Events
Trujillo, a proponent of anti-Haitianism (i.e., anti-Haitian bias), had made his intentions for the Haitian community clear in a short speech given at a dance held in his honor on 2 October 1937 in Dajabón, stating:
For some months, I have traveled and traversed the border in every sense of the word. I have seen, investigated, and inquired about the needs of the population. To the Dominicans who were complaining of the depredations by Haitians living among them, thefts of cattle, provisions, fruits, etc., and were thus prevented from enjoying in peace the products of their labor, I have responded, ‘I will fix this.’ And we have already begun to remedy the situation. Three hundred Haitians are now dead in Bánica. This remedy will continue.Trujillo’s actions were reportedly in response to information regarding Haitians stealing cattle and crops from Dominican residents of the borderlands; therefore, the annihilation of an estimated 20,000 living within the Dominican border was clearly a direct order of Trujillo. For approximately five days, from 2 October 1937 to 8 October 1937, Haitians were killed with guns, machetes, clubs and knives by Dominican troops, some while trying to flee to Haiti by crossing the Artibonite River, which has often been the site of bloody conflict between the two nations. Of the tens of thousands of ethnic Haitians who were killed, a majority were born in the Dominican Republic and belonged to well-established Haitian communities within the borderlands, thus making them citizens.
Read more about this topic: Parsley Massacre
Famous quotes containing the word events:
“When the course of events shall have removed you to distant scenes of action where laurels not nurtured with the blood of my country may be gathered, I shall urge sincere prayers for your obtaining every honor and preferment which may gladden the heart of a soldier.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“There is much to be said in favour of modern journalism. By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, it keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community. By carefully chronicling the current events of contemporary life, it shows us of what very little importance such events really are. By invariably discussing the unnecessary, it makes us understand what things are requisite for culture, and what are not.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“A curious thing about atrocity stories is that they mirror, instead of the events they purport to describe, the extent of the hatred of the people that tell them.
Still, you can’t listen unmoved to tales of misery and murder.”
—John Dos Passos (1896–1970)