Louverture betrayed a planned Jamaica uprising to secure his British treaty.

Evidence

Louverture had kept control over the negotiations with the British for a very specific reason. He wanted them to withdraw from Saint-Domingue, but he also wanted their help in rebuilding the colony’s economy. Even as he negotiated the withdrawal of the British with Maitland, therefore, he signed a secret treaty with the British general. Louverture promised not to attack or encourage sedition in Jamaica, and in return Maitland agreed to end the British blockade of the island. It was a bold step. France and Britain were still at war, and yet with this agreement—along with a second he signed in 1799 expanding its provisions—he was promising peace between French Saint-Domingue and British Jamaica. And he was agreeing to—indeed encouraging—trade between British merchants and the French Caribbean’s major colony. Louverture was making sure that he would have a mechanism to export the coffee and sugar it produced and a source for what it needed to survive. But he was also doing more. He was preparing for the possibility of open conflict with the French government. — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 778 (#expands, via linked claim)

It was a major victory for Leclerc, and a turning point in the first stage of the war for Saint-Domingue. Louverture, probably fearing that with peace with the British definitively signed he would be unable to hold out against the French troops for much longer, and understanding that Christophe’s defection had severely undermined his military position, soon contacted Leclerc and began negotiating for his own surrender. … While Christophe and Dessalines ate the food offered them, Louverture refused everything. He ate only a small piece of cheese, doing so only after having cut large slices off each of its sides, and holding it with his hands rather than using the silverware. He had granted his submission, but not his trust, to the French. He was right to be suspicious, though he miscalculated the kind of poison they were to use against him. — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 975 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Louverture signed a secret treaty with Britain to prepare for possible war with France — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 778; Christophe’s defection and the Anglo-French peace pushed Louverture to negotiate surrender — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 975

Related

• Louverture signed a secret treaty with Britain to prepare for possible war with France (similarity 0.90)
• French planters proposed handing the colony to Britain for protection. (similarity 0.88)
• Louverture forged a secret trade alliance with Britain while nominally loyal to France (similarity 0.88)
• Christophe’s defection and the Anglo-French peace pushed Louverture to negotiate surrender (similarity 0.84)
• Louverture sabotaged a plan to spread slave revolution to Jamaica to court Britain (similarity 0.82)
• Facing continued battles, Henri Christophe surrendered by negotiating to keep his rank and liberty (similarity 0.81)
• Louverture surrendered tactically but withheld all trust from the French. (similarity 0.81)
• Louverture stayed with Spain because the Republic looked doomed in 1793 (similarity 0.78)

Broader Connections

• Louverture signed a secret treaty with Britain to prepare for possible war with France #expands (0.70) — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 778
• Christophe’s defection and the Anglo-French peace pushed Louverture to negotiate surrender #corroborates (0.55) — Dubois, Laurent, Avengers of the New World_ The Story of…, 975