1796, March 20: (The Villatte Affair and Toussaint’s Rise): In March 1796, the mulâtre commander Villatte and his agent Pierre Pinchinat attempted a coup aga…

1796, March 20: (The Villatte Affair and Toussaint’s Rise): In March 1796, the mulâtre commander Villatte and his agent Pierre Pinchinat attempted a coup against Governor Laveaux at the Cap. Laveaux was assaulted in his bedroom by a mob of about a hundred gens de couleur, dragged by his hair through the streets, and imprisoned in a cell for three days. Toussaint responded by sending Major Henry Christophe and Colonel Pierre Michel to demand Laveaux’s release, threatening to “sacrifice everything alive” if the governor was harmed. After Toussaint marched into the Cap with a significant force to restore order, a grateful Laveaux appointed him lieutenant governor of Saint-Domingue, prompting Toussaint’s famous reply: “After God, Laveaux!”.