Viertieres

 Defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte in Haiti

Vertieres battle for independence

Vertieres is a war museum located about two miles from Cap-Haitien, the second largest city, located in the most northern tip of the island of Haiti.  This is where the Haitian indigenous troops defeated Napoleon Bonaparte army.  Tourists and researchers visit it out of historic curiosity or for their own work on a particular facet of Haitian history.

I can’t help talking about Vertieres without mentioning its historic importance and the heroes who made it what it is today.  The important people who made Viertieres are the following remarkable fighters:

• Jean-JacquesDessalines 
• ToussaintLouverture 
• Henri Christophe 
• Capois-La-mort 
• Alexandre Petion 
• Paul Prompt 
• Charles Daut, etc.

Vertieres had seen the fiercest battle of independence fought between the indigenous troops and the French.  As troops on both sides fought and died, some Haitian fighters were recognized for their bravery and their stern resistance.  Capois-La-Mort braved death so many times that two things happened: he was renamed Capois-La-Mort and his famous historic slogan is “bullets are nothing but dust.” 

The top two war heroes are Jean-Jacques Dessalines and Toussaint Louverture of whom I will talk about individually in separate blog posts.  Those two are the heroes of all heroes.  They are themselves Haiti in its entirety.  Alexandre Petion, a mulatto, often switches sides between the indigenous and the French troops, but at the end he became one of great fighters in the ranks of the Haitian fighters. 

Northern Haiti is good for tourism because it is considered the cradle of the Haitian history.  Most of the war fighters and leaders are from the area.  All the historic sites that draw tourists to northern Haiti are the ingenuity of them, for instance the fortress of the Citadelle, which is the work of King Henri Christophe.