1792-Jan.: France sent commissioners Sonthonax and Polverel to restore order amid escalating conflict between whites, free people of color, and enslaved insu…
1792-Jan.: France sent commissioners Sonthonax and Polverel to restore order amid escalating conflict between whites, free people of color, and enslaved insurgents. The civil commissioners published the decree of September 24, 1791, and subsequently proclaimed a general amnesty for all insurgents who would take an oath to the new constitution. This measure backfired as white inhabitants viewed it as a justification for atrocities, while mulattoes in Petit Goave responded by breaking thirty-four white prisoners alive on the wheel. Significance:Metropolitan France was forced to confront the revolutionary reality created by enslaved rebels. Nuance: Fick argues that French concessions were reactive. Abolition would come not from humanitarian impulse but from military necessity.