Beheadings of Moca

Jean-Jacques Dessalines printed on a stamp

These events were narrated in the accounts of witness Gaspar de Arredondo y Pichardo, a young law student living in Santiago, Santo Domingo, who later fled to Cuba after surviving the genocide. Dessalines's intended targets were Ferrand and his French soldiers, but he had also warned the Dominican inhabitants in a letter to cooperate with him or risk death. In that letter, written in May 1804, Dessalines writes:

To the inhabitants of the Spanish part. Scarce had the French army been expelled when you hastened to acknowledge my authority. By a free and spontaneous movement of your hearts, you ranged yourselves under my subjection. More careful of the prosperity than the ruin of that part which you inhabit, I gave to this homage a favorable reception. From that moment I considered you as my children and my fidelity to you remains undiminished. As a proof of my paternal forcitude, within the places which have submitted to my power, I have proposed for chiefs none but men chosen from among yourselves. Jealous of counting you in the ranks of my friends, that I might give you all the time necessary for recollection and I may assure myself of your fidelity. I have hitherto restrained the burning ardor of my soldiers. Already I congratulated myself on the success of my solicitude, which had for its object to prevent the effusion of blood. But at this time a fanatic priest had not kindled in your breasts the rage which predominates therein. The incensed Ferrand had not yet instilled into you the poison of falsehood and calumny. Writings originating in despair and weakness have been circulated, and immediately many amongst you, seduced by perfidious insinuations, solicited the friendship and protection of the French. They dare to outrage my kindness by coalescing with my cruel enemies. Spaniards, reflect! On the brink of the precipice which is dug under your feet, will that diabolical minister save you when with fire and sword I shall have pursued you to your last entrentchment? Ah! Without doubt his prayers, his grimaces, his relics would be no impediment to my career. Vain as powerless, can he preserve you from my just anger after I shall have burried him and the collection of brigands he commands under the ruins of your capital city! Let them both recollect that it is before my intrepid phalanxes that all the resources and the skill of Europeans have proved ineffectual. And that into my victorious hands the destiny of the Captain General Rochambeau has been surrendered. To lure the Spaniards to their party, they propagate the report that vessels laden with troops have arrived at Santo Domingo. Why is it not the truth? They little imagine that in delaying to attack until this time my principal object has been to increase the mass of our resources and the number of our victims. To spread distrust and terror, they incessantly dwell upon the fate which the French have just experienced; but, have I not had reason to treat them so. The wrongs of the French, do they appertain to the Spaniards? And must I visit on the latter the crimes which the former have conceived, ordered, and executed upon our species? They have the effrontery to say that, reduced to seek safety in flight, I am gone to conceal my defeat in the southern part of the island. Well then! Let them learn that I am ready and that the thunderbolt is going to fall upon their heads. Let them know that my soldiers are impatiently waiting for the signal to go and reconquer the boundaries which nature and the elements have assigned to us. A few moments more and I will crush the remnants of the French under the weight of my mighty power. Spaniards! You to whom I address solely because I wish to save you. You who, for having been guilty of evasion, shall speedily perserve your existence only so far as my clemency may deing to spare you. It is yet time, adjure an error which may be fatal to you and break off all connections with my enemy if you wish your blood may not be confounded with his. Name without delay that part of your territory on which my first blow is to be struck or inform me whether I must strike on all points without discrimination. I give you fifteen days from the date of this proclamation to forward your intentions and to rally under my banners. You are not ignorant that all the roads of Santo Domingo in every direction are familiar to us. That more than once we have seen your dispersed bands fly before us. In a word, you know what I can do and what I dare. Think of your preservation. Receive here the sacred promise which I make not do anything against your personal safety or your interests, if you seize upon this occasion to shew yourselves worthy of being admitted among the children of Haiti.

Gaspar de Arredondo y Pichardo details his account of the events in the book Recuerdo de mi salida de la isla de Santo Domingo el 28 de abril de 1805 (Memory of my departure from the island of Santo Domingo on April 28, 1805), which was discovered in Cuba and then handed over to the Dominican government for historical record.[3]

Dessalines retreats from Santo Domingo, but along the way, orders the extermination of the Dominicans.

Having failed in his capturing of Santo Domingo, Dessalines, along with the army of Christophe, retreated back to Haiti through the Cibao, but not before subjecting the Dominicans to a massacre, which subsequently escalated into a genocide. Haitian troops entered the cities and killed everyone they encountered, whether they were white, mixed or black.[5] Some of the stories:

The Haitian (troops) entered the city like a fury of hell, cutting their throats sword in hand, trampling everything they found, and making blood run everywhere. Imagine what would be the consternation, terror and fright that that neighborhood, so neglected, fell silent for a moment, in view of similar events, when almost everyone was gathered in the main church, with their pastor imploring divine help, while it represented on the altar the sacrifice of our Redemption, and in readiness to receive communion, as one of the days of the year in which, by custom, even those in the country came to fulfill the annual precept. The throng of women fleeing without knowing where. The screams of children and the elderly who came out of their houses in terror. The ecclesiastical confused in the midst of those who asked him for comfort. – de Arredondo y Pichardo.

