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At the onset of the slave revolt in 1791, Haiti (called Saint-Domingue until the expulsion of the French) had 8,000 plantations and produced half of the world’s coffee. It was also a leading exporter of sugar, cotton, tobacco, cocoa, and indigo, which was used as a posh purple-blue fabric dye. The petite island colony accounted for an astounding 35% of France’s total mercantilist economic empire.
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Timothy C. Winegard (The Mosquito: A Human History of Our Deadliest Predator)