Petion orders peasants armed for the Republic’s war on Christophe

Haiti was cut in two. Henry Christophe held the North; Alexandre Petion held the West and the South from Port-au-Prince. On 16 May 1812 Petion ordered Colonel Tahet to raise a detachment of one hundred men in Miragoane, Saint-Michel and Anse-a-Veau, chosen among cultivators who already owned arms and who, Petion judged, had the most to lose if Christophe won. Thomas Madiou copied the order into his history. Eight years after independence, black Haitians were being armed to shoot black Haitians.