Rivière du Massacre. Toussaint Brave’s post at its mouth taken by Pradine

In the North, Rochambeau was making useless efforts to occupy the villages of the coast. The insurgents withdrew into the interior as soon as the French landed. The French built forts, left garrisons in them and then withdrew into the towns. The Indigenous would then gather their forces and destroy these posts. The government was forced to send an expedition into the bay of Mancenille, of which the Indigenous had made themselves masters after Clausel’s departure from Fort-Liberté. Their armed barges, manned by intrepid Black and mixed-race coasting sailors, kept merchant ships from entering or leaving the roadstead of that town. Toussaint Brave had set up a post at the mouth of the Massacre river. On 14 December (23 frimaire) ship captain Pradine appeared at the mouth of that river. He was aboard the frigate Embuscade, which carried 150 men of the 86th under the orders of battalion chief Pigné Montignac. He landed under cover of the frigate’s fire, overthrew the Indigenous, killed a few of their men and made himself master of their post. He found two cannon there, one an eight-pounder and the other a twenty-four-pounder, and spiked them. Ten boats that fell into his hands were given to the flames. Toussaint Brave rallied the fugitives and went to camp in the plain of Fort-Liberté. Colonel Félix and squadron chief Daulion at once made a vigorous sortie against him. For an hour both sides fought furiously. The French cavalry could not break the Indigenous. The whites and the Indigenous spent the night on the field of battle. The next day at daybreak Toussaint Brave had his dead buried in the presence of the enemy without being molested, and carried off his wounded as he abandoned the plain.