Lafayette (2 page)
Authors: Harlow Giles Unger
The Lafayette family, Michel and Geneviève Aubert La Fayette, were exceptionally generous in welcoming me to their beautiful Château de Vollore* in the Auvergne, where they not only shared their collection of Lafayette memorabilia and documents but stood ready to serve as consultants at every stage in the development of this book. Also of great help were the curatorial staff at the Château de Chavaniac, Lafayette’s birthplace and childhood home.
Of all those who helped me with this book, however, my deepest thanks must go to my dear friends of more than forty-five years, André and Eva Mandel, to whom I have dedicated this book. For two years, they willingly helped me in my research, translating archaic language, hunting for hard-to-find, out-of-print books, photographs, and documents, locating Lafayette descendants, and driving me over hundreds of miles of dusty roads in the Auvergne— at times through driving rain—on the trail of Lafayette and his family.
In the United States, my wonderful friend and literary agent, Edward Knappman, was, as always, kind and generous with his wise counsel and his help in locating a number of hard-to-find, out-of-print works that proved essential for this book—and in sharing his wisdom. The always gracious Louise Jones, the librarian at the Yale Club of New York City, was also helpful, as were Peter Jaffe, of the rare books department of Argosy Book Store in New York, my former editor, Randi Ladenheim Gil, and Sibylle Kazeroid, an excellent proofreader. Economist Jonathan Falk was also most generous in contributing his time and extensive knowledge. Finally, my deepest thanks, as always, to my editor and friend, Hana Lane, for her constant guidance and wise counsel in every phase of this book.
*The Château de Vollore, in Courpière, is the site of
Les Concerts de Vollore
, an annual music festival held in July. Although the château is still the home of the Lafayette family, its Lafayette Memorial room is open to the public, along with an art gallery, conference rooms, and guest suites.
1757 | September 6. Gilbert du Motier de La Fayette born in Chavaniac, France. |
1759 | Father killed in Battle of Minden. |
1768 | L moves to Paris. |
1770 | Mother dies. |
1771 | Enrolls in Black Musketeers at the Palace of Versailles. |
1774 | Marries Marie-Adrienne-Françoise de Noailles. |
1775 | Joins Noailles regiment at Metz; enrolls in Freemasons; daughter Henriette born. |
1776 | Enlists in American Continental army as major general. |
1777 | Sails for America; joins Washington’s staff; wounded at Battle of Brandywine; Battle of Saratoga; routs Hessians at Gloucester; assigned command of Canada invasion; helps expose Conway Cabal; daughter Anastasie born; Henriette dies. |
1778 | Valley Forge; negotiates treaty with Indians; Battle of Barren Hill; Battle of Monmouth; d’Estaing’s French fleet arrives; Battle of Newport. |
1779 | L returns to France; wins French support for American Revolution; birth of son, George-Washington Lafayette. |
1780 | L returns to America; Rochambeau arrives with French fleet, 4,000 troops; treason of Benedict Arnold; hanging of Major André. |
1781 | L’s Virginia campaign; traps Cornwallis; French fleet blocks Cornwallis escape by sea; siege of Yorktown; Cornwallis surrender. |
1782 | L returns to France; awarded Cross of Saint-Louis; becomes maréchal de camp; daughter Virginie born. |
1783 | Treaty of Paris ends Revolutionary War; Britain recognizes American independence. |
1784 | L’s farewell tour of United States; forges treaty between Indians and Americans; last visit with Washington; Congress names him ambassador without portfolio in Europe; Jefferson replaces Franklin in France. |
1785 | L returns to France; visits Frederick the Great; buys plantation in French Guyana to free slaves; negotiates trade deals for U.S. whale oil, books, paper, agricultural products. |
1786 | Louis XVI convenes Assembly of Notables; L demands sweeping economic and social reforms under constitutional monarchy. |
1787 | First French provincial assemblies meet; L elected to Auvergne assembly; votes to curb royal spending; Americans ratify Constitution. |
1788 | King strips L of marshal’s rank; second Assembly of Notables. |
1789 | King convenes Estates General; conversion to National Assembly; first U.S. Congress convenes; Washington elected first U.S. president; Lafayette, Jefferson write “First Declaration of Rights of Man for Europe”; French mob storms Bastille; L organizes National Guard; mob attacks Versailles; L saves royal family. |
1790 | Radicals seize French Assembly, abolish aristocracy, nationalize lands and Roman Catholic Church; Jacobins mutiny in army; L organizes huge |
1791 | Royal family flees Paris, captured and confined to palace; Assembly approves constitution; L resigns, returns to Chavaniac; L ordered to war against Austrians. |
1792 | King vetoes Jacobin decrees; mob invades Assembly and Palace; L demands arrest of Jacobins; Jacobins overthrow monarchy, imprison royal family, and order L’s arrest for treason; he flees France; Prussian king orders him imprisoned in Wesel, then Magdeburg. |
1793 | Jacobins execute King Louis XVI in January, Queen Marie-Antoinette in October; Adrienne Lafayette arrested; Robespierre begins the Terror, sends thousands to guillotine without trial. |
