What did it mean for the French-held third of Hispaniola to become the richest colony ever? It has been estimated that between 1716 and 1787, a period that covers France’s greatest boom years in the eighteenth century, fully 15 percent of its economic growth derived from its Caribbean empire. No fewer than a million of the French king’s subjects depended directly on the colonial trade for their livelihoods. Saint Domingue alone generated as much trade as the entire United States. The immense profits generated by the plantation societies Britain and France controlled in the West Indies helped
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