Although the queen had stood by Henry Christophe’s side since the earliest days of the Haitian Revolution, and eventually outlived most of her immediate family, dying in 1851, hardly any of the kingdom’s many chroniclers bothered to consult her tale. Much later, while living in exile in Italy — as one of the only “black faces,” in her words — she at last told her story to a British acquaintance, a frequent visitor at the former palace. She lamented that she had suffered through the deaths of her husband and her sons, including that of her eldest, François Ferdinand, who died in Paris in 1805. Seeking neither recognition, nor glory, nor pity, nor wealth, she said with a sigh, “I have lost a husband, an empire, and [nearly] all my children … sorrow has quite weaned me from the vanities of this life; at my age and in my situation, I can only look forward to the next world, as a place of rest and peace.”

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