Here is an annotated, scholarly, multilingual edition of the only lengthy text personally written by Haitian revolutionary Toussaint Louverture: the memoirs he wrote shortly before his death in the French prison of Fort de Joux. The translation is based on an original copy in Louverture's hand never before published.

Historian Philippe Girard begins with an introductory essay that retraces Louverture's career as a slave, rebel, and governor. Girard provides a detailed narrative of the last year of Louverture's life, and analyzes the significance of the memoirs and letters from a...