The First and Last King of Haiti
About
Named a Times Literary Supplement Book of the Year
The essential biography of the controversial freedom-fighter, revolutionary, and only king of Haiti. Henry Christophe is one of the most richly complex figures in the history of the Americas, and was, in his time, popular and famous the world over. In The First and Last King of Haiti, a brilliant, award-winning Yale scholar unravels the still controversial enigma that he was.
Slave, revolutionary, king, Henry Christophe was, in his time, popular and famous the world over. Born in 1767 to an enslaved mother on the Caribbean island of Grenada, Christophe first fought to overthrow the British in North America, before helping his fellow enslaved Africans in Saint-Domingue, as Haiti was then called, to end slavery on the island. Yet in an incredible twist of fate, Christophe later ended up fighting with Napoleon’s forces against the formerly enslaved men and women he had once fought alongside. Later, reuniting with those he had abandoned, he offered to lead them and became their king. But it all came to a sudden and tragic end when Christophe—after nine years of his rule as King Henry I—shot himself in the heart, some say with a silver bullet.
Why did Christophe turn his back on Toussaint Louverture and the very revolution with which his name is so indelibly associated? How did it come to pass that Christophe found himself accused of participating in the plot to assassinate Haiti’s first ruler, Dessalines? What caused Haiti to eventually split into two countries, one ruled by Christophe in the north as king, the other led by President Pétion in the south?
The First and Last King of Haiti is a riveting story of not only geopolitical clashes on a grand scale but also of friendship and loyalty, treachery and betrayal, heroism and strife in an era of revolutionary upheaval.
Praise for this book
“A fascinating, in-depth, and meticulously researched biography of Haiti’s revolutionary-turned-king.”
“Daut shows us, often for the first time, the various personal, cultural, political, and financial forces that created the controversial future king in all his complexity, as well as the specific contours of his leadership—and his failures. From a place of heartfelt agony, she deploys magnificent archival detective work to catalog the horrors of enslavement and the slave-based economy from which sprang the world-historic Haitian revolution, progenitor of the modern era.”
“Daut’s monumental work conclusively demystifies one of the most misunderstood, romanticized, and demonized figures of the Haitian Revolution in order to set him free once more. This is an important, signal work from one of Haiti’s leading historians.”
“A tour de force. Daut brings King Henry Christophe vividly back to life in this deeply researched and rivetingly told biography. In a work overflowing with new archival discoveries and insights, she carries us expertly through a moment of revolutionary political thought and cultural transformation that reshaped our world and its possibilities. Everyone should know this history.”
“A powerful biography of Henry Christophe, who fought for, defected from, and ultimately ruled over Haiti. . . . Christophe … emerges in Daut’s telling as a complex figure in a world gripped by radical transformation. . . . The result is an expertly told and richly detailed reexamination of the revolutionary period.”
“By clearly chronicling Christophe’s complexstory with detail and nuanced analysis, Daut portrays a crucial, if little-known leader and traces the deep roots of Haiti’s ongoing struggles.”
“[Marlene] Daut, one of the foremost historians of Haiti, has penned a groundbreaking scholarly biography of Henry Christophe. . . . Daut’s research is outstanding. She has unearthed new sources in Caribbean and European archives, and she weighs all evidence carefully and reaches judicious conclusions. . . . A must-read for scholars.”
“An impressively-researched biography.”
“The Shakespearean drama of Haitian revolutionary Henry Christophe’s life is revealed in all its glorious color and complexity in Marlene L. Daut’s superb The First and Last King of Haiti. A product of more than a decade of research, this stout biography is a shimmering synthesis of his life within the rebellious milieu of Saint-Domingue/Haiti in the late 18th and early 19th centuries.”
"Christophe’s career personified the amazing achievement of the Haitian revolution, a triumph over racism, slavery and France’s genocidal attempt to destroy it. Schoolchildren study the American, French and Russian revolutions but rarely the Haitian revolution, the first slave rebellion that led to an independent state formed by freed slaves.
This is why this book is overdue. There have been biographies of Toussaint Louverture, the best known Haitian revolutionary, such as CLR James’s classic studyThe Black Jacobins and the excellent prizewinning Black Spartacus by Sudhir Hazareesingh. But Christophe, who ruled from 1807 until 1820, has lacked a modern, scholarly biography. Finally, we have Marlene L Daut’s impressively researched The First and Last King of Haiti."