The Parsley Massacre was a genocidal act of violence committed against Haitians living in the northwestern Dominican Republic, initiated on this day in 1937 by Rafael Trujillo. Tens of thousands were murdered at the hands of Dominican troops.

Estimates of the amount of Haitians killed in the massacre, known as "kout kouto-a " in Creole ("the stabbing") and "El Corte" in Spanish ("the cutting"), range from 12,000-35,000.

The violence was carried out by the Dominican Army on the orders of Dominican dictator Rafael Trujillo, who initiated it with this statement, given on October 2nd, 1937:

"To the Dominicans who were complaining of the depredations by Haitians living among them, thefts of cattle, provisions, fruits, etc., and were thus prevented from enjoying in peace the products of their labor, I have responded, 'I will fix this.' And we have already begun to remedy the situation. Three hundred Haitians are now dead in Bánica. This remedy will continue."

In the following week, hundreds of Dominican troops poured into the region, killing Haitians with rifles, machetes, shovels, knives, and bayonets. Haitian children were thrown in the air and caught by soldiers' bayonets, then thrown on their mothers' corpses. Others were drowned in the sea, making identification and counting of the dead impossible.

The term "Parsley Massacre" for the genocide came from the method that Dominican soldiers would use to determine whether or not those living on the border were native Afro-Dominicans or immigrant Afro-Haitians - they would hold up a sprig of parsley to someone and ask them what it was.

If the person could pronounce it the Spanish way ("perejil"), the soldiers considered them Dominican and let them live, however if they pronounced it with a French or Creole accent, they were considered Haitian and executed.

"Before the massacre, in the frontier, there were always two sides, the people were one, united."

• an anonymous survivor of the Parsley Massacre

Revolutionary freedoms

80 Years On, Dominicans And Haitians Revisit Painful Memories Of Parsley Massacre

DOMINICAN REPUBLIC: Bearing Witness to a Modern Genocide

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