Citadelle Laferrière
| Citadelle Laferrière | |
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The Citadelle Laferrière
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| Location | Northern Haiti |
| Coordinates | 19°34′25″N 72°14′38″W / 19.573611°N 72.243889°WCoordinates: 19°34′25″N 72°14′38″W / 19.573611°N 72.243889°W |
| Area | 108,000 square feet (10,000 m2) |
| Elevation | 3,000 feet (910 m) |
| Built | 1820 |
| Built for | Henri Christophe |
| Official name: National History Park – Citadel, Sans Souci, Ramiers | |
| Type | Cultural |
| Criteria | iv, vi |
| Designated | 1982 (6th session) |
| Reference no. | 180 |
| State Party | Haiti |
| Region | Latin America and the Caribbean |
 Location of Citadelle Laferrière in Haiti
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The Citadelle Laferrière or, Citadelle Henry Christophe, or simply the Citadelle (English: Citadel), is a large mountaintop fortress in northern Haiti, located on top of the mountain Bonnet a L’Eveque, approximately 17 miles (27 km) south of the city of Cap-Haïtien and five miles (8 km) uphill from the town of Milot. It is one of the largest fortresses in the Americas and was designated by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) as a World Heritage Site in 1982—along with the nearby Sans-Souci Palace. The mountaintop fortress has itself become an icon of Haiti. The Citadel was built by Henri Christophe, a key leader during the Haitian slave rebellion (1791–1804), after Haiti gained independence from France at the beginning of the 19th century.
The massive stone structure was built by up to 20,000 workers between 1805 and 1820 as part of a system of fortifications designed to keep the newly independent nation of Haiti safe from French incursions. The Citadel was built several miles inland, and atop the 3,000 ft (910 m) Bonnet a L’Eveque mountain, to deter attacks and to provide a lookout into the nearby valleys. Cap-Haïtien and the adjoining Atlantic Ocean are visible from the roof of the fortress. Anecdotally, it is possible to sight the eastern coast of Cuba, some 90 miles (140 km) to the west, on clear days.
The Haitians outfitted the fortress with 365 cannons of varying size. These were obtained from various nations, and still bear the crests of 18th Century monarchs. Enormous stockpiles of cannonballs still sit in pyramidal stacks at the base of the fortress walls. Since its construction, the fortress has withstood numerous earthquakes, though a French attack never came and it was eventually abandoned.
Henri Christophe initially commissioned the fortress in 1805. At the time, Christophe was a general in the Haitian army and chief administrator of the country's northern regions. In 1806, Alexandre Pétion launched a coup against Haiti's emperor, Jean-Jacques Dessalines. Though General Christophe was aware of this through his system of spies, he did not warn Dessaline viewing his assassination as a necessary evil that would permit him to achieve his goals. Dessalines's death led to a power struggle between Christophe and Pétion, which ended with Haiti divided into northern and southern states, with the north under Christophe's presidency by 1807. He declared himself king in 1811.
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