King Henry Christoph was a leader in the Haitian Revolution of 1804, helping to establish Haiti as the first independent Black Republic.

But his story goes beyond the battlefield. Rising from slavery to kingship, he shaped the nation's early history while facing resistance from foreign powers. This week on the

lectures and history podcast, Yale University professor Marlena Doubt explores Christoph's life,

his role in the revolution, and how the world reacted to Haiti's fight for independence.

More after this. Right, good morning.

Thank you everyone for our last class session of Haiti in the age of revolutions.

So we're going to be talking today.

We're going to be rounding out sort of what we learned all semester long,

discussing the Haitian revolution, sort of revisiting some

of that material, but focusing on the particular life of Henri Christoph, King of Haiti,

and thinking about the relationship as we've done all semester between the Haitian Revolution

and Haitian independence. It's very important to try to understand the pivotal moment in world historical significance

of the Haitian revolution in relationship to Haitian independence and to what happened in the post- emancipation period,

how sovereignty unfolded and how Haiti's first leaders really tried to establish black sovereignty

in a hostile world of slavery. So that's what we're going to discuss today. We're going to start

with King Anli Christoph's coronation on June 2nd, 1811. And then we're going to kind of fold back

and think about, well, how did he get to this point?

He himself was a formerly enslaved person.

How could it come to pass that he would end up becoming the king of Haiti as this is obviously

a remarkable trajectory for a remarkable life for someone who fought during the Haitian

revolution and ended up leading

Haiti becoming one of the principal leaders in the post-emansipation period.

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