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1791-Aug.-21

1791-Aug.-21: A religious ceremony at Bois-Caïman provides a framework for uprising.

1791-Aug.-21: A religious ceremony at Bois-Caïman provides a framework for uprising. Enslaved leaders gathered in the northern plain at Bois Caïman. A Vodou ceremony, often associated with Dutty Boukman and Cécile Fatiman, preceded the coordinated slave uprising that would begin days later. This secret meeting in the forest combined spiritual ritual with military planning for the mass revolt. Significance: Marked the organized launch of the slave insurrection that ignited the Haitian Revolution.Nuance: Fick treats the ceremony not as myth but as part of broader plantation-level coordination. The uprising was not spontaneous chaos but structured planning rooted in enslaved networks.

Source Dubois, Avengers of the New World, 100; Nicholls, From Dessalines to Duvalier, 31; Fick, The Making of Haiti pp, 91-95