Toussaint Louverture Read Online Free PDF

when it was enough to be white to be massacred. 2
    Toussaint's ability to keep order and conduct business as usual, in the midst of the anarchy that had engulfed the surrounding region, seems altogether extraordinary. But sometime in the fall of 1791, he left Breda, crossed the ash-strewn ruins of the Northern Plain, and went upinto the mountains of Grande Riviere, where he joined a band of rebel slaves led by Biassou. At first he served Biassou as a secretary; later he was given the title of
medecin general,
or general doctor. At Breda Plantation and the surrounding area, Toussaint had the reputation of an excellent veterinarian, especially for horses, and he was also recognized as a
doktefey
—literally “leaf doctor.” Along with substantial skill in African/Creole herbal medicine, he seems to have had some instruction in European doctoring.
    If Toussaint did any fighting when he first joined Biassou, he was not much noticed as a leader; no white observers picked him out of the fray. However, a couple of his surviving letters suggest that he already had more authority among the rebels than he wanted to be known outside that group. To Biassou he writes on October 4,1791:
    My dear friend,
    I have received your letter with pleasure; I cannot agree to your rendezvous; we are not able to leave our camp, for both of us to travel to meet the Spaniard. If this Spaniard has something to communicate to me, he has only to get himself to my camp; as for myself, I don't have time to appear; I wish you the most perfect health and am for life your friend. 3
    Though Toussaint modestly signs this letter “Medecin General,” at a time when Jean-François and Biassou had declared themselves “Generalissime” and the like, there is no sign that he was under Biassou's orders—on the contrary, the message seems to pass between equals. Later on, when relations between the rebel slaves and the military of Spanish Santo Domingo had become more official, Toussaint would explain himself more fully to the Spanish colonial governor: “I reported and accounted for my operations to General Biassou, not at all because I considered myself to be his subordinate, but for love of the good, being familiar with his impetuous, muddle-headed, thoughtless character, likely to do more harm than good, as he demonstrated under circumstances. 4
    Toussaint wrote to Biassou again on October 15, 1791, referring obscurely to what seems to have been a planned attack on the outskirts of Cap Francais, if not on the town itself. The letter implies, though lightly, that Biassou may have been pushed too far in this direction by the rebels' Spanish contacts; in the event, the attack did not take place.
    My Very Dear Friend,
    After the requests which I have just made to the Spaniard, and as I am waiting day by day for the things which I asked for, I beg you to wait until we should be in better shape before we undertake what you have had the friendliness to write me about. I would very much like to go for it, but I would like to have, on all the plantations, enough crowbars to roll rocks down from the mountains of Haut du Cap, to hinder them [the enemy] from approaching us, for I believe there is no other way, unless we expose our people to butchery. I beg you to make certain that you will have the spy you have sent explain very well the location of the powder magazine of Haut du Cap, so that we can succeed in seizing the powder; my good friend, you can see from the above that I am taking every precaution in this affair; and you may say as much to Boukman; as for Jean-François he can always keep going on carriage rides with the ladies, and he has not even done me the honor to write me a word for several days. I am even astounded by that. If you need rum, I will send it to you whenever you want, but be careful how you manage it; you know that you must not give them [the rank and file of the rebel slaves] so much that they are deranged by it. Send me some carts, for I need