1804, February – March 15: (The Extermination at Les Cayes and Jérémie): In February 1804, Dessalines issued the formal order for the extermination of the Fr…
1804, February – March 15: (The Extermination at Les Cayes and Jérémie): In February 1804, Dessalines issued the formal order for the extermination of the French while stationed at Les Cayes. General Geffrard was so repulsed by the command that he delegated the task to a subordinate and left on a tour of inspection. On March 9, Dessalines entered Jérémie with his personal guard, rounded up white males in the main square, and balefully announced that “the blood of all of you shall pay!”. After collecting ransoms from 400 men of property, he had them beheaded and their bodies stacked in mounds as a grisly display for the rural laborers. By the time Dessalines left Jérémie on March 15, nearly 1,500 French residents had been murdered, leaving blood flowing across the roads in rivulets.