I venture this hypothesis, sir, only because in the blacks of St. Domingue, living now free of whites — Spaniards and Frenchmen — for the first time since 1512,1 have seen a pride, independence, and ambition (as well as arrogance) that favors the confidence of our own patriots after they defeated King George. Nowhere is this pride more evident, or infectious, than in Le Cap, and in the person of the island's beloved leader, Toussaint L'Ouverture. As General Washington is to us, he is to them: a warrior legendary for his courage; the framer of their Constitution; and a statesman capable of forgiving his defeated enemies, for Toussaint has approved trade with France, and it is well known that he has sent both his sons to study at world-acclaimed institutions in Paris.
You will be interested to learn that after his cold rejection of my Commission, and of me as your consul, the governor-general relented and has now allowed me to visit with him on five occasions, the most recent being yesternight. Due to illness, my wife and son could not accompany me to dinner with Toussaint and other officials of this new republic. I must say I felt a bit light-headed during the aperitif, and a little off-balance in that dining room of stunningly beautiful mulatto ladies and darker-skinned heads of state, but I smiled until the muscles round my mouth began to ache, and drank as lustily as my hosts, who seemed — I was sure of this — amused by my discomfiture. Perhaps it was the wine, or my generally fatigued condition in this horseshoe-shaped country's merciless heat, but when I looked at the head of the table, where Toussaint sat, he presented a magnific figure of manhood, one far better-looking and more dashing in his French uniform and black knee-boots than that runt Bonaparte. Gradually, I began to see why his people called him L' Ouverture ("the Opener"), and then later added "Deliverer" to his many honorific titles. He chatted now with Jacques Dessalines, who sat at his right side, and with Henri Christophe, at his left, ignoring me deliberately for as much as fifteen minutes at a time, so that all I could do was stare down at my dinner plate, shoveling down the entrée, then dessert, in humiliating silence until he deigned to politely ask me a question about you, our system of government, or our relations with the French. I believe he deliberately seated me on a chair shorter than the others at the table, so that even the women looked down at me all during the meal. Try as I might, I could not intimidate him or the others with my superior breeding, credentials as a representative of the United States government, or the color of my skin, which before their Revolution would have been enough to make most slaves treat me with deference. No, none of that worked on them. All during that evening, after we'd eaten, I fèlt a sharp pain slice through my abdomen, but you will be relieved to know, sir, that despite my weakening condition I was alert and overheard Christophe discussing with Toussaint his idea for constructing a mountaintop fortress to protect this fledging nation from attack. He wants to call it the Citadelle. His plan is to equip it with 365 heavy bronze cannons.
I must confess, sadly, that as your consul it seems to me that Toussaint knows that, despite the decision of Congress to continue trade with St. Domingue, you — as our president — have no plans to support his Revolution, indeed, that you consider its leaders to be property that has illegally seized a freedom it does not deserve, and that their successful example of insurrection sends a dangerous message to Negroes on our shores. It is this suspicion of you that led to the poor treatment I received last night, and to Toussaint's remark to Christophe that his color alone was the reason you failed to send him a greeting.
These, as I say, are the tribulations I have endured in your service since my arrival, troubles I gladly endure for my country. I list them here only for one reason. As I was leaving the governor-general's mansion, almost doubled over by the recurrent complaint in my lower regions, but smiling nevertheless, shaking the hand of my host, then Christophe's, I came to Jacques Dessalines, and swung out my palm. He took it in a firm grasp, but then I saw it. Just for a moment. There, in his left hand, which he kept behind his back, Dessalines held a clay homunculus — a white doll — of me, one with a pin stuck in its belly.
Sir, I have barely started my tenure as consul in St. Domingue. However, I pray you will consider the problems, political and personal, that my family and I have encountered and repeal my appointment. If you do not, I fear this may well be the last communication from
Your most obedient, and most obliged,
And most dutiful humble Servant,
Theobald Wedgwood
The People Speak
A NEWS ITEM from the Philadelphia Liberator
(Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, January 16, 1817)
A Vote on Colonization
Yesterday a reported three thousand black people packed into Bethel Church to vote on a proposal by the newly created American Colonization Society that free blacks in the United States should be resettled in Africa. The tempestuous meeting, which lasted most of the day, and was peppered throughout by passionate speeches for and against the proposal, ended with a historic vote that will no doubt be decisive — if not fateful — for the future of all people of African descent in this nation.
Fiction often changes the facts for dramatic effect. Paul Cuffe did not attend the meeting described here, and he learned of the vote by letter. There were no women present, and the actual vote was by voice, not paper ballot. The author hopes readers of this tale can forgive the liberties taken with facts in order to conjure a moment in time with feeling.
It was, some observers remarked, a debate on two equally powerful yet antithetical dreams within the black American soul.
The meeting came but fifteen days after the founding of the American Colonization Society, a creation of Robert Finley that has been endorsed with enthusiasm by President James Madison and former president Jefferson. Its mission, according to its founder, is to redress the evils of exploitation visited upon Negroes in Africa, and to establish on that continent a homeland for American people of color, a place to which they can emigrate, live free from white persecution, and pursue their interests without interference. The idea has great popularity these days, among both blacks and whites, who question whether the Negro, once released from bondage, will ever be accepted in or assimilated by American society.
In attendance at Wednesday's gathering were some of the most prominent leaders and luminaries from Philadelphia's growing black community. On hand was the ubiquitous Rev. Absalom Jones; maritime entrepreneur Paul Cuffe and his Indian wife, Alice; businessman James Forten; and Rev. Richard Allen, who, as on many occasions previously, provided his church as the site for this great Negro debate and introduced Mr. Forten as the day's first speaker.
Taking the stage, Mr. Forten, fifty-one, explained how he was contacted by a representative of the American Colonization Society who sought his support in swaying Philadelphia's Negroes to the idea of leaving America. "You all know me and what I stand for," said Mr. Forten, his voice breaking with emotion. He reminded the gathering of his humble beginnings as a powder boy in the American Navy when he was fifteen, how at twenty he was foreman in a sail loft, and by age forty owned it and now employed more than forty men. "My life has been nurtured in the ground of this fledging nation," he said. "I have been an American patriot through and through, but I have also been one of this country's greatest critics as well."