MEDICAL REVOLUTIONARIES: The Enslaved Healers of EighteenthCentury Saint Domingue

Midwives, herbalists, mesmerists, and other healers among the slaves on the Caribbean island treated their fellow slaves, white residents, and nonhuman animals with their own combination of Western, African, and Caribbean remedies. Weaver (American history and history of medicine, Susquehanna U.) describes how these men and women used their prestige and their networks of communication among the slave community to help instigate and lead the slave revolt in Haiti. Annotation 2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)