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An Historical Account of the Black Empire of Hayti by Marcus Rainsford (review)

The publication of Marcus Rainsford’s 1805 history of the Haitian Revolution in this newly edited edition is a key contribution to the field that will allow scholars at all levels to better understand the world’s only successful slave revolution. Paul Youngquist and Grégory Pierrot’s thoughtful and well-researched introduction and editorial footnotes provide crucial details that shed light on Rainsford’s writing, experiences, and goals. The introduction also contextualizes the publication, providing details on British investment in the Caribbean and highlighting how the British undertook their most ardent support of slavery during their occupation of the south and west of SaintDomingue after the abolition of slavery by the French. Youngquist and Pierrot argue that the expansion of slavery by the British, in the very midst of abolitionist opposition, is one of the key reasons that the black revolutionaries in Haiti became for Rainsford the “true heir[s] to a British freedom that for the moment even Britain had forsaken, but that this British bard does his best to sing.” They add: “It’s a neat trick, this Britishization of the Black Empire” (p. xxxix).