#cidihca

At any rate, this is a very great resource for those of you thinking of making more substantial research on Haiti or if you are just curious and want to look at old photos!

For those interested in more material on Haitian-Cuban relations, Afro-Cuban filmmaker Gloria Rolando’s Reembarque documentary explores the experiences of Haitian workers in the Cuban sugar industry and their deportations. Ada Ferrer’s Insurgent Cuba: Race, Nation, and Revolution, 1868-98 and Freedom's Mirror: Cuba and Haiti in the Age of Revolution provide excellent introductions to the important subjects of Afro-Cubans, slavery, relations between Haiti and Cuba, and the “specter of Haiti” as a tool to weaken nationalist sentiment in Cuba. 

Photo Courtesy of: CIDIHCA.

Similarly to many individuals of his generation, Sylvain viewed the Occupation of Haiti as a transgression of international law and as a insult to Haiti's national sovereignty. In 1922, he founded the Union Patriotique (Patriotic Union) to oppose the Occupation and the inherent racism of most Marines towards Haitians. While Haitian and American sources disagree on the matter, many (usually American) historians concede that the Union Patriotique was modelled after the NAACP, following James Weldon Johnson - at the time secretary of the organisation - visit to Haiti in 1920. If the two did meet and discussed ways to better organize Haitian resistance to the Occupation and to make the abuses of American Marines known to a wider public outside Haiti, it is still unsure as to whether the Union was truly a response to Johnson's recommendations or if an indigenous movement to that effect was not, in fact, in place before his arrival. (Sources: X X X X)

The city of Le Cap between 1780 and 1940. Source. 

Grand Rue, Port-au-Prince, Haiti, 1954. CIDIHCA Archives.

Syrian-Haitian women, circa 1950s. CIDIHCA Archives.