Léopardins Explained

The Léopardins, also called the Assembly of Saint-Marc (Assemblée de Saint-Marc) or the “Faction des 85”, were the elected members of the self-proclaimed Assembly in Saint-Domingue (now Haiti) who tried to resist the reforms of the French Revolution, claiming to be above the Governor General.They sailed to France aboard the military ship Le Léopard to try to impose the Secession of Saint-Domingue there. The Léopardins were successors to the Club de Hôtel de Massiac, who were also worried about plans to give more freedoms to mulattoes or blacks.

History

On 25 March 1790 and 15 April 1790, the elected deputies of the three provinces of North, West and South Saint-Domingue, were summoned to Saint-Marc (Haiti), under the chairmanship of Thomas Millet, to create a new "General Assembly of the French part of Saint-Dominge".The assembly of the west mainly answered the call, while that of the north preferred to remain "legalist" as the old and large families there preferred. The new "General Assembly of the French part of Saint-Domingue", known as "Saint-Marc", quickly made its main mission, in the minds of its electors, of preventing application of the decree of 15 May 1790, which had been prepared in France by the National Constituent Assembly, to grant people of color (mulattoes) equal political rights with whites. Thomas Millet, successively president then vice-president, proposed a motion that would force all whites who were married to a woman of color to take an African name.

On 28 May 1790 the "Assembly of Saint-Marc" published its own constitutional laws for the colony.The assembly then decided to open the ports of the colony to foreigners, which went against the laws of exclusive trade, still in force in the Kingdom. It let it be known that Saint-Domingue should be independent. Several bloody clashes then took place between supporters of this assembly, called "Red pompons", and the king's representatives, led by Governor Antoine de Thomassin de Peynier and Colonel Mauduit and named "White pompons", because of the white pins, which they attached to the pockets of their shirts.

On 30 June 1790, loyalist troops attacked the Western Assembly.Some sympathizers of the "red pompoms" tried to leave for France to assert their point of view with the revolutionaries.They were intercepted soon after they arrived in the port of Saint-Marc, and thrown in prison. On the night of 29–30 July 1790 Governor Antoine de Thomassin de Peynier dispersed the deputies of the "Saint-Marc Assembly".

A group of 85 elected members of the assembly seized the government ship Le Léopard on 7 August 1790, after having persuaded the crew to mutiny". They sailed for metropolitan France and Paris to assert the interests of the colonists of Saint-Domingue during the French Revolution.6 When the ship requisitioned by the "Léopardins" arrived in the harbor of Brest after having crossed the Ocean, the town council, impressed by the fact that almost all the elected representatives of the assembly were on board the ship, sent a delegation to meet them.In the process, they obtained financial support from a merchant in Dunkirk, in the form of a sum of 400,000 francs.

The national assembly agreed to hear them, but nevertheless decided on 12 October to dissolve the assembly of Saint-Marc.

The "Léopardins" included Thomas Millet, coffee planter, René-Ambroise Deaubonneau, deputy for Petit-Goâve in the Colonial Assembly, who was one of the founders of the so-called Assembly of Saint-Marc and the president of this assembly, Paul, François, Eustache, Marquis de Cadush and Colonel Jean-Jacques Bacon de la Chevalerie who was also president of the assembly, and had previously played a role in the development of Freemasonry.

Timeline

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