As sugar estates turned to Haiti for seasonal migrant labor, increasing numbers settled in the Dominican Republic permanently. The census of 1920, conducted by the U.S. occupation government, gave a total of 28,258 Haitians living in the country; by 1935 there were 52,657. In October 1937, Trujillo ordered the massacre of up to 38,000 Haitians, the alleged justification being Haiti's support for Dominican exiles plotting to overthrow his regime. The killings were fuelled by the racism of Dominicans, who also disdained the manual labour which Haitians performed in conditions of near-slavery. This event later became known as the Parsley Massacre because of the story that Dominican soldiers identified Haitians by their inability to pronounce the Spanish word "perejil". Subsequently, during the first half of 1938, thousands more Haitians were forcibly deported and hundreds killed in the southern frontier region.