Large Scale Central

Independence Day

Forgive me for being a little mawkish today, but from everything I’ve read and learned, I’ve come to the conclusion that my grade school teachers at St Dominic were right about one thing anyway: this is the greatest man in American history:

I didn’t learn until later that, as great as he was though, there would have been no Independence Day in 1776 without the help of the country that gave us the Statue of Liberty.

The help from France is often left a footnote in history as timely assistance from the French Navy at Yorktown but it is indeed much deeper. From the early days of the Revolution support came in the person of the Marquis De Lafayette who served as a line officer in the Continental Army and contributed approximately $200K of his own personal fortune to the cause.

Wounded at the battle of Brandywine and later the victor at the battle of Barren Hill he provided professional military training to the Continental Army during the encampment at Valley Forge in 1777. He is credited with turning the rebels into an army. All of which made him a hero in his home nation and help sway support to the patriots. He is often confused with Jean Lafitte the privateer who fought beside future president Andrew Jackson in the war of 1812 at New Orleans.

It is the Marquis who was referred to by the AEF in WW I “Lafayette We Are Here!”

Significant numbers of the French Army and Navy also fought at the direction of King Lois XVI including Jean-Baptiste Donatien de Vimeur, comte de Rochambeau, Commander of the French Expeditionary Force. He famously refused the surrender of British forces at Yorktown from BG Charles O’Hara (on behalf of Cornwallis) directing him to General Washington as the Commander in Chief.

Liberty is contagious. Only a few years later the French Revolution began with the storming of the Bastille prison in 1789. It is celebrated every July 14th.

Viva La France!!!

You’re a good man, Keel…you know things.

My Great Grandmother on my mother’s side was French, “Goyette”. I do not know a lot about her other than she was first generation immigrant. Came through Ellis Island in the 1890s. She and her husband were both school teachers as were my grandmother and mother. History was doctrine in our house.

In a nation of immigrants it take some effort, not just to know who you are, but to know who your people are.