Such was the brilliancy and the solid worth of the first contributions of France to her feeble ally. To estimate the motives and spirit of such aids, what influences ranged an old and brilliant monarchy by the side of an infant Republic branded with "rebellion," and intertwined flags so opposite, it will be well to review the relations of the parties to an alliance so strange and exceptional.
France had no interests to cultivate in America, no objects of ambition to secure in a quarter of the world from which she had deliberately withdrawn. Her flag had not appeared there since the Treaty of Paris in 1756, and her subsequent cession to Spain of her possessions on the Mississippi left her, for the present, disembarrassed of all territorial claims and interests in America. She had no reason for any affection for the English colonists now asserting their independence; they were the sons of those who had fought against her; the traditions of the colonial wars in America were yet fresh. On the side of the rebel colonists themselves, there was a suspicion of France—at least, no disposition to expect any generosity from her in the struggle that was to ensue. So little was that part expected which she did eventually take in the American Revolution, that Patrick Henry (incredible as the fact may appear to those who have read only eulogiums on this person) actually retreated at the last from the Declaration of Independence, from fear of France and her co-operation to subdue the colonies. In a letter to John Adams, written five days after the Virginia Convention had adopted the famous resolution of the 15th May, 1776, for independence, he dwells upon the apprehension that France might be seduced to take sides against the colonies by an offer from England to divide the territories of America between them. It was an unworthy suspicion; but Mr. Henry, who had but little originality, and was a characteristic retailer of popular impressions, was probably in this imputation upon France the echo of a thought common at the time.
No grounds of sympathy were yet apparent between France and the struggling colonists; nothing, as far as the men of 1776 should see, but recollections of old animosity and present causes for distrust. Even the sympathy of religion, which has proved such a fruitful source of international friendships and alliances, where there have been no other points of coincidence, was wanting; instead of it, a sharp antagonism was the fact. Protestant America, many parts of it yet fresh with the persecution of Catholics, had no reason to expect favors from Catholic France. Indeed, when those favors were given, there was some discontented and ungrateful outcry that it was a design upon the religion of the colonists; so deeply sown was the distrust of France. There were those to object that Congress had attended a Mass, and that the municipal authorities of Boston had, on some occasion, walked in a Catholic procession. The traitor, Benedict Arnold, in casting about for reasons to defend his treason, could find none more plausible, or, in his estimation, more likely to be received, than that the French alliance was about to betray the religion of the colonists, and that he, therefore, had determined to take refuge in Protestant England! Such an appeal to popular prejudice was doubtless extravagant, even more so than that of Patrick Henry accusing France; but both show the extent of estrangement and suspicion which France had to overcome before she could convince America of her friendship and generosity. And, unfortunately, as we shall presently painfully see, such suspicion was never entirely overcome, but was to remain to disfigure the last page of the history of the Revolution, and to attach to it a story of permanent disgrace to America.
When the colonies implored the aid of France, through an address of Congress in November, 1780, the appeal showed an extremity and temper of the colonists which suggested that almost any price would be paid for the necessary succors. How far the French monarch might have availed himself of the necessities of his suppliant ally, had he been selfish enough to make these the measure of his demands, is a conjecture almost illimitable. To purchase the aid of Spain, the American Congress had been willing to retract former resolutions, and to offer the almost priceless boon of the exclusive navigation of the Mississippi; and it was only the fatuity and blindness of that power that had prevented the fatal concession. Was the aid of France worth less? and was the temper of concession not to be practised upon by herself?
It has been usual to give a very summary and cold explanation of the aids which France furnished the American cause, by pointing out its effect to cripple her powerful and hereditary foe, England; thus detracting from the generosity of the contribution, and representing it as a mere move on the diplomatic chess-board which the French monarch could not do otherwise than make. But this detraction does not hold good. Admitting the full force of the reasons which it imputes to France, there is much in her alliance with America that is yet left unexplained; and there are circumstances which make it one of the most peculiar and unique examples of generosity recorded in history. It has not been unusual for powerful nations to assist the weak on no other ground of sympathy than having a foe in common; but it has seldom been the case that such aid has been rendered without the powerful ally exacting terms for her own contribution, and turning to her own advantage the necessities she has been called upon to aid. England herself had afforded a precedent for the price of such concessions. She had asked of the United Provinces, for the price of her support against Spain, that all her expenses should be repaid, and that the towns and fortresses of Holland should be held by her as pledges for the conditions of the alliance. France would have been sustained by historical example, and by moral right, in exacting very important concessions for her aid of the American cause in circumstances in which that aid was deemed vital for the success of a struggle that already bordered on despair. She asked nothing. She gave an army and a fleet, and bore all the expenses of both armaments. She advanced money and replenished the almost empty treasury of her ally. And she yet enlarged the generosity of her alliance by devoting her arms, not only to a common operation, but pledging at the outset the indispensable conclusion of her exertions in the independence of America and the territorial integrity of the States. In the Treaty of 1778, "the direct and essential end" of the alliance was declared to be "the liberty, sovereignty, and independence, absolute and unlimited, of the United States."
The arms of France were thus given directly to a cause of republican liberty rather than merely involved in a diplomatic complication. What reasons could have induced this apparent excess of generosity, this singular spectacle of the ancient monarchy of the Franks taking sides with the infant republic of the Anglo-Saxon colonists of America?
