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This 1773 Réglement Concernant les Gens de Couleur Libres was one of many discriminatory laws that magistrates in the French colony of Saint-Domingue issued against free people of color from the mid-1760s on. Such laws were intended to racially mark free people of African ancestry and prevent the possibility that they could “pass” for white in the colony. Specifically, this law prohibited “mulâtres and other people of color who were born free” from taking the surname of their white fathers, and it likewise proscribed those who were manumitted from using “the surname of the Masters who gave them freedom.” Instead, the law required free people of African descent to baptize their children with an African surname, or one associated with their occupation or color, and compelled slaveholders to ensure that those they freed followed suit. Such laws spurred the ongoing struggle of free people of color for legal equality in Saint-Domingue during the years leading to the Haitian Revolution between 1791-1804. - Kate Ramsey, Associate Professor, University of Miami Department of History, November 25, 2019. - Project funded thanks to the Andrew W. Mellon CREATE Grant.

"Port-au-Prince: chez Guillot, 1773. Quarto. 4pp. Single folded sheet... Rules for Freed Slaves and Free 'Men of Color.' A rare Haitian imprint that enumerates the rules on how mulattos and other 'gens de couleur libres' [free people of color] who were born free can take the last names of their fathers and how freed slaves can take the names of the masters who gave them their freedom. In the complex slave society of colonial St. Domingue, the illegitimate offspring of white masters and their slave mistresses were generally free, sometimes quite wealthy, but with circumscribed civil rights. Likewise, freed slaves (for example, Touissant L'Overture) often had substantial property and slaves. Rare, with only one copy located at the the John Carter Brown Library. The origins of printing in St. Dominigue, now Haiti, are obscure. The best contemporary source, Isaiah Thomas in his History of Printing in America, says that a press was established at Port-au-Prince as early as 1750, but this is uncertain since the earliest imprints do not survive. In American libraries we can locate a 1767 Port-au-Prince imprint at the Library Company of Philadelphia, while the earliest held by the John Carter Brown Library (which has by far the most extensive collection of very early Saint Domingue imprints, with about three dozen prior to 1785) is 1769. Thomas says there was a press at Cap Francois 'as early as 1765, and probably several years preceding,' but we locate a single imprint at the Library Company dated 1752. In the period 1769-1773 a printer named Guillot evidently operated presses in both Port-au-Prince and Cap Francais with the royal patent. Guillot either died or retired the year this was printed and was succeeded by a printer named Donnet. A rare and highly important imprint describing the complex rules that governed free African-Americans in the slave culture of Saint Domingue." -Donald A. Heald Rare Books.

"Dated 16 August 1754, this indenture records a transfer of title from the St. Kitts planter Edmund Akers (1710-1782) to Francis Fane (c.1698-1757) MP, Commissioner for trade and the plantations, of a sugar plantation of 55 acres in the parish of Christ Church Nicola Town on the island of St. Christopher 'with all and singular dwelling houses, boiling houses, mills, stills, coppers and other ... buildings.' The estate is delineated to the North by lands of John Hutchinson and William Percival, to the East by Scotch Island Gutt and the lands of William Woodley and Samuel Vanderpoole, to the South by lands of Ralph Willett, esquire, and to the West by lands of John Hutchinson.." –Description from Samuel Gedge, bookseller

First edition imprint of a charter describing the rules and commercial relations of Catalonia and its colonies in the Caribbean. This edition was printed by Joseph Rico, royal printer to the Spanish crown and member of the Supreme Council of the Indies, and only has 33 pages, ending at section XXVII.

