Cap-Français Refugees and the Washington Administration (1793–1794)

A cluster of primary documents from the Founders Online archive — Washington Papers and Hamilton Papers — covering the October 1793–April 1794 refugee crisis following the burning of Cap-Français, including a petition from over 200 destitute refugees who arrived in Wilmington, Delaware, and the Washington cabinet's response recommending that remaining congressional relief funds be used to repatriate them. The crisis established the first federal humanitarian appropriation in U.S. history and brought the Haitian Revolution physically into the American republic, intensifying slaveholder anxiety and shaping U.S. policy toward Saint-Domingue for a decade.