Hannibal Price, Haitian author and diplomat

Born in Jacmel in 1841 to a well-to-do mulatto couple, Hannibal Price began life above the curve. His well-funded education gave him the means to rise high in various respects and he became known as an author as well as a diplomat, having had the post of ambassador from Haiti to the United States for three years from 1890 until his death in 1893.

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Price also acted as a Provisional Government Counselor after President Michel Domingue's fall in 1875 and was a serious advocate of Florvil Hyppolite. During the time he played the role of Minister Plenipotentiary to Washington he wrote the book he would be most known for entitled, 'De la Réhabilitation de la Race Noire par la République d'Haïti' (On the Rehabilitation of the Black Race by the Republic of Haiti). This further journey into authorship and the subject matter discussed was said to be in answer to 'Hayti or the Black Republic' by Spenser St. John. Published posthumously, the book sets about to comprehensively show all the possibilities for Haiti if the chains of illiteracy and the consuming practice of vodou were not in existence. It also endeavored to defend the Negro race and present the country to the foreign world in a more friendly light through the discourse of the history and social life of Haiti so voluminously documented within the pages.

When he succumbed to typhoid fever and died in the United States he was fifty-one years old. The Haitian author, called the father of Noirisme, Jean Price-Mars, adopted the name to honor the man.

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Read more: jacmel, Mulato, book, writer, Poet, Florvil Hyppolite, Michel Domingue, Noirism, Race, Hannibal Price, People

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