Lafayette: The American Patriot Who Wasn’t Even an American Citizen

Last updated on: December 17, 2014 at 1:40 pm by Kathy Schiffer

Lafayette: The American Patriot Who Wasn’t Even an American Citizen 2014-12-17T13:40:04-05:00 Kathy Schiffer

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Today, something different: The story of a hero in the Revolutionary War, the Marquis de Lafayette.

The following article is reprinted with permission from Image Books, publisher of The American Catholic Almanac by Brian Burch and Emily Stimpson. I’ve written before about the Almanac, and how much I enjoy its colorful stories of Catholics from all walks of life. I told the story of the Snowshoe Priest, Father Frederic Baraga, who carried the gospel message to the Chippewa tribe in upper Michigan.

There’s a story in The American Catholic Almanac for each day of the year. Wouldn’t it be a great gift under the Christmas tree for someone you love?

And here, meet the French nobleman who joined the Continental Army and helped to secure America’s freedom from the British.

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Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette was determined to fight in the American Revolution. But fate seemed equally determined to stop him.

In 1775, the 18-year-old Catholic learned about America’s bid for independence. The colonists’ struggle captured Lafayette’s young heart, and he longed to join the fight. Lafayette knew, however, that King Louis XVI would object; the Marquis was one of the wealthiest noblemen in France and husband to the king’s cousin.

Nevertheless, the following winter, Lafayette met with the American Silas Deane, who’d come to Paris to enlist French support. Deane promised Lafayette that if he went to America, he could fight as a major general. On December 7, 1776, the two contracted an agreement, and Lafayette prepared to depart.

Right away, a problem of financing arose. Lafayette learned that the Continental Congress couldn’t pay for his passage. Undeterred, Lafayette hired his own ship. Next, British spies learned of his plan, and the British ambassador seized Lafayette’s ship. So the Marquis secured passage on another. Finally, the king found out about Lafayette and threatened him with prison if he sailed. Lafayette sailed anyway, sneaking aboard ship dressed as a woman. He also bought the ship’s cargo, so the captain wouldn’t need to stop along the way.

At last, in June 1777, Lafayette landed in America. He didn’t, however, receive the welcome he expected. The Continental Congress, weary of “French glory seekers,” refused him his commission. Only when Lafayette offered to fight for free (and the Congress learned of his wealth), did the commission come through.

Over the next four years, Lafayette became one of General George Washington’s most trusted commanders. He led men to victory in battle and secured both troops and money from France, more than earning the honorary citizenship granted to him at the war’s end. He left America a hero in 1781, and returned to France to work for liberty there.

When Lafayette died, in 1834, his son sprinkled dirt from Bunker Hill over his grave. To this day, an American flag flies over his tomb.

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Excerpted from The American Catholic Almanac by CatholicVote.org Education Fund Copyright © 2014 by CatholicVote.org Education Fund. Excerpted by permission of Image Books, a division of Penguin Random House, Inc. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.

BRIAN BURCH is the president of CatholicVote.org, a nonprofit political advocacy group based in Chicago.
EMILY STIMPSON is a Catholic writer based in Steubenville, Ohio, and the author of The Catholic Girl’s Survival Guide for the Single Years and These Beautiful Bones: An Everyday Theology of the Body.

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