Many Haitian-Americans Are Heritage Americans, Too

The first big wave of immigration to the US from what is now Haiti came in the 1790s, after a 1791 slave revolt in the French colony of Saint-Domingue kicked off years of turmoil. About 10,000 refugees arrived at US ports, to varying degrees of welcome. An even larger contingent came after 1800 and mostly to New Orleans, which became part of the US in 1803 thanks mainly to the goings-on in what became independent Haiti in 1804. The new arrivals doubled the city’s population and were largely responsible for creating its distinctive culture.

These refugees weren’t the first people from Saint-Domingue to make an impression up north. Nobody knows for sure where Jean Baptiste Point du Sable came from, but as a French-speaking Black man, the founder in the 1780s of the Lake Michigan trading post that became Chicago has been assumed to be from Saint-Domingue. In 1779, the Chasseurs-Volontaires de Saint-Domingue — 545 Black and mixed-race volunteers — fought heroically alongside the Continental Army against the British in the unsuccessful and bloody Siege of Savannah. Several went on to play prominent roles in the Haitian revolution.