The explanation is that the French aid was a contribution of the people of France rather than that of its crown. It sprung out of the popular heart rather than the grace of a kind and munificent monarch; and it has this circumstance of a tender and imperishable souvenir to the American people. It was a free love-offering, the first dedication of their cause in the sympathies of the world. That republican sentiment which a few years later in France sprang into such fierce life, was already deeply harbored in the hearts of her people; and the movement of the American colonists gave it an opportunity of comparatively safe expression; while all the romance of such a sentiment found abundant material in the circumstances of the struggle, the distance of the theatre, its scenery bordered by savage life, the novelty of a people whose history was entirely unique, and whose simplicity of manners suggested comparisons with classical antiquity. The enthusiasm of the French mind seized every attractive circumstance of the occasion. It was entitled "the crusade of the eighteenth century." Again, it was adorned with recollections more antique, and it was said that "the Republic of Plato" had at last found realization in the midst of a people whose exclusive situation had been a school for virtues hitherto unknown, and was to afford an experiment that had until then lingered in the speculations of philosophy and the dreams of poetry. The simplicity of American manners was taken as a charming contrast to the court splendors of Paris and Versailles. It was not only Franklin's cotton stockings, but every peculiarity of the American citizen became a picturesque study and the symbol of a new political life. The memoirs of the Count de Ségur are among the contemporary testimonies of the rage in the French capital for everything American; and we are specially told of "cet air antique qui semblant transporter tout-a-coup dans nos murs, au milieu de la civilisation amollie et servile au dix-huitième siècle, quelques sages contemporans de Platon, on des republicains du temps de Caton et de Fabius!"
Of the operations of the allied arms, our space only affords such a sketch as may give some general idea of the extent and value of the French aid. Washington had at first proposed, on the arrival of Rochambeau, to attempt the repossession of New York City, and to crush there the main body of the British army. But the failure to arrive of the naval forces expected from Brest and the West Indies disconcerted the plan; and events were preparing another theatre for the final catastrophe. The British post and army in Virginia became the objective point of the allied arms. The long-expected French fleet was at last assured; it was to make its appearance in the Chesapeake; and Washington prepared to move his army from the banks of the Hudson to the distant scene of co-operation. From a temporary observatory on the heights near Newburg, the anxious commander watched his army crossing the blue stream; and as he mounted his horse, to put himself at the head of a march that was to toil over many hundreds of miles to find a last and effulgent field, far away in Virginia, he wrung the hand of a French officer who stood in the group around him, as expressing the new hope that had dawned in his face, and repledging the alliance that was to win its realization. And now ensued a combination of circumstances, in each one of which the French arms determined a crisis, and displayed a dramatic spectacle.
Lafayette, "the boy" in Cornwallis's estimation, "the tutelary genius of American independence," as he has been designated by a Virginian historian and statesman (William C. Rives), was sent forward to Virginia, to hold in check there the haughty enemy. Washington had given to this young Frenchman supreme command of the operations in Virginia. He justified a trust which the pride of the state might possibly resent, in his own estimate of the qualities of the noble foreigner. In a private letter to a Congressman of Virginia (Jones) he wrote: "The Marquis possesses uncommon military talents; is of a quick and sound judgment; persevering and enterprising without rashness; and, besides these, he is of a very conciliating temper, and perfectly sober—which are qualities that rarely combine in the same person. And were I to add that some men will gain as much experience in the course of three or four years as some others will in ten or a dozen, you cannot deny the fact, and attack me upon that ground." Lafayette was elevated over the heads of both General Wayne and the Baron de Steuben.
When the Frenchman came to the defence of Virginia, she was well-nigh conquered. She was open in every direction to the enterprise of the invader. Her public men were recreant, and under the suspicion of cowardice. One of her most faithful censors has recorded the delinquency of the times. In a letter dated the 6th November, 1780, Judge Pendleton wrote: "We had no House of Delegates on Saturday last, which, with our empty treasury, are circumstances unfavorable at this juncture. Mr. Henry has resigned his seat in Congress; and I hear Mr. Jones intends it. It is also said the governor intends to resign. It is a little cowardly to quit our posts in a bustling time." The city of Richmond, for which was to be reserved in history stains beyond any other American city, was ready to submit tamely to another occupation. The fact is, painful as the confession may be to the Virginian of to-day—offending the pride of a state that has almost invidiously claimed her part in the Revolution—Virginia had grown reluctant in the war, and disposed to have recourse to unworthy expedients. She had been prominent in Congress to recommend the surrender of the navigation of the Mississippi in order to buy the alliance of Spain. She had twice proposed a dictatorship; and now, when Cornwallis was advancing, and Mr. Jefferson was resigning the governorship, and suspicion, as we have seen, had fallen on other leaders in the "bustling times," no less a person than Richard Henry Lee, then in retirement at Westmoreland, was willing to surrender the liberties of Virginia to a dictator as the only resource of safety! Now, the state had nothing between her and the public enemy than the twelve hundred bayonets of Lafayette. The address and skill of the young Frenchman saved the Old Dominion from a subjection that would, otherwise, have been complete, as far as the swift arms of Cornwallis could have overrun the state.