"Containing a rare mid-eighteenth century reference to a synagogue on the Caribbean island of Nevis, this document of 1 February 1761 records the leasing by Samuel Harris Esq. (d.1773?) to John Ward Esq., both 'of the island of Saint Christopher,' of a piece of land, 'by estimation fifteen acres...bounded to the East with lands belonging to Ralph Willett Esquire...To the West with the Common Path...To the North with lands belonging to the said John Ward...To the South with...the common path leading from the Jew's Synagogue...” A Sephardic Jewish community on the island of Nevis is recorded from at least the 1670s to the close of the 1760s. The reference in this document must be to the synagogue at Charlestown (parish of Saint Paul), the capital of the island of Nevis, which is thought to have been built in the 1680s. Born on Nevis, Alexander Hamilton (1755-1804) attended the Jewish school attached to this synagogue in the 1760s." --Description from Samuel Gedge, bookseller

"[ France, 1770s ] - 'Extraits de divers ouvrages que jaij [j'ai] lus, entiers et en prose..." [Excerpts from various works that I have read, whole and in prose]. Manuscript journal of philosophical, entertaining, and politically important texts published mid-eighteenth-century books, specialized journals, private letters, and decrees, the lot compiled by a learned man whose range of interest includes theatre, nobility, politics, and war, as he engages in the period of enlightened thinking. Text is in French. 8vo. 162 pages in manuscript. In the writer's custom-made, elegant full calf binding, four raised bands, ornate tooled borders, titled 'Excerpta' and initialed 'V. F. St.' to front... This uncommon assortment of extracts from eighteenth century works, many of which are scarce or inaccessible today, provides a glimpse into the style of seventeenth century literature and theatre, as well as political and social interests of the period, a time when Europeans challenged themselves to steer away from tradition and to embrace diverse philosophies for betterment. Several texts are drawn from volume three of 'Epitres diverses sur des sujets differens,' by Georges Louis de Baar, published in London between 1750 and 1756 by Philippe Changuion whose shop was on the Strand near Somerset House. The earliest work that the writer had in hand, and partly transcribes in his journal, is a notice dated 18/28 December 1621 during the Thirty Years' War, from the Lord of the Duchy of Bouillon [Henry de la Tour d'Auvergne (1555-1623), Duke of Bouillon]. 'Avis de Monseigneur le Duc de Bouillon...' This manuscript extract of 18 pages concerns the religious wars as the Duke is rallying the inhabitants to stand together and fight for the public cause. He instructs them to create an army, selectively choosing their men for battle, to prepare defenses that will render their land inaccessible to invaders, to guard the forts, to select a legation to join an embassy representing seventeen cantons, and so forth."- Voyager Press

"A scarce example of a French military commission issued in the Caribbean during the American War of Independence, this document on vellum bears the signature of the French governor general of the island of Saint-Domingue (now Haiti), Robert-Maurice, Comte d’Argout (d.1780), Creole sugar plantation owner and former governor of Martinique (1776-1777). Dated 25 June 1779, this commission appoints Jean-Baptiste de Cressac, a Creole owner of plantations of coffee, indigo and cotton as captain in the mixed race infantry ('d’Infanterie Mulatres') in the Saint-Domingue militia, Port-de-Paix batallion, parish of Gros Morne." –Description from Samuel Gedge, bookseller

"This decree authorized foreign vessels to transport African slaves for sale in Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint Lucia, and Tobago, to meet the needs of those islands which had been abandoned by French slave traders in favor of the colony of Saint-Dominique; funds raised by the decree, which imposed a payment of 100 livres per head, were to be paid as a bonus rewarding captains of French slave trading vessels who brought slaves to the islands." –description from James Cummins, bookseller

"The bills of sale from Mexico show that the slave trade did not collapse with the end of the Portuguese asiento in 1640. A growing population of American-born Creoles sustained the market during the subsequent decades, along with a modest number of new African arrivals. In the 18th century, slavery remained integral to Central Mexico's economy." –description from Libreria Urbe

Enslaved persons included:

VE1 - 1722: Cervantes, Antonio
VE2 - June 30, 1777: Gaitan, Josef Antonio
VE3 - October 5, 1777: Martine Jose
VE4 - July 22, 1778: Nieto, Josef Antonio
VE5 - August 17, 1779: Mathias, Josef
VE6 - May 8, 1787: Montaño, Jacinto (Lomelin)
VE7 - April 1, 1787: De La Luz, Ignacio
VE8 - November 24, 1785: Nepomuceno, Juan and Chrisanto (no surname listed)

The Walter Adams Collection contains letters, deeds, notes, property records, and receipts from the years 1674 to 1786, in the Massachusetts area.

