Istwa Nou

The new government had no money at all. Oreste Zamor asked John Allen for a loan of three quarters of a million pounds and was told there could be no loan without American control of the customs. The Cacos who had marched south on a promise of ten gourdes a day were never paid a centime, and robbery began the day Zamor was elected. Within a week they were fighting the town police, and when they took and stripped the police stations the force disappeared. Crowds ran about Port-au-Prince while rifles went off at random, and the palace yard filled with people shouting past each other between the field guns. On 26 February Washington instructed its minister that recognition would follow once Zamor's willingness to accept American help with customs and lighthouses was established, and once Haiti confirmed the Môle would go to no other power. Léger said nothing could be discussed before recognition. Bryan recognised the government on 1 March and got nothing back. German merchants then lent 2.3 million gourdes on ruinous terms.

Within a day of the Caco army entering Port-au-Prince, the National Assembly was found and made to elect Oreste Zamor president. The British minister Leech set down his impressions of the family: Oreste fierce looking and barely schooled, Charles lighter skinned, well educated and plainly the brains of it, and a third brother of no account at all. The difference between the first two was a matter of accident rather than colour. Charles was the elder and had been at Saint-Martial in the capital before the family, Bazelaisists, fled Salomon and settled at Cerca-la-Source on the Dominican border. Oreste was born after the move and learned what Hinche and the mountains had to teach. The American minister expected a long civil war and was right. On 5 February Davilmar Théodore had reached Cap-Haïtien, looted it and set it alight, then took Grande Rivière du Nord, organised sanctuaries in the Caco strongholds and held Port-de-Paix inside a week. Foreign Minister Léger told Leech the only obstacle to a settlement was Theodore's asking price.