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

A good many names for a small boy to carry, but his family was very old, and it was the custom of France to give many family names to each child. He was called Gilbert Motier for short, however, though he was actually born with the title and rank of Marquis, for his father had been killed in battle six weeks before the little heir to Chavaniac was born.

The family name of Motier could be traced back to before the year 1000. Then one of the family came into possession of a farm called the Villa Faya, and he lengthened his name to Motier of La Fayette. And as other properties came to belong to the family the men added new names and titles until in 1757 the heir to the old château had not only a long string of names but was also a marquis and baron and seigneur by right of his birth. There were few families in Auvergne of older lineage than the house of Lafayette.

The little heir’s father, Michel-Louis, Marquis de Lafayette, had been killed while leading a charge at the head of his regiment of French Grenadiers in the battle of Hastenbeck, one of the battles of what was known as the Seven Years’ War in Europe, which took place at about the same time as the French and Indian War in America. Although only twenty-four years old Michel-Louis de Lafayette was already a colonel and a knight of the order of Saint Louis and had shown himself a true descendant of the old fighting stock of Auvergne nobles. Now the small baby boy, the new Marquis, succeeded to his father’s titles as well as to the castle and several other even older manor-houses, for the most part in ruins, that were perched high up in the mountains.

For all its blue blood, however, the family were what is known as “land poor.” The little Marquis owned large farms in the mountains, but the crops were not very abundant and most of the money that had come in from them for some time had been needed to provide for the fighting men. Fortunately the boy’s mother and grandmother and aunts, who all lived at Chavaniac, were strong and sturdy people, willing to live the simple, healthy, frugal life of their neighbors in the province and so save as much of the family fortune as they could for the time when the heir should make his bow at court.

Without brothers or sisters and with few playmates, spending his time out-of-doors in the woods and fields of Chavaniac, the young Lafayette had a rather solitary childhood and grew up awkward and shy. He was a lean, long-limbed fellow with a hook nose, reddish hair, and a very bashful manner. But his eyes were bright and very intelligent; whenever anything really caught his attention he quickly became intensely interested in it, and he was devoted to all the birds and beasts of the country round about his home.

Some of these beasts, however, were dangerous; there was a great gray wolf that the farmers said had been breaking into sheepfolds and doing great damage. The boy of eight years old heard the story and set out, sword in hand, to hunt and slay the wolf. There is no account of his ever coming up with that particular monster, but the peasants of the neighborhood liked to tell all visitors this story as proof of the courage of their young Marquis.

But the family had no intention of keeping the head of their house in this far-off province of France. He must learn to conduct himself as a polished gentleman and courtier, he must go to Paris and prepare himself to take the place at the royal court that belonged to a son of his long, distinguished line. His family had rich and powerful relations, who were quite ready to help the boy, and so, when he was eleven years old, he left the quiet castle of Chavaniac and went to a school for young noblemen, the College du Plessis at Paris.

Lafayette’s mother’s uncle, taking a liking to the boy, had him enrolled as a cadet in one of the famous regiments of France, “The Black Musketeers,” and this gave the boy a proud position at school, and many a day he took some of his new friends to see the Musketeers drill and learn something of the Manual of Arms. The company of other boys, both at the College du Plessis in Paris and then at the Academy at Versailles, as well as the interest he took in his gallant Black Musketeers, made Lafayette less shy and awkward than he had been at Chavaniac, though he was still much more reserved and thoughtful than most boys of his age. He learned to write his own language well, and his compositions in school showed the practical common sense of his country bringing-up. He wrote a paper on the horse, and the chief point he brought out in it was that if you try to make a horse do too many things well he is sure to get restless and throw you, a bit of wisdom he had doubtless learned in Auvergne.

The boy Marquis was at school in Paris when, in 1770, his devoted mother and the rich granduncle who had had him appointed a cadet of the Musketeers both died. The little Lafayette was now very much alone; his grandmother in the distant castle in the mountains was his nearest relation, and, though only a boy of thirteen, he had to decide important questions for himself. But the granduncle had been very fond of the lad, and in his will he left Lafayette all his fortune and estates. The fortune was very large, and as a result the boy Marquis, instead of being only a poor young country nobleman from Auvergne, became a very rich and important person.

Immediately the proud and luxury-loving society of the French court took a great interest in Gilbert Motier de Lafayette. Every father and mother who had a daughter they wished to marry turned their attention to the boy. And Lafayette, who, like most boys of his age, paid little attention to girls, was beset with all sorts of invitations to parties and balls.