This dissertation project examines the impact of one particular insurgent slave group, the Black Auxiliary Troops of King Carlos IV, during the early years of the Haitian revolution. Led by free black generals Jean-François Papillon and Georges Biassou, members of this group accepted aid from Spain in order to continue their fight against the French colonists on Saint Domingue. A series of political and military circumstances led to their exile, and they ended up in various ports in Spanish America. These Black Auxiliaries managed to navigate the spaces in-between, and tracing their history allows us to better understand the ways in which subaltern groups can use political and military instability to advance their position. I argue that the Auxiliaries experience in the Saint Domingue rebellion, negotiating with the French and Spanish officials, turned them into diplomats, well versed in the legal and civil structures of the Spanish empire. I analyze the Auxiliaries experience in trying to maintain a cohesive unit while in exile by deploying their military service to Spain. In particular I argue that the Auxiliaries exercised a degree of autonomy and negotiating power over their own lives and played an active role in fixing contested imperial boundaries.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:VANDERBILT/oai:VANDERBILTETD:etd-05172015-181542 |
| Date | 22 May 2015 |
| Creators | Erickson, Miriam Rebekah Martin |
| Contributors | Jane Landers, Edward Wright-Rios, Daniel Usner, Steve Wernke |
| Publisher | VANDERBILT |
| Source Sets | Vanderbilt University Theses |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Source | http://etd.library.vanderbilt.edu/available/etd-05172015-181542/ |
| Rights | restricted, I hereby certify that, if appropriate, I have obtained and attached hereto a written permission statement from the owner(s) of each third party copyrighted matter to be included in my thesis, dissertation, or project report, allowing distribution as specified below. I certify that the version I submitted is the same as that approved by my advisory committee. I hereby grant to Vanderbilt University or its agents the non-exclusive license to archive and make accessible, under the conditions specified below, my thesis, dissertation, or project report in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of the thesis, dissertation or project report. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis, dissertation, or project report. |
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