Port-de-Paix. Suffers under Christophe; republican since the revolution; the 9th demi-brigade rises under Rébecca and proclaims for Pétion

The parish of Port-de-Paix suffered especially from this order of things; its inhabitants, proud and brave, whom he made to expiate their attachment to Capoix, loved liberty and complained aloud. From the dawn of the revolution they had shown themselves devoted to republican principles, unlike most of the other inhabitants of the North, who had defended the royalist cause. Under Laveaux, Port-de-Paix had been the bulwark of liberty; under Toussaint, it had taken all the energy of Maurepas to hold it in check. The sympathies of this town were with the institutions established in the West. Jacques Simon, intendant of the first division of the North, carried out Christophe’s instructions there with extreme rigidity. The 9th demi-brigade, recruited and quartered in this parish, bore the yoke with impatience. The spirit of the population of the district had been worked upon in favor of the Republic, after the battle of 1 January 1807, by Citizen Pierre Thimothé, deputy to the Constituent Assembly in 1806. Thimothé, in order to be able to return to the North and prepare an insurrectionary movement there, had signed the protest against the Constitution of 27 December 1806.

There was in the ranks of the 9th a grenadier known for his energy, very insubordinate, loved by his comrades and exercising great influence over them. This was Jean-Louis Rébecca, a native of the district of Port-de-Paix. Deeply imbued with the democratic ideas that Pierre Thimothé had spread in his parish, he resolved to bring the whole 9th into revolt against Christophe and to recognize the government established at Port-au-Prince. He instilled into all his comrades the spirit of insurrection that animated him. He had been adjutant, a noncommissioned rank, in his corps, but his colonel, offended by his imperious character, had broken him and put him back in the ranks as a private.

General Guillaume, who likewise put Christophe’s orders rigorously into practice, commanded the arrondissement of Port-de-Paix. The troops, whom he often ill-treated, had come to execrate him. On the thirteenth of May all the soldiers and noncommissioned officers of the 9th, stirred up by Rébecca, demanded of him with threats three gourdes per review instead of two. General Guillaume refused. A few hours later the soldiers, led by Rébecca, who kept insubordination alive among them, invaded the government palace and searched in vain for the general to cut off his head: he had hidden at the approach of the mutineers. After remaining shut away for several days, he learned that the agitation had subsided; he then came back to occupy the government palace, reviewed the troops (17 May)* and had three gourdes given to each soldier. Immediately after the review the troops hooted him and proclaimed the insurrection with cries of Long live President Pétion!** Long live the Republic! They put the grenadier Rébecca at their head and conferred on him the right to exercise supreme authority. Rébecca was preparing to have General Guillaume arrested when the latter took flight and made his way toward Le Cap. The same day, pursuing his plan, Rébecca drove out of the corps, without doing them any violence, all the officers who formed its staff, seized the Grand Fort at the head of the 1st and 2nd battalions of the 9th, fired round shot on the town, then abandoned the fortification after carrying off all its munitions, and threw himself onto the road of the Trois-Rivières, then onto that of Le Gros-Morne. After passing through the Aubert plantation, he went to entrench himself in the fort of the Trois Pavillons and at once sent dispatches to President Pétion asking for prompt assistance.