LAFAYET FE, GILBERT-MOTTlElt, MARQUIS DE, was born in September 1757, at Ceavegnae, near Brioude, in the present depart meut of the Haute•Loire; his father having been killed shortly before at the battle of Minden. He received a very imperfect education, which in after life he found little time or iuclioation to remedy. Left to follow his own inclinations he married at the age of sixteen Mademoiselle de Noaillea d'Ayen, and his wife's relations offered him a place at court, which he refused. While a schoolboy he was an officer in the French army, but his military duties seem only to have required his attendance at reviews. When the American revolution broke nut, Lafayette, who had adopted with enthusiasm the indefinite liberal notions then in vogue among the younger members of the French nobility, made an offer of his services to the American Com missioners then in Paris; and Silas Deane fancying that the adhesion of a wealthy young French noble and courtier would produce some eclat, gladly accepted them, engaging at the same time that Lafayette (then nineteen) should receive a major-general's commissiou in the American army. Accordingly he armed a vessel at his own expense and lauded at Charlestown in April 1777. He fought 119 a volunteer at the battle of the Braudywine on the 11th of September 1777, in which he was wounded. He served in the north under Washingtou's orders, and in May 1778 being sent forward with a detachment to occupy Barren Hill, he only escaped from a superior British force by a hasty retreat. He was at the battle of Monmouth in the following June 1778, and afterwards received the thanks of Congress for his gallant conduct, and the present of a valuable sword. About this time his petulance and vanity were somewhat ludicrously manifested by his sending a challenge to Lord Carlisle, for some reflections on the conduct of France contained in a public letter from the English Cousuiistiouere to the President of the American Congress. In 1779 Lafayette returned to Frince, the government of that country having acknowledged the independence of the American States, and he obtained assistance in men and money, with which he returned to America. In 1780 he commanded the advanced guard of Washing. ton's army ; and lie eat in the court-martial which condemued the unfortunate Andre. In 1781 Lafayette was intrusted with the defence of Virginia against Lord Cornwallis, but his only military achieve ment while holding a separate command was that of eso•tping by a dexterous retreat from the English commander. Milder Washington he subsequently contributed to the operations iu consequence of which Lord Cornwallis was obliged to capitulate at York Town.
After the surrender of Cornwallis, Lafayette returned to France for fresh reinforcements, but the peace of 1783 prevented his sailing bank to America. lie however visited that country in 1784, and was received with the greatest enthusiasm in all parts of the United States. Washington maintained a friendly correspondence with Lafayette as long us he lived. After Lafayette's return to France he travelled through Germany, and was received with marked distinction by Frederick the Great and Joseph II. of Austria.
When the threatening state of affairs which preceded the outbreak of the French revolution compelled the king to summon the Assembly of Notables in 1787, Lafayette was returned a member, aud he entered heartily into the proceedings of that body. He advocated the abolition
of the lettres de cachet and of state-prisoue, aud be supported the claims of the Protestants of France, who were still labouring under civil disabilities. He also supported the convocation of the States General, of which assembly ha was returned a member. In this capacity he supported Mirabeau's motion for the removal of the mili tary from the neighbourhood of the oapital ; and in July 1789, he proposed the first declaration of rights, which formed the basis of the following constitution. In the same month, being appointed commandant-general of Paris, he organised the national guard, and distributed among the soldiers a tricoloured cockade, namely, blue and red, the colours of the commune of Paris, and white, the colour of the lilies of France, and these became thenceforth the natioual colours. On the 15th of October of that year he marched at the head of the national guard to Versailles, where a tumultuous multitude had preceded him : and he escorted the king and the royal family back to Paris, whither the Assembly also removed their sittings. He voted in the Assembly for the institution of the jury for the sup pression of hereditary nobility, for the political equality of all citizens, &e. Mistrusting the effects of individual ambition iu revolutionary times, ho moved and carried a resolution to the effect that the same person should not have the command of the national guards of more than one department at once. He himself refused the appointment of lieutenaet-general of the kingdom. In conjuuction with Bally he instituted the club of the Feuillans, which supported the constitu tional monarchy on a popular basis. After the king's forced return from the flight of Varenties, Lafayette supported the decree by which the king was restored to the exercise of his regal office on swearing to the new constitution. Upon this the republican party broke out into an insurrection, which Lafayette and the national guards put down on the Champ de Mars. Soon afterwards Lafayette gave in his resignation and retired into the country; but the war of the first coalitiou having begun, he was appointed to the command of the army of Flanders, and he defeated the allies at Philippeville and Maubenge. He was however hated by the Jacobins at Paris, and mistrusted by the court. On the 16th of June 1792, he wrote a strong letter to the Legislative Assembly, denouncing the plots of those men "who, under the mask of democratic zeal, smothered liberty under the excess of their licence." He soou after repaired to Paris, and demanded of the Legislative Assembly the punishment of the outrages committed against the king at the Tuileries on the 20th of June. But the republican party was already preponderating in that Assembly, and Lafayette found that he was not sale in Paris. It is said that he then proposed to the king and the royal family to take shelter in his camp at Compiegne, but the advice was rejected by Louis, or rather by those around him, who placed all their con fidence in the Duke of Bruuswiok and the Prussians.