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Soldiers, Rebels, and Pirates
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Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Photographs and Prints Division

Alexandre Pétion

Alexandre Pétion (1770-1818) was the son of a French colonist and a freeborn woman of color. During the Haitian Revolution, he fought alongside Toussaint L'Ouverture until 1799, when he joined Toussaint's republican opponents. When Toussaint defeated the republican forces, Pétion was exiled to France. He soon returned to Saint Domingue to help establish the independent Republic of Haiti in 1804. When rival factions divided Haiti into two states in 1806, Pétion was elected president of the South's Haitian Republic and reelected president of Haiti until his death. In Louisiana in 1816, Pétion assisted Haitian refugee Joseph Savary, a free black veteran of the French republican army, and his allies in their support of Mexican independence. Pétion, who actively supported Simon Bolivar, hero of South America's independence (he provided him with men, money, and ammunition), is considered one of the founders of Pan Americanism.

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Image ID: 497504
Title: Général Alexandre Pétion (1770-1818). Héros de I'Indépendance d'Haïti (1807-1818).
Source: Kurt Fisher Haitian history collection.
Name: Fisher, Kurt (1908-) - Compiler
Location: Photographs and Prints Division, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture
Subjects: Haiti -- History -- 1804-1844
Pétion, Alexandre, 1770-1818

Keywords: Bolivar, Simon
Haitian Revolution
Men - Caribbean - Haiti
Pan Americanism
Petion, Alexandre
Presidents - Haiti
Savary, Joseph
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