On this day — August 21 in African history

Enslaved people in Saint-Domingue (present-day Haiti) rose up on the night of August 21 in a mass uprising that grew into the Haitian Revolution, the only successful slave revolt in modern history.

South African President Nelson Mandela convened regional leaders in Pretoria for a summit aimed at mediating an end to the escalating conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Ahmed Kathrada, the South African anti-apartheid activist imprisoned alongside Nelson Mandela on Robben Island, was born in Schweizer-Reneke.

Mohammed VI, who has reigned as King of Morocco since 1999, was born in Rabat.

Public Domain, Wikimedia Commons

A massive cloud of carbon dioxide erupted from volcanic Lake Nyos in Cameroon, killing up to 1,800 people and livestock in nearby villages in one of the deadliest natural disasters of its kind.