Читать книгу What You Do Is Who You Are - Бен Хоровиц, Ben Horowitz - Страница 23

The slave revolution of Saint-Domingue got into the area’s bloodstream and spread from island to island in the Caribbean. Later rebellions in Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, Curacao, Guadeloupe, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Louisiana were attributable, at least in part, to Haitian agents and their followers. These rebellions influenced the eventual withdrawal of the French, British, and Spanish empires from the region.

In the United States, Louverture inspired the abolitionist John Brown to launch the raid on the armory at Harpers Ferry, which Brown hoped would prompt the local slaves to rebel. The attack failed and Brown was hanged, but the Harpers Ferry raid escalated tensions that, a year later, led to the South’s secession and the Civil War.

While one of the greatest culture geniuses in history was unable to permanently establish the way of life he hoped for in his home country, he helped shift the Western world from a culture of slavery to one of freedom.

Toussaint Louverture made missteps that locked him up for life, yet he helped liberate us all.