William Eugene Warner

Warships of Salnave's War (Haiti, 1867-1869) William Eugene Warner

Two years after the American Civil War, another civil war waged among the jungles and beaches of one of the hemisphere's first's democracies, Haiti. This civil war is one of the few examples of a three-way internal conflict. It was waged by peasants in the hills as well as by state-of-the-art warships along its Caribbean shorelines. As in many conflicts in South and Central America, it lies forgotten in the few French texts and even fewer English books, covered over by the violent and often sad history of Haiti's past. The conflict is known as Salnave's War because it revolved around the fate of President Sylvain Salnave. Salnave rose to power on the promise of democracy, but that promise soon faded into authoritarian dictatorship.