[3]

A well-known mixed-race tailor named Fernando Pimentel is mentioned in (44):

A man (44), who had not yet swallowed the sacramental species, was passed with a bayonet and was left lying at the door of the same sanctuary. From there, whoever was able to escape later fell into the hands of the army (Christophe's army) who roamed the city and did not spare any life they encountered. All obeyed, believing that some pardon or grace was going to be proclaimed in their favor, but the pardon was to slaughter them all after the meeting like cornered sheep. The Haitian (troops) after consummating the frightful, sacrilegious and barbarous sacrifice, left the town: that of all the women who were in the church, only two girls were left alive who were under the corpse of the mother, the aunt or the person who accompanied them, they pretended dead because they were covered with the blood that had spilled the corpse they had on top that in the presbytery. There were at least 40 children with their throats slit and on top of the altar a lady from Santiago, Mrs. Manuela Polanco, a woman from Don Francisco Campos, a member of the Departmental Council, who was sacrificed on the day of the invasion and hung on the arches of the Town Hall, with two or three mortal wounds from which he was dying. – de Arredondo y Pichardo.

[3]

But these massacres did not just occur in Moca alone, as explained in another excerpt of Pichardo, which was written by Eugenio Descamps, another survivor, he writes:

There are in the Dominican south, the towns of San Jaun de la Maguana, Las Matas (de Farfán), Las Caobas; in the Dominican north (Cibao), the towns of Monte Plata, Cotuí, San Francisco de Macorís, Moca, La Vega, Santiago de los Caballeros and Monte Cristi. All ancient towns conserving in their traditions the horrors committed by the Haitians.

Those incredible scenes can't be explained in their entirety.

Imagine a people possessed by others who breathe vengeance, crime and pushes them. A people that by tradition, by independence, by love of its own Dominican people and culture, were hated by the invading Haitian army with an indestructible force.

All the Dominican towns mentioned above were ransacked and burned by the Haitian army.

The most distinguished Dominicans and multiple Dominican families were treated in the most cruel way.

Five priests were killed in Santiago de los Caballeros and, according to history, Dessalines himself set the fire that burned down this illustrious town.

Before, the Haitian invaders had committed the bloody Moca Massacre, of which no Dominican mention without horrors. The Moca inhabitants fled to the surrounding countryside as the Haitian army approached, but with false promises regarding their safety, the Haitians managed to convince many of them to return to town. The perfect scene to increase to spill of new Dominican blood? Of anywhere in town, the perfect place to put them was the church. There the Haitians make the innocent Dominicans go to give thanks to God for their change of heart. Then a signal from the Haitian general to his troops, the doors of the church were quickly closed and the Haitian troops commit the most horrible spectacle. The evilness didn't stop when the innocent Dominican children also were killed with the bayonets of the Haitians. The evilness didn't end with the priest either, who was killed and his blood stained the altar...

The Haitian troops returned to Haiti after noticing French ships they thought were heading towards the western part of the island, which they believed were being sent to attack their country. Gaspar de Arredondo y Pichardo also relates that, in the retreat to Haiti, all the cities crossed and the population were reduced to ashes, even altars.[9][3] The Otsego Herald newspaper, based in Cooperstown, New York, published details of the massacre on the same month:

Haytian army had gone against Santo Domingo. They were said to amount to 40,000 men. Dessalines, the Emperor, had marched at the head of these until they reached Santiago, an inland town of considerable strength. A council of war was then held, when it was determined to storm the city. The Emperor, however, was requested not to risk his life in the attempt. The direction of the siege was given to General Brave, who, after a desperate and bloody conflict, succeeded in carrying the city; not, however, without considerable loss – It was rumored that General Brave was mortally wounded and had lost 1,000 of his best troops. The French and Spaniards found in the city, it was supposed, were all put to the sword. – Otsego Herald newspaper, April 25, 1805

[6]

On their retreat, prisoners from every city subject to attack were rounded up by the army, and forced to walk barefoot and get beaten on their way to Haiti. From Santiago, an estimated 997 Dominicans were taken as captives, which included 249 women, 430 girls, and 318 boys. Deprived of food and water, many Dominicans along the way died of hunger and thirst. The young girls and women were raped by the Haitian troops, some were even given to the soldiers as prizes to serve as their sex slaves. Soon after arriving in northern Haiti, Dessalines gave the order to have prisoners either killed on the spot, or forced to work on plantations.[10]