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1802-03-04

French column under Debelle and Devaut is thrown back at the Crête-à-Pierrot

Haitian

From dawn the sentinels redoubled their attention. Suddenly, on 4 March, the echoes of the mountain repeated the noise of musketry: a French column had just crossed the Artibonite after driving Dessalines back at a fairly great distance from the Petite-Rivière, and was debouching by a wooded path. They were the generals Debelle and Devaut who, on their way to the Verrettes, were marching at the head of a division of 2,000 men of white troops and a black battalion of the 9th of Port-de-Paix, commanded by Captain Bodin. The French column advanced with confidence to carry the fortification at the bayonet. When it had reached the edges of the ditches it was met by the liveliest grapeshot and thrown back. Devaut, struck by a bullet in the chest, was overthrown in the midst of his men; Debelle was gravely wounded under the arm by a blast of grapeshot.

Rouzier tells this under the entry Crête-à-Pierrot (la).

Source  ·  p. t. I, p. 264 Sémexant Rouzier, Dictionnaire géographique et administratif universel d'Haïti (t. I) (1892), p. t. I, p. 264