The John Moultrie Collection contains the following three items:

(1) A sales report titled "Copy of Sales of Effects of Estate of John Moultrie" dated 1772. The commodities sold range from a plantation titled Goose Creek to slaves to "bush corn & peas."

(2) A 1786 letter addressed to a Lord Hawke. In this, Moultrie apologizes for having to leave London early and missing an engagement with Hawke, and asserts his gratitude to Hawke on behalf of the people of East Florida.

(3) A leaf excerpt of a letter, chronicling the fate of the British people living in East Florida after the American revolution. The leaf begins: "...about the time or just before the revolt of the Americas the governor of East Florida secured the Kings order restraining him from any further grants of land in the usual manner and terms, and ordering all the vacant lands in the province to be surveyed, advertised, & laid out in certain tracts and to sell them at public sale at certain periods - giving public notice thereof. This of course could not accommodate with lands those unfortunate people who were obliged to fly from their homes in the neighboring colonies on behalf of their attachment to Great Britain, into East Florida held out as a place of refuge by proclamation in consequence of his Majesties instructions to his governor."

The collection also contains typescripts of these documents, and a photocopy of an image of Moultrie.

Purchase from the New Antiquarian

Purchase from the New Antiquarian

"Two rare brochures giving the recipe for French physician Gilles-Joseph Decourcelle's patent medicine, l'élixir Américain, as well as advertising the third edition of his medical text of the same name.

Decourcelle lived in Saint-Domingue for thirteen years before establishing a practice as an obstetrician in Vitry-le-François. He claimed to have learned the medicinal properties of Caribbean herbs by observing the way in which they were used by women of African descent, including enslaved women, in the French colony. Upon his return to France, he marketed his élixir Américain by prominently emphasising the exotic origin of the ingredients, and promotion their benefits for a myriad of gynaecological and birth-related conditions. The Nancy imprint describes the elixir as a cure "les maladies de lait," and his medical text contains many endorsements from women whose health problems had been relieved by his remedy.

The plants in the recipe which are specifically described as originating in Saint-Domingue are: Cocos aculeatus (root of grugru palm), Crescentia cujete (calabash), Erythroxilum areolatum (bark of smoke wood), Justicia assurgens (sixangle foldwing), Laurus-Persea (avocado leaves) and Saccharum officinarum (root of cane sugar). Given that Erythroxylaceae are natural producers of cocaine, and that one of the other ingredients is listed as Egyptian opium, the medicine would certainly have been potent, if not prescriptively effective.

The different type-settings and regional imprints of these two versions of the same bifolium can be explained by the fact that they were job-printed locally by the distributors of the elixir. In the back of the 1787 third edition of L'Élixir Américain, as advertised in this brochure, there is a list of authorised dispensaries. For Nancy "chez M. Mandel, Directeur de Bureau de confiance" and for Moulins "chez M. Gueriot, capitaine d'Artillerie."

Whilst revealing the specific instructions for the preparation of such patent medicines seems counter intuitive, the exotic ingredients and complex method outlined in the text of the brochure were perhaps more to endorse the product than to inspire the purchaser to attempt to make their own batch at home. These brochures were likely distributed gratis with a bottle of the elixir." –description from Maggs Bros. Ltd. Rare Books & Manuscripts

"This pamphlet repudiates the secessionist assembly at Saint Marc and declares that real authority resides solely with the King in France. The authors reiterate that Saint Domingue is not a sovereign state but a colony of France and should behave accordingly. The French Revolution fueled unrest in the colony, eventually leading to the overthrow of French rule on the island. This imprint serves to illustrate the remarkable print culture of pre-Revolutionary Saint Domingue, by far the richest of French sugar colonies. From imprints handled by this firm we know that there were presses at Saint Marc, Port-au-Prince, and Cap Français, with probably two different printers at each of the latter two." --Description from William Reese Company

"...An unrecorded pamphlet, printed by a government press in the French colony of Saint-Domingue, documenting the emotional and political reactions to the beginnings of the Haitian Revolution, a critical moment in Caribbean colonial history.

