Lafayette as a lieutenant general, in 1791
Portrait by Joseph-Désiré Court
Posted on 07/04/2015 2:46:11 PM PDT by afraidfortherepublic
It is doubtful the American Republic would have been born were it not for the courage and generosity of our greatest French friend, Marquis de Lafayette, who joined the Continental Army at the age of 19 with the rank of lieutenant general.
He helped provision George Washington's army, led troops in several battles ,and played a key role at Yorktown.
He persuaded France to join the war on our side.
He was Washington's surrogate son and a beloved American.
When he died in 1830 he was eulogized by former President John Quincy Adams for three hours, and Congress and the nation mourned his death for 30 days.
All Americans today still owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Gen. Lafayette!
(Excerpt) Read more at newsmax.com ...
At least he didn't try to become Chelsea Arnold.
“Lafayette Street is a major north-south street in New York City’s Lower Manhattan. It originates at the intersection of Reade Street and Centre Street, one block north of Chambers Street. The one-way street then successively runs through Chinatown, Little Italy, NoLIta, and NoHo and finally, between East 9th and East 10th Streets, merges with Fourth Avenue. A buffered bike lane runs outside of the left traffic lane. North of Spring Street, Lafayette Street is northbound (uptown)-only; south of Spring Street, Lafayette is southbound (downtown)-only.
The street is named after the Marquis de la Fayette, a French hero of the American Revolutionary War.[1]”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lafayette_Street
More like when they saw we wouldn’t fold like a cheap deck of cards. We didn’t actually start winning until the British began their southern campaign and after early major successes had their butts handed to them at King’s Mountain and Cowpens. In the north the contest had become a staring contest outside New York. The Brits gambled on the south being strongly Tory and they lost.
True, but that was after a lot of water had flowed under the revolutionary bridge. Sometimes things just have to run their course.
For instance, the Sunni tribes weren’t ready to work with us to fight AQ until they’d had a taste of what they were really like.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Visit_of_the_Marquis_de_Lafayette_to_the_United_States
http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/lafayette/exhibition/english/tour/
Lafayette. Words at the Tomb of Washington. [Mt. Vernon, October 17, 1824].
“The feelings, which on this awful moment oppress my heart don’t leave me the power of utterance. I can only thank you, my dear Custis for your precious gift and pray a silent homage to the tomb of the greatest and best of men, my paternal friend.”
Lafayette thanks George Washington's adopted son, George Washington Parke Custis (1781-1857), for giving him a sprig of Cyprus plucked from the tomb of George Washington. An 1829 account by Auguste Levasseur, Lafayette’s personal secretary, describes Lafayette’s 1824 visit to Washington’s grave: “the tomb is scarcely perceived amid the somber cypresses... Lafayette descended alone in the vault, and a few minutes thereafter reappeared, with his eyes overflowing with tears. He took his son and me by the hand, and led us into the tomb... We knelt reverentially near his coffin, which we respectfully saluted with our lips; rising, we mingled our tears with his”.
Most people don’t know that!
In “La Rabouilleuse,” Balzac has one of the characters, a grocer, get guillotined on the same day as the poet Andre Chenier. It was the closest conjunction ever of poetry and the grocery business, according to Balzac.
Of course, that was before Ginsberg’s poem on Walt Whitman in the supermarket.
In my little town our home is right across the street from Lafayette Park.
With any luck, Ted Cruz will be saying the same thing in a few years!
I served on the USS Lafayette, so I took the time to find out what he did to get a missile sub named after him. I always remember Lafayette on July 4.
All Americans today still owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Gen. Lafayette!
***
So very true.
There is a replica of the ship that brought him here, the “Hermione”, which is currently on a good will tour of the East Coast. I had hoped to visit it when it reached Maryland, but I was unable to do so.
Thank you for the ping, FRiend.
The French goal was to weaken Britain, both to keep it from getting too powerful and to exact revenge for the defeat in the Seven Years' War. After the American capture of the British invasion army at Saratoga in 1777, and after the French navy had been built up, France was ready. In 1778 France recognized the United States of America as a sovereign nation, signed a military alliance, went to war with Britain, built coalitions with the Netherlands and Spain that kept Britain without a significant ally of its own, provided the Americans with grants, arms and loans, sent a combat army to serve under George Washington, and sent a navy that prevented the second British army from escaping from Yorktown in 1781. In all, the French spent about 1.3 billion livres (in modern currency, approximately thirteen billion U.S. dollars) to support the Americans directly, not including the money it spent fighting Britain on land and sea outside the United States.
So basically France had an alterior motive in helping American independence.
They gave him a lock of hair from Washington that had been cut while he lie in state. He kept it with him until his riverboat hit a submerged log on the Mississippi at night. They had to leave the boat and were in the lifeboats when Lafayette remembered the box of hair was still in his room. He sent his assistant (read man servant) back to get it before the boat sank. He was successful.
When the Bastille fell, Lafayette had the key sent to George Washington. It is said to be still kept at Mount Vernon.
When the Bastille fell, Lafayette had the key sent to George Washington. It is said to be still kept at Mount Vernon.
Wow! That key would be a great historical artifact.
“Whiff of grapeshot” is an inspired term. Kudos to Carlyle.
I like the portrayals of the Napoleonic and post-Napoleonic periods by Balzac and Stendhal. Am currently reading Balzac’s “La Rabouilleuse,” the action of which extends from the Revolution up to 1840, most of the action taking place in the period 1815-1825.
What an imagination Balzac had!
Never hear that one, thanks!
hear* =heard.
There is a statue of Lafayette on West Market St. in York, PA. York was the first Capitol of the United States when the Congress fled Philadelphia when endangered by the Redcoats. They came to York in order to have the Susquehanna River between them and the Brits.
The Articles of Confederation were signed in York. A cabal of politicians were planning to dump George Washington for some other pompous general when Lafayette arrived in York. Sensing the shenanigans that were afoot, he proposed a toast to His Eminence General Washington. Since we were desperate to have France as an ally, the cabal didn’t want to cross Lafayette, so they folded, joined in the toast, and the rest is history.
Shortly thereafter the Continental Army, defeated General Johnny Burgoyne up in New York State, taking many prisoners in the bargain, in substantial part thanks to the heroic efforts of Benedict Arnold. Upon that news reaching Europe, France signed on as our ally. Arnold later turned coat and betrayed his Country.
Lafayette truly was Washington’s surrogate son. During the bloody French Revolution Lafayette was erroneously accused of wrong doing and came close to being executed. His children were spirited out of France and brought to America. I cannot recall whether their mother was with them or not. The children lived at Mount Vernon until the unpleasantness in France cleared up. Released from prison, Lafayette came back to America to visit the Washingtons.
The account of the scene of his departure back to France is reported as very touching, with he and Washington embracing and weeping, both knowing that because of Washington’s advanced age they would never see each other again. The Founding of our Country has some wonderful human history among its pages.
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