Memorials
On August 29, 1954, the Haitian ambassador to France, Léon Thébaud, inaugurated a stone cross memorial for Toussaint Louverture at the foot of the fort. Years afterward, the French government ceremoniously presented a shovelful of soil from the grounds of Fort-de-Joux to the Haitian government as a symbolic transfer of Toussaint Louverture's remains. An inscription in his memory, installed in 1998, can be found on the wall of the Panthéon in Paris, inscribed with the following description:
Combattant de la liberté, artisan de l'abolition de l'esclavage, héros haïtien mort déporté au Fort-de-Joux en 1803.
(Combatant for liberty, artisan of the abolition of slavery, Haitian hero died in deportation at Fort-de-Joux in 1803.)
The inscription is opposite a wall inscription, also installed in 1998, honoring Louis Delgrès, a mulatto military leader who died leading the resistance against Napoleonic reoccupation and re-institution of slavery in Guadeloupe; the location of Delgrès' body is also a mystery. Both inscriptions are located near the coffins of Jean Jaurès, Félix Éboué, Marc Schoelcher and Victor Schoelcher.
Read more about this topic: Toussaint Louverture
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