In 1791, a great slave revolt broke out in Saint-Domingue, which eventually led to the decree of 1794 that abolished slavery in the French West Indies and the Indian Ocean. In 1801, Toussaint Louverture, one of the major leaders of the insurrection, called a Constituent Assembly. The new constitution, promulgated in July 1801, established that the entire island of Hispaniola, including the Spanish portion, was part of the French empire. It also confirmed the prohibition of slavery in Saint-Domingue.  
This was an important victory, but when Napoleon Bonaparte came to power in 1799, he rejected Saint-Domingue's autonomy. In February 1802, he sent an expedition of 22,000 soldiers to Saint-Domingue to fight Louverture. In May 1802, Bonaparte issued a decree re-establishing slavery in the French colonies. Louverture was imprisoned and deported to France, where he died one year later. But the rebels continued fighting. As thousands of soldiers of Bonaparte's  
army succumbed to the epidemics of yellow fever, the insurgent bondspeople eventually defeated the French troops.  
On 1 January 1804, Jean-Jacques Dessalines declared Saint-Domingue an independent nation. Saint-Domingue became the first colony in the Americas to abolish slavery altogether while simultaneously breaking its colonial ties with a European power. The new nation was renamed Haiti, and Dessalines was appointed lifetime governor-general. The new black nation became the symbol of freedom for the populations of African descent in the Atlantic world, and a reminder of the cruelties of slavery. For white planters and slave owners in Europe and the Americas, the simple existence of Haiti was a constant reminder that a nightmare could become reality.