Haiti: Its dawn of progress after years in a night of revolutionKuser, John Dryden
History
Haiti: Its dawn of progress after years in a night of revolution
Kuser, John Dryden
Haiti -- Description and travel
At last the vari-colored lights of Port-au-Prince peeped forth from
among the foothills on the right and we followed the channel in by
alignment with two huge red range lights, one on the top of the
Cathedral and the other on Fort National. The beauty of coming into
Port-au-Prince is by daylight, when, not unlike Serrento, it shows
a background of 2800 foot mountains rising behind, and with the
pellucid green sea stretching out from the town. A Haitian launch
came alongside for the custom officials to board. Our passports
were taken to be kept for overnight and recorded, and we were then
allowed to proceed to the dock which is at the end of a long pier
jutting out from the land.
As we spun along to the house where we were to visit we went over
streets smoother and wider than all but a few in the United States.
These streets, throughout most of the town, were put down under
contract with an American firm in 1914, before American occupation
of Haiti, and are of excellent quality. From the business district
we came out into the Champ de Mars, a laid-out park with a bronze of
Dessalines, the "Founder of Haitian Independence," in the center;
and at the end a grandstand from which to watch the sports or
national festivities. Next to the Champ de Mars is the new palace
of the President of Haiti. It is now at a stage of near-completion,
and one wing is already occupied by the President and his family.
This building is the fourth palace to be built on the same site, one
of the others having been set on fire and destroyed, and the other
two ruined through explosions. In the latter cases the President
had been unable to trust anyone with the keeping of the national
supply of ammunition and was forced to keep it in his own palace,
so that in both cases the Presidents were killed by means of their
own powder. On the lower side of the palace are the marine barracks
and the gendarme caserne, opposite one another, and above the Champ
de Mars is the marine brigade headquarters.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account