This book examines how competing narratives about the Haitian Revolution influenced American public culture during the Civil War. It argues that both antislavery and proslavery groups appropriated the symbols of Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution in their attempts to determine the fate of slavery in the United States.

Toussaint Louverture and the American Civil War
The Promise and Peril of a Second Haitian Revolution

Matthew J. Clavin

2009 | 248 pages | Cloth $39.95 | Paper $22.50
American History
View main book page

Table of Contents

Introduction
Chapter 1. "The insurrection of the Blacks in St. Domingo": Remembering Toussaint Louverture and the Haitian Revolution

PART I. OPENING THE CIVIL WAR OF WORDS
Chapter 2. "He patterned his life after the San Domingan": John Brown, Toussaint Louverture, and the Triumph of Violent Abolitionism
Chapter 3. "Contemplate, I beseech you, fellow-citizens, the example of St. Domingo": Abolitionist Dreams, Confederate Nightmares, and the Counterrevolution of Secession

PART II. A SECOND HAITIAN REVOLUTION?
Chapter 4. "Liberty on the Battle-field": Haiti and the Movement to Arm Black Soldiers
Chapter 5. "Emancipation or Insurrection": Haiti and the End of Slavery in America

PART III. NATIONS WITHIN A NATION
Chapter 6. "Many a Touissant L'Overture amongst us": Black Identity
Chapter 7. "A Repetition of San Domingo?": Southern White Identity
Chapter 8. "Do we want another San Domingo to be repeated in the South?" Northern White Identity

Conclusion
Notes
Index
Acknowledgments