Les Cayes. Taken by Acaau after the rout of the government columns; many citizens flee by sea.
Three Black men, cultivators and former soldiers, Acaau, Dugué Zamor and Jean Claude, had met at Camp-Perrin and there proclaimed the revolution against Rivière Hérard, raising the plain and part of the mornes of the arrondissement of Les Cayes. Those who had stirred them to this taking up of arms had deluded themselves into believing that they could have governed the insurrectionary movement, but they would recognize too late that they had given too free a rein to their personal animosities in stirring the masses so deeply. Acaau was a former lieutenant of the gendarmerie who could read and write; Dugué Zamor, a former drum major of the 13th regiment; and Jean Claude, a former adjutant-major of the national guard of Camp-Perrin.
The unavowed object of the insurrection was to destroy the political preponderance of the men of color, to do away with all those among them who would not submit to Black supremacy, to proclaim a Black man President of Haiti immediately after the triumph, and above all to dispossess the citizens reputed rich, of whatever color, and to divide their property among the proletarians; but that was an aspiration for the future. And it was also agreed that they would demand, by a public act, the recall to their homes of the citizens Salomon, interned by Rivière Hérard at Las Matas in the eastern part, and the abolition of martial law. From then on they were unanimous in deciding that all poor mulattoes would be considered Black, and all rich Black men would be considered mulattoes; this was the inauguration of the war upon great property.(bc)
The insurgents established their headquarters at Camp Perrin, after gathering nearly two thousand cultivators armed with pikes, machetes and muskets. They set out on 3 April, dragging in their midst a 16-pounder which they had nicknamed Maman Pimba, and moved toward the town of Les Cayes, declaring that their intention was not to fight, but to present their demands in so imposing an attitude that one would be obliged to grant them. They crossed the camp général at the charging pace without meeting any obstacle, and halted at the carrefour Boyer at eight o’clock in the evening. They gathered its inhabitants there and set before them the motives of their taking up arms; their political and social doctrine was received with enthusiasm, and they recruited many adherents.(bd)
Acaau had taken precedence over Dugué Zamor and Jean Claude, and was acknowledged by the bands as general-in-chief of the people’s demands. In the same night of the 3rd he continued his march and halted at the carrefour Fonfrède at nine o’clock. On the next day, the 4th, he addressed a letter to the municipal council of Les Cayes making known to it the motives of the insurgents’ taking up of arms. It was Holy Week; the municipal council had him answered by word of mouth that, because of the holy days, the population being given over to its devotions, no serious business could be attended to. Nevertheless it at once made arrangements, in concert with the military authority, to fight the insurgents. Two columns were formed on the spot, one composed of troops of the line under the orders of general Augustin Cyprien, the other of national guards, commanded by general Pierre Colin; they marched out of the town at once and found themselves facing the insurgents the same day, the 4th, at eleven o’clock in the morning, at the carrefour Fonfrède, having passed, the first by the pont Drouet, and the second by the place called Bambous Madame Jérôme. Battle was joined; general Augustin had several round shot fired upon the bands, who came at him with their pikes; after an hour of fighting he was put to utter rout, leaving dead and wounded on the field; he returned to Les Cayes in the greatest disorder, having lost the only piece of cannon he had, which was directed by the colonel of artillery Thomas Presse. General Pierre Colin sustained the shock of the insurgents with resolution; but immediately after the rout of Augustin Cyprien he fell back and likewise returned to Les Cayes without having been broken. It was his bearing that prevented Acaau from entering Les Cayes pell-mell with the fugitives. Acaau’s bands had lost a certain number killed and wounded, although a few days later he admitted to no more than three wounded and one dead.
He took possession of the Quatre Chemins, at the entrance of the town, the same day, 4 April, at three o’clock in the afternoon. Then he moved to Fort Boyer, where he established his headquarters. His dress was a straw hat full of holes, a torn jacket of colette, trousers of colette in the same state, a great machete, pistols fastened to his belt, and sapattes. (*) His two lieutenants, Dugué Zamor and Jean Claude, were dressed like him, and his men were either in rags or nearly naked.
He detached one column which, under the command of Dugué Zamor, seized Fort l’Îlet without striking a blow, and another which, under Jean Claude, occupied the causeway. By ten o’clock in the evening he was master of the whole town, except the town hall, where the government troops had concentrated. The next day, the 5th, very early in the morning, he parleyed with them; there was a capitulation. Immediately afterwards all the civil and military authorities stood aside before him, and the citizens, most of them dismayed and at his mercy, declared that they acknowledged the justice of his demands; nevertheless they judged it prudent to flee in great numbers, taking ship either for Jamaica or for other towns of the Republic.