Saint-Domingue expedition

The Saint-Domingue expedition was Napoleon's attempt to restore French rule over the richest colony in the Caribbean and to reinstate slavery, which the Revolution had abolished. The first troops under General Leclerc landed in December 1801 and quickly recovered the coastal towns; Toussaint Louverture was seized by trickery and shipped to France. Resistance hardened under Dessalines and Christophe once news spread that slavery had been restored elsewhere in the French empire, yellow fever gutted the expedition, and whole units of black and mixed-race auxiliaries went over to the enemy. By late 1803 the survivors, perhaps eight to ten thousand fit men, were penned at Le Cap and defeated at Vertières. The expedition surrendered and evacuated in December 1803; France lost the colony, which proclaimed independence as Haiti on 1st January 1804, and Napoleon soon sold Louisiana. The disaster at Vertières stands today as one of the decisive defeats of European colonial arms, and Haiti's independence as the first successful slave revolution.