The Journey to Make Slavery an Idea of the Past

            The effects of the French and Hatian Revolution rippled throughout all of Hispaniola and were experienced by colonists and slaves in Santo Domingo in that it led to the abolishment of slavery in Santo domingo as well as Haiti. In response to the French revolution, Spanish commanders helped slave rebels such as Toussaint in their fight against the french because they figured they would be able to get their lands back from the French. What actually happened was the slave rebels turned and fought against them in the name of France after slavery was abolished in Haiti.

              The end result of all of the Spanish and french conflict during this time was the Treaty of Basel which stated that Spanish had to give up Santo Domingo to the French and had a year to do so and could move to Havana. Since many of the Spanish colonists and religious leaders had property and revenues tied up in santo Domingo, they were very reluctant to leave and were further deterred from leaving upon hearing about how bad others were doing in Havana. In contrast, the Spanish did not agree with the french on the topic of slavery. According to Frank Pons, "The spanish knew that in December 1795 Governor Laveaux had declared the slaves found in the spanish colonies would be freed". This still did not speed up their delivery of Santo Domingo to the french.

            This resulted in Toussaint leading an army to push the spanish out of Santo Domingo so that the island could be united under french rule and in february 1801, the french flag replaced the spanish one. Then Toussaint completely abolished slavery across all of Hispaniola and took steps to solidify the union between santo domingo and saint domingue. In 1802, Napoleon sent french generals to oust Toussaint's troops and reinstitute slavery in Santo Domingo with the support of spaniards and creoles. This french rule of Santo Domingo lasted for some time, then eventually Haiti invaded Santo Domingo and abolished slavery once again.

            In conclusion, the main driving forces behind the end of slavery in Santo Domingo was the french revolution, Toussaint's vision to abolish slavery and untie the island, and the Hatian Revolution because of the strategic access Santo Domingo could give to european forces against Haiti. The Spanish did not want to end slavery in Santo Domingo and attempted to reinstate it several times, even going so far as helping the french to do so. In the end Hatian involvement abolished slavery in Santo Domingo.





Moya, Pons Frank. The Dominican Republic: a National History. Princeton, NJ: Markus Wiener, 2010. Print.

Geggus, David Patrick. "Haitian Revolutionary Studies - David Patrick Geggus." Google Books. Web. 13 Nov. 2011. <http://books.google.com/books?id=BAy4XwFE3AsC>.