1794 | L transferred to Austrian prison at Olmütz; his wife, Adrienne Lafayette, transferred to Paris prison; Adrienne’s sister, mother, and grandmother guillotined; Robespierre overthrown, dies on guillotine; the Terror ends. |
1795 | New constitution creates republican government under five-man directory, bicameral legislature; American ambassador James Monroe wins Adrienne’s release; she sends son, George-Washington to America to his godfather, President George Washington; Adrienne and daughters join L in Olmütz prison. |
1797 | American officials and Napoléon win release of “Prisoners of Olmütz”; family moves to exile in Denmark; Anastasie marries. |
1798 | George-Washington Lafayette returns from America; family moves to Holland. Adrienne goes to Paris to recover family properties. |
1799 | Napoléon seizes power; L returns to France; retires as gentleman farmer at Château de La Grange; Washington dies. |
1802 | George-Washington Lafayette marries. |
1803 | L fractures hip; Virginie marries. |
1807 | Adrienne dies; is buried in Picpus cemetery in Paris, near graves of murdered mother, grandmother, and sister. |
1814 | Napoléon abdicates; First Restoration; Napoléon’s “Hundred Days” of republican rule; L resumes political career, is elected to National Assembly; Napoléon’s Waterloo; Coalition armies occupy France; Louis XVIII begins Second Restoration; L leads liberal opposition to king in Assembly. |
1821 | L backs conspiracy of Charbonniers to overthrow king. |
1823 | L defeated for reelection to Assembly. |
1824–1825 | Congress invites L as “the Nation’s Guest” for triumphal thirteen-month tour of United States; lays cornerstone of Bunker Hill monument. |
1827 | L reelected to French Assembly; provides aid to rebels in Poland, Italy, Greece, elsewhere. |
1830 | King dissolves Assembly; suspends free press; riots break out; L takes command of National Guard, leads “Three Glorious Days” of July Revolution; king abdicates; L rejects presidency, seats Louis-Philippe on throne as constitutional monarch; king rescinds rights agreement; L resigns. |
1831 | L reelected to Chamber of Deputies; leads liberal opposition to king. |
1832 | L leads funeral cortège for General Lamarque; Parisians riot; king crushes insurrection, seizes authoritarian powers. |
1833 | L makes last speech to Chamber of Deputies, assails Louis-Philippe’s government. Dies in Paris on May 20, is buried beside Adrienne at Picpus beneath soil from Bunker Hill. |
1917 | July 4. General Pershing’s aide plants American flag over L’s grave: “Lafayette, we are here.” |
“Pronounce him one of the first men of his age, and you have yet not done him justice. . . . Turn back your eyes upon the records of time . . . and where, among the race of merely mortal men, shall one be found, who, as the benefactor of his kind, shall claim to take precedence of Lafayette?”
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With those words to Congress in 1834, John Quincy Adams plunged America into deep and universal mourning. Lafayette was dead, and Americans mourned as they had never mourned before, not even when Washington had died, thirty-five years earlier. For no one in the history of the nation had ever given of themselves as generously or as freely as “Our Marquis.” Lafayette was the last of the world’s gallant knights, galloping out of Arthurian romance, across the pages of history, to rid the world of evil. Of all the Founding Fathers—the heroes and leaders of the Revolutionary War—only Lafayette commanded the unanimous acclaim and veneration of Americans. For only he came with no links to any state or region; only he belonged to the entire nation; and only he, among all who pledged their lives, fortunes, and sacred honor, sought no economic or political gain. He asked no recompense but the right to serve America and liberty, and, when Americans lost him, they knew that they and the world would never see his kind again—a hero among heroes.
An intimate and friend of world leaders over seventy years of earth-shaking social, political, and economic change, Lafayette led three revolutions that changed the course of world history and became the world’s foremost champion of individual liberty, abolition, religious tolerance, gender equality, universal suffrage, and free trade. He was arguably the wealthiest aristocrat in France, with close ties to the king, the royal family, and the entire court; his wife’s family was equally wealthy and well-placed. He
and his family danced at Marie-Antoinette’s balls, hunted with the king, and glutted themselves at palace banquets in Versailles. Lafayette turned his back on it all—indeed, fled, from incomparable luxury—to wade through South Carolina swamps, freeze at Valley Forge, and ride through the stifling southern heat of Virginia—as an unpaid volunteer, fighting and bleeding for liberty, in a land not his own, for a people not his own. Even the most selfless of his fellow Founding Fathers in America had some personal interests at stake. George Washington also refused compensation for his military service, but admitted that his initial motive for battling the British was his distaste for taxes: “They have no right to put their hands in my pockets,” Washington complained.