Chief Duvalle (also spelled DuValle, Du Valle, Du Vallée, or Duvallier; sometimes referred to as Charles Du Valle), Black Carib (Garifuna) chief and military commander of Saint Vincent (Yurumein/Hairouna) | Active c. 1770s–1796
Chief Duvalle was one of the two most important Black Carib leaders on Saint Vincent in the late 18th century. He is remembered primarily as the brother (or very close kin) and principal co-commander of the paramount chief Joseph Chatoyer (Satuye). While Chatoyer is celebrated today as Saint Vincent and the Grenadines’ first National Hero, Duvalle was the military strategist and sustained leader of the western (leeward) resistance during the decisive Second Carib War.
Background and Pre-War Position
The Black Caribs (Garifuna) of Saint Vincent were a free Afro-Indigenous people formed through the mixing of Kalinago (Island Carib) communities and Africans who arrived via shipwrecks, escapes from slavery, and other means beginning in the 17th century. By the mid-to-late 1700s, they controlled large parts of the island’s rugged interior and northern coasts and had developed a sophisticated society that included agriculture, trade, and skilled canoe navigation.
Duvalle and Chatoyer belonged to the leading chiefly families. Before the final war, they maintained complex relations with both French and British settlers. Contemporary accounts note that Sir William Young (a prominent British planter and colonial official) received both brothers as guests and gave them gifts. Like Chatoyer, Duvalle obtained loans from English settlers, acquired land, and operated a small cotton plantation on which he directed the labor of about nine enslaved people. This economic activity did not prevent the brothers from preparing for armed resistance when British expansion threatened Carib lands and autonomy. Their territory on the leeward side—centered in the area still associated with the name Duvalle (near the foothills of La Soufrière, between Chateaubelair and Richmond)—was a fortified stronghold of deep ravines, dense forest, and mountain passes that gave them a strong defensive advantage.
Leadership in the Second Carib War (1795–1797)
In early 1795, as Britain and revolutionary France were at war, the Black Caribs rose in alliance with French forces under the influence of Victor Hugues in Guadeloupe. Hugues sent the brothers gifts that included a French officer’s uniform, ammunition, and promises of support. Chatoyer and Duvalle divided command of the island: Chatoyer generally directed operations from the windward side and the advance on the capital, while Duvalle commanded the leeward/western front.
Their coordinated “pincer” strategy aimed to isolate Kingstown. Duvalle’s forces advanced along the west coast, burning estates and disrupting British supply lines. British officers described him with a mixture of fear and respect as “a man of great cunning and influence… his knowledge of the woods makes him a shadow we cannot catch.” He proved highly effective at combining traditional Carib guerrilla tactics with elements of European-style warfare.
On the night of 14–15 March 1795, British forces launched a surprise attack on the Carib–French position at Dorsetshire Hill overlooking Kingstown. Chatoyer was killed in the fighting (accounts differ on the exact circumstances). According to persistent oral tradition in leeward villages such as Walliabou and Chateaubelair, Duvalle’s men recovered Chatoyer’s body and carried it back to the Duvalle/Richmond area, where it was buried in a “Round Mound” or sacred cave so the British could not display it as a trophy.
After Chatoyer’s death, many French allies withdrew. Duvalle assumed primary leadership of the remaining resistance and kept the fight going for more than a year. His forces were among the last major groups to hold out. Only after the British adopted a scorched-earth policy—systematically destroying cassava and other food crops—did Duvalle and his followers capitulate in October 1796. His camp was captured, and he was one of the final high-ranking leaders to surrender.
Exile and Later Life
Following the British victory, thousands of Black Caribs were rounded up and confined on the small, barren island of Baliceaux. Overcrowding, lack of food and clean water, exposure, and disease killed roughly half of those held there. The survivors (approximately 2,000–2,500) were deported in 1797 to Roatán, off the coast of present-day Honduras. Duvalle is recorded among those sent to Baliceaux and is believed, according to historical tradition, to have been one of the survivors who reached Central America, along with some of Chatoyer’s children. From Roatán, the Garifuna spread along the Caribbean coasts of Honduras, Belize, Guatemala, and Nicaragua, founding the communities that exist today.
No reliable record of Duvalle’s exact date or place of death has survived.
Legacy
Duvalle is less prominent in official Vincentian commemorations than Chatoyer. Yet, he occupies an important place in Garifuna historical memory and literature as the resilient military commander who prolonged the resistance after the paramount chief’s death. Place names on the leeward coast of Saint Vincent still mark the family’s former influence. In modern discussions, some Vincentians and Garifuna advocates have argued that Duvalle deserves formal recognition as a national hero alongside Chatoyer, citing his strategic leadership, the length of his resistance, and the oral traditions that preserve his role.
Together, the two brothers represent the high point of Black Carib organized resistance to colonial dispossession. Their defeat and the subsequent exile remain foundational events in Garifuna identity and in the wider history of Indigenous and Afro-Indigenous struggle in the Caribbean.