Jérémie. Brunet’s 2,000 reinforcements arrive there on 20 Germinal (10 April).

Captain-General Rochambeau, having learned of the heavy losses General Sarrasin had suffered on his march from Tiburon to Les Cayes, was compelled to embark for the South 2,000 fresh troops, Polish and French, who had just arrived from France at Port-Républicain on a squadron commanded by Admiral Bedout. These troops, entrusted to General Brunet, left for their destination on 16 Germinal, Year 11 (6 April 1803), and arrived at Jérémie on 20 Germinal (10 April). They were to carry out the operations with which General Sarrasin had been charged. Darbois received orders to push into the plain of Les Cayes; and at the same time the troops of that town and those of Anse-à-Veau were to come out of their quarters and assail General Geffrard. The independent army held the whole stretch of country between Saint-Louis and Port-Salut. Every night young men from Les Cayes came to swell the party of the independents. All the posts the French had set up around Les Cayes had fallen into the hands of General Geffrard, who had contacts inside the town. Most of the market women who entered the town laden with provisions came out of it with powder under their skirts. As famine was beginning to be felt, Colonel Berger was compelled to open the gates of Les Cayes to those laborers who brought in provisions, fruit and vegetables. Many independent soldiers disguised as peasants got into the town in this way and bought munitions there in secret, which they carried to Camp Gérard, Geffrard’s headquarters. It was at this time that Boisrond Tonnerre, an educated man of color who later became one of Dessalines’s private secretaries, left Les Cayes in disguise and went to Geffrard, who received him with distinction and attached him to his person. Boisrond Tonnerre was a Creole of Aquin, and his family then lived in the village of Saint-Louis du Sud. Had the independents had artillery, they would have reduced the town of Les Cayes within a few days. General Geffrard, unwilling to waste precious time in vain efforts before a place so well provided with cannon, resolved to go and attack Anse-à-Veau at the head of one of the divisions of his army. But he learned that the French were advancing in several columns to surround him on every side. Instead of waiting for the enemy, he marched to meet him, after dividing his troops into several corps.