1779-10-09: (The Siege of Savannah, Where Over Five Hundred Free Black and Mulatto Troops From Saint-Domingue Fought to Cover the Retreat of French and Ameri…

1779-10-09: (The Siege of Savannah, Where Over Five Hundred Free Black and Mulatto Troops From Saint-Domingue Fought to Cover the Retreat of French and American Forces During the American War of Independence, the Largest Deployment of African-Descended Soldiers in That War, With Future Haitian Revolutionaries Christophe and Rigaud Among the Combatants): On October 9, 1779, over five hundred free Black and mulatto troops from Saint-Domingue, known as the Chasseurs Volontaires de Saint-Domingue, fought in the Siege of Savannah under the command of French general Comte d’Estaing. The battle resulted in the heaviest single-engagement casualties the allied Franco-American forces suffered during the entire American War of Independence, with roughly 250 dead and 600 wounded. The Haitian regiment’s role was critical: they covered the retreat of French and American forces, forestalling a British counterattack that could have inflicted far greater losses. The vast majority of the Haitian troops were teenagers and young men, and among them were Henri Christophe, then a twelve-year-old drummer boy, and André Rigaud, both of whom would later become principal commanders of the Haitian Revolution. In 2007, a bronze monument by sculptor James Mastin was unveiled in Savannah’s Franklin Square honoring the Haitian soldiers. The monument, commissioned by the Haitian-American Historical Society, was expanded in 2009 with additional figures, though controversy arose over the accuracy of the depictions. What the monument memorializes is this: men from a French slave colony crossed the Atlantic to fight for American independence, a freedom their own nation would have to seize by force a generation later without any American help at all.