Lafayette, We Come! / The Story of How a Young Frenchman Fought for Liberty in America and How America Now Fights for Liberty in France

by Rupert Sargent Holland

Major Huger had already sent a pilot to the Victory and had done everything he could to assist Lafayette’s companions. All the Major’s family were so kind and hospitable that they instantly won Lafayette’s heart. He judged that all Americans would be like them, and wrote to his wife, “the manners of this people are simple, honest, and dignified. The wish to oblige, the love of country, and freedom reign here together in sweet equality. All citizens are brothers. They belong to a country where every cranny resounds with the lovely name of Liberty. My sympathy with them makes me feel as if I had been here for twenty years.” It was well for him that his first reception in America was so pleasant and that he remembered it with such delight, for he was later to find that some Americans were not so cordial toward him.

If he was delighted with the Hugers, the Major and his son Francis were equally delighted with the young Frenchman. And, strangely enough, the little boy Francis, who had seized Lafayette’s hand on that June night in 1777, was later to try to rescue his hero from a prison in Europe.

The Marquis and his friends thought they had had quite enough of life on shipboard for the present, and so decided to go to Charlestown over the country roads. The pilot that had been furnished by Major Huger came back with word that there was not sufficient water for the Victory to stay in Georgetown Bay, and Lafayette ordered the ship, in charge of the pilot, to sail to Charlestown. Meantime he and his companions, with horses of the Major’s, rode to that seaport. As soon as he arrived there he heard that there were a number of English cruisers on that part of the coast, and so he at once sent word to Captain Leboucier to beach the Victory and burn her, rather than let her be captured by the cruisers.

The Victory, however, sailed safely into Charlestown without sighting a hostile sail, and the captain unloaded Lafayette’s supplies and his own private cargo. Later the sloop was loaded with rice and set sail again, but was wrecked on a bar and became a total loss.

No welcome could have been warmer than that Lafayette received in Charlestown. A dinner was given him, where the French officers met the American generals Gulden, Howe, and Moultrie. All houses were thrown open to him, and he was taken to inspect the fortifications and driven through the beautiful country in the neighborhood. How pleased he was he showed in a letter to Adrienne. “The city of Charlestown,” he wrote, “is one of the prettiest and the best built that I have ever seen, and its inhabitants are most agreeable. The American women are very pretty, very unaffected, and exhibit a charming neatness,—a quality which is most studiously cultivated here, much more even than in England. What enchants me here is that all the citizens are brethren. There are no poor people in America, nor even what we call peasants. All the citizens have a moderate property, and all have the same rights as the most powerful proprietor. The inns are very different from those of Europe: the innkeeper and his wife sit at table with you, do the honors of a good repast, and on leaving, you pay without haggling. When you do not choose to go to an inn, you can find country houses where it is enough to be a good American to be received with such attentions as in Europe would be paid to friends.”

That certainly speaks well for the hospitality of South Carolina!

He did not mean to tell his plans, however, until he should reach Philadelphia, where the Congress of the United States was sitting. “I have every reason to feel highly gratified at my reception in Charlestown,” he wrote, “but I have not yet explained my plans to any one. I judge it best to wait until I have presented myself to the Congress before making a statement as to the projects I have in view.”

He had only one difficulty in the seaport town. When he started to sell the Victory and her cargo he found that the men who had sold him the ship and Captain Leboucier had so entangled him with agreements and commissions, all of which he had signed without properly reading in his haste to sail from Bordeaux, that, instead of receiving any money, he was actually in debt. To pay this off and get the needed funds to take his companions and himself to Philadelphia he had to borrow money, but fortunately there were plenty of people in Charlestown who were ready to help him out of that difficulty.

With the money borrowed from these well-disposed people Lafayette bought horses and carriages to take his party over the nine hundred miles that lay between Charlestown and Philadelphia. On June twenty-fifth the expedition started. In front rode a French officer dressed in the uniform of a hussar. Next came a heavy open carriage, in which sat Lafayette and De Kalb, and close behind it rode Lafayette’s body-servant. Then there followed a chaise with two colonels, the counselors of the Marquis, another chaise with more French officers, still another with the baggage, and finally, as rear-guard, a negro on horseback.

The country roads were frightful for travel; indeed for much of the way they could scarcely be called roads at all, being simply primitive clearings through the woods. The guide kept losing his way, and the carriages bumped along over roots and logs in a hot, blistering sun. As far as this particular journey went, the Frenchmen must have thought that travel was very much easier in their own country. One accident followed another; within four days the chaises had been jolted into splinters and the horses had gone lame. The travelers had to buy other wagons and horses, and to lighten their outfit kept leaving part of their baggage on the way. Sometimes they had to walk, often they went hungry, and many a night they slept in the woods. They began to appreciate that this new country, land of liberty though it was, had many disadvantages when it came to the matter of travel.