1795-May: The Treaty of the Hague brought a formal end to the war between France and Holland, signaling a major geopolitical shift in the Atlantic world.

1795-May: The Treaty of the Hague brought a formal end to the war between France and Holland, signaling a major geopolitical shift in the Atlantic world. Enslaved people in the Dutch colonies, including Curaçao, expected that French revolutionary laws regarding emancipation would now extend to them. When freedom did not immediately follow the signing of the treaty, the unfree concluded that only the resistance of local Dutch authorities stood in their way. This belief sparked a wave of “liberation rumors” that energized the slave community and challenged the legitimacy of continued bondage. The treaty illustrated how international diplomacy could inadvertently catalyze local movements for self-determination among the colonized.