Haiti was once the honeymoon destination for Hollywood’s elite. What happened?

Once the place to be for celebrity royalty like Elizabeth Taylor and Mick Jagger, the one-time paradise is now hell on earth for its inhabitants. Kim Sengupta explains how this beautiful island nation became a prime spot for kidnappings and gang violence

Richard Burton (right) poses with his wife, Suzy Miller, and the president of Haiti, Jean-Claude Duvalier, in 1976 (AFP/Getty)

There was a time when Haiti was a favoured destination of the rich and famous. Richard and Elizabeth Taylor had one of their honeymoons there. Other visitors included Noel Coward, John Gielgud, Paulette Goddard and Irving Berlin. Mick Jagger and the broadcaster Barbara Walters were among a later generation of celebrities to visit.

The names of the glitterati can be seen in the visitors’ book of the grand Hotel Oloffson in the capital, Port-au-Prince. Graham Greene stayed there while writing The Comedians, which brought the Haiti of Francois “Papa Doc” Duvalier – with his murderous secret police force, the Tonton Macoute – to a wider English-speaking readership.

The slide, which began with the repressive rule of Duvalier – who sought to strike terror into his subjects by identifying with Baron Samedi, the Haitian Vodou god of the dead – was never reversed. Papa Doc died in 1971, to be succeeded by his 19-year-old son, Jean-Claude “Baby Doc” Duvalier. The descent into chaos continued.