On 14 August 1791, under the charge of enslaved leader Dutty Boukman, and the Vodou prophetess Cécile Fatiman, about two hundred enslaved people in the northern regions of the isle of Saint-Domingue took the Oath of Bois Caïman, committing to an orchestrated revolt against their white enslavers. The conflict was the only successful revolt of enslaved people in modern history and resulted in the establishment of the autonomous nation of Haiti in 1804, after 13 years of open conflict.

The document was printed during the initial shockwave generated by the rebellion, which began in the north of the island and developed after mass killings of white landowners and their families into a military conflict between revolutionary factions. Our document, written by one Goujon representative of the people of the commune of Cayes and addressed to the Colonial Assembly of Saint Domingue urges three central points: 1) A strengthening of the role of communes and municipalities in order to consolidate republican ideals on the island; 2) maintenance of freedom of the press, which had been restricted in other parts of the colony, and 3) delegation of the restoration of order to the executive branch of the government in the face of the accelerating violence of the rebellion..."--Description from W. S. Cotter Rare Books.

"Headed as 'No. 5' and 'No.6,' and like issued together, these two letters are dated December 31 and January 1 and specify the conditions of the general amnesty proclaimed on December 5th by the three civil commissioners from France." –Description from William Reese Company.

"[ Printed Commission, Completed in manuscript, signed by Légér-Félicité Sonthonax, appointing the Mulatto General Villate as Commander of Cap-Français ]. Cap-Français, Oct. 10, 1793. Broadside, 18 1/2 x 11 3/4 inches, completed in manuscript. During the early years of the French Revolution, Sonthonax was the civil commissioner of Saint Domnigue, which would soon become Haiti. A radical Jacobin, he presided over a chaoiic period of conflicts between royalists and revolutionaries and between whites, free people of color, and slaves in full revolt. He is most remembered for freeing the colony's slaves on Aug. 29, 1793 in an effort to gain the support of Toussaint L'Ouverture's forces against the Spanish. This document appoints the mulatto general, Villate, a rival of Toussaint's, as military commander of the city. It is signed by Sonthonax and countersigned by French military leader Etienne LaVeaux, who later assumed the governorship for himself, but he held power only briefly before deposed by Toussaint. A large woodcut vignette proclaiming 'La Republique Française, Une et Indivisible' heads the document. All early printed material from Saint Domingue is, in and of itself, rare by nature. A handsome and important piece, signed by two important figures in the early Haitian revolution, formalizing the rise to power of a third." -William Reese Company

"Shirley, Henry. [Autograph letter signed, to Stephen Fuller in London, concerning the election of Roland Sewell as agent in England for the Jamaica Assembly and other matters concerning the island.] Kingston [Jamaica.] 16 November 1794. Autograph letter signed. 4to (19 x 22cm) [3] pages on bifolium, second leaf with marginal tear from seal opening (not touching text), verso with manuscript address panel & postal markings, old folds...[TOGETHER WITH] Taylor, Simon. [Autograph letter signed, to Stephen Fuller in London, concerning the election of Roland Sewell as agent in England for the Jamaica Assembly.]Kingston Jamaica, 13 December 1794. Autograph letter signed. 4to (20 x 24cm) [1] page on bifolium, second leaf with marginal tear from seal opening (not touching text), verso with manuscript address panel & postal markings, old folds...Sent from Jamaica to London addressed to Stephen Fuller (1716-1799), from 1764 to 1794 agent in England for the Jamaica Assembly, these two letters were penned by wealthy planters Henry Shirley II (1745-1812) and Simon Taylor (1739-1813), both supporters of Fuller writing to him after his loss of the post of agent following the appointment of Robert Sewell (1751-1828) by vote of the assembly in 1794. Taylor, one of the richest men in Jamaica (see: ODNB), explains in detail the political machinations behind the voting in of Sewell. In addition to discussion of the election Shirley provides a list of how each assembly member voted, also writing with details concerning the 'fatal pestilential fever' afflicting several parishes of Jamaica, commenting on losses to the army and navy as a result of infection and noting how plantation slaves were not affected." –Description from Samuel Gedge, bookseller

A manuscript of financial entries for tenants' rent payments for residences in London.