Charles Leclerc (general, born 1772)
Charles Leclerc | |
---|---|
Général de division | |
Battles/wars | French Revolutionary Wars Saint-Domingue expedition |
Charles Victoire Emmanuel Leclerc (French pronunciation:
Biography
To 1801
Leclerc started his military career in 1791 during the
He became
Saint-Domingue
In 1791, black slaves in the Caribbean colony of Saint-Domingue had risen up against their French owners in the Haitian Revolution, which was contemporaneous with the French Revolution. In August 1793, the French Republican commissioner Léger-Félicité Sonthonax officially abolished slavery on Saint-Domingue, as part of an effort to recruit rebel slaves to the side of the new French Republic. The prominent rebel leader Toussaint Louverture, himself a former slave, joined the French Republican side shortly afterwards. By 1801, Louverture had consolidated his rule over the entire island of Hispaniola, including the colony of Saint-Domingue. In July 1801, Louverture promulgated a new constitution for the colony that appointed himself governor for life, while simultaneously reaffirming the colony's position as "part of the French empire."[1]
Upon receiving the news in October 1801, Napoleon interpreted Louverture's new constitution as an unacceptable offense to French imperial authority, and subsequently appointed Leclerc commander of a military expedition to reconquer Saint-Domingue.[2][3] In his initial instructions, Bonaparte directed Leclerc to disarm Louverture's black-controlled government and deport his military officers to France, while publicly maintaining the abolition of slavery in Saint-Domingue. Bonaparte announced intentions to reinstate slavery in neighboring Spanish Santo Domingo, which Louverture had recently occupied.[4] It was Napoleon's intention to reinstate slavery in Saint-Domingue once Louverture had been arrested.[5]
Leclerc set off from Brest in December 1801 and landed at Cap-Français in February 1802, with other warships and a total of 40,000 troops (including reinforcements, upwards to 80,000 troops were sent to Saint-Domingue during Leclerc's campaign), publicly repeating Bonaparte's promise that "all of the people of Saint-Domingue are French" and forever free. Louverture's harsh discipline had made him numerous enemies and Leclerc played off the ambitions of Louverture's younger key officers and competitors against each other, promising that they would maintain their ranks in the French Army and thus bringing them to abandon Louverture. The French won several victories and regained control in three months after severe fighting, with Louverture forced to negotiate an honorable surrender and to retire to tend his plantations under house arrest. However, Napoleon had given secret instructions to Leclerc to arrest Louverture, and so Leclerc seized Louverture – during a meeting – for deportation to France, where he died while imprisoned at Fort de Joux in the Jura Mountains in 1803.
Despite his superiors' warnings, Leclerc did not consolidate his victory by disarming Louverture's old officers. After a brief period in which he incorporated many of Louverture's officers into his own forces, Leclerc began suffering mass defections of troops over the latter half of 1802. Those troops, along with the black and Creole population of the colony, rose up in response to news that slavery had been reestablished on Guadeloupe. The prospect of a similar restoration on Saint-Domingue swung the tide inexorably against French hopes for reimposing control, as Leclerc began executing suspected conspirators en masse.
By October 1802, Leclerc wrote to Bonaparte advocating for a war of extermination, declaring that "We must destroy all the blacks of the mountains – men and women – and spare only children under 12 years of age. We must destroy half of those in the plains and must not leave a single colored person in the colony who has worn an epaulette." In that letter to Bonaparte, Leclerc also lamented his assignment, declaring "My soul is withered, and no joyful thought can ever make forget these hideous scenes."
Death
In November 1802, Leclerc died of
Memorials
A statue at
References
- ISBN 9780674034365.
- ISBN 9780674034365.
- ISBN 9780674034365.
- ^ Perry, James Arrogant Armies Great Military Disasters and the Generals Behind Them, (Edison: Castle Books, 2005) pages 78–79.
- ISBN 9780674034365.
- ISBN 9780674034365.
Bibliography
- Girard, Philippe R. "Liberte, Egalite, Esclavage : French Revolutionary Ideals and the Failure of the Leclerc Expedition to Saint-Domingue," French Colonial History, Volume 6, 2005, pp. 55–77
External links
- Bob Corbett's Haiti Page – Online collection of resources on the revolution in Haiti. See especially links to the Haiti Mailing List and Corbett's essays on the revolutionary period.