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Haiti

République d'Haïti

by Mark Sensen

History of the flag
Imperial flag

History of the flag

Haiti rose up against the French in the late 1790s under General Toussaint L'Ouverture. He used a flag of white with a Negro's head on it. In 1805, one of his successors, Dessalines, adopted a vertically divided red and black flag in which the colours stood for 'victory or death'. Dessalines achieved both: he won independence from France but was murdered in 1806. There was then a civil war between two factions. The first, under Christophe (who crowned himself Henri I in 1811) continued to use the red and black flag. Their rivals used a flag of blue and red, which in fact dated from 1803. The design was said to derive from the French tricolour, with the omission of the white symbolising the expulsion of the white man from the island. Although originally vertical, by 1806 a horizontal version, blue over red, was in use. In 1820 Haiti was united under a single regime which used the blue and red flag. In 1964, Duvalier reintroduced the black and red flag, which continued in use until his son's regime was overthrown in 1986. Because of its association with the previous dictatorship, the blue and red flag was then reintroduced.

Stuart A. Notholt, 3-SEP-1996

Imperial flag

by Jaume Ollé, 10-SEP-1996

In an old atlas (Frangott Bromme, Multrirter Hand-Atlas der Geographie und Statistik, Stuttgart 1862) there is a blue and white horizontal flag with a central square containing a red and green flower. W. Smith identifies this flag as that of the Haiti Empire. I don't know much about Haitian History, but is it possible that there were two empires?

Jaume Ollé, 7-SEP-1996

I'm not familiar with the flag you describe here, but the history of Haiti is such a muddle that it would not surprise me if there were indeed two 'empires'. Blue and white on a Haitian flag is certainly a new one on me - I thought that the horizontal blue-red flag was in use from 1822-1964. It's possible, of course, that the flag you describe isn't the national flag but the flag of a would-be dynasty or faction.

Stuart A. Notholt, 6-SEP-1996