during the Haitian struggle for independence. In this revolt, he led thousands of slaves on the island of Hispañola to fight against the colonial European powers of France, Spain and England. The former slaves ultimately established the independent state of Haiti and expelled the Europeans. L’Ouverture eventually became the governor and Commander-In-Chief of Haiti before recognizing and submitting to French rule in 1801. In June of 1802, L’Ouverture was arrested by French forces and taken to France where he was imprisoned at Joux. There he penned his autobiography “. . . to render to the French government an exact account of my conduct.” L’Ouverture died in prison on April 7, 1803 from pneumonia.Although L’Ouverture died a captive of the French, the revolution he led was historically perhaps the most significant world event opposing slavery. It precipitated a re-examination--among the major European powers as well as those in the new world--of the right of all mankind to be free and self-governing.John Relly Beard, an English minister, wrote The Life of Toussaint L’Ouverture and published it in London in 1853. Ten years later, the biography was re-published and augmented to include L’Ouverture’s 35-page translated autobiography--along with other documents and contributions by public officials--and was re-published in Boston. This reconstituted edition was titled, Toussaint L’Ouverture: A Biography and Autobiography. (Introduction by James K. White)

• Language: English
• Publisher: LibriVox
• Release date: Aug 25, 2014

John Relly Beard

John Relly Beard (1800-1876) was an English Unitarian minister who wrote more than thirty books in his lifetime, including The Life of Toussaint L'Ouverture (1853) and several reference volumes on a variety of topics.

Reviews for Toussaint L'Ouverture

[shannonlove65 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

One historian commented that 20th century American foreign policy was largely a matter of cleaning of French mistakes. Bit of exaggeration, really only WWI, WWI and Vietnam can be laid at their doorstep.

This book tells the story of how the French Revolution ignited a Civil War (not really a slave rebellion) in what was then Santa Domingo, which lead over the course of a decade to a death spiral ending in the massacre of all the white French on the island, which not only utterly destroyed the island's intellectual and skilled labor capital, but which engendered an international embargo that crippled the island further. Hati's long history of instability and intense poverty can be directly traced to actions taken by the Monarchy, the Directorate and lastly Napoleon.

It also touches on covert support by then President Thomas Jefferson to Toussaint L'Overture in an attempt to found a democratic state including blacks. Jefferson hoped to use that pass his anti-slavery legislation starting in Virginia. After Napoleon's treachery and the subsequent massacres, all practical plans for emancipation in America died in the cradle. The events in this book therefore comprise an important background to the US Civil War.