Slavery in Saint-Domingue

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The 1926 Slavery Convention described slavery as "...the status or condition of a person over whom any or all of the powers attaching to the right of ownership are exercised..." Therefore, a slave is someone who cannot leave an owner or employer without explicit permission, and who will be returned if they escape. Control may be accomplished through official or tacit arrangements with local authorities by masters who have some influence because of their social or economic status.

Slavery was commonly used in the parts of the Caribbean controlled by France or the British Empire. The Lesser Antilles islands of Barbados, Antigua, Martinique and Guadeloupe, which were the first important slave societies of the Caribbean, began the widespread use of African slaves by the end of the 17th century, as their economies converted from tobacco to sugar production.

The slaves were treated terribly, often beaten and raped. They had such miserable lives that death was considered a welcome release. By the middle of the 18th century, British Jamaica and French Saint-Domingue had become the largest slave societies of the region, rivaling Brazil as a destination for enslaved Africans. Due to overwork, the death rates for Caribbean slaves were higher than birth rates, this was especially true in the north of Saint-Domingue. The conditions led to increasing numbers of slave revolts and campaigns against slavery in Europe.

On On August 29, 1793 French Commissioner Léger Félicité Sonthonax declared the emancipation of the slaves of St. Domingue.

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