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Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette by Lafayette

L >> Lafayette >> Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette




Some time after I came back, General Varnum arrived here; General
Greene is, too, in this place since this morning; he engaged me to give
you myself the account of the little advantage of that small part of
the troops under his command. I have nothing more to say to your
excellency about our business on this side, because he is writing
himself: I should have been very glad, if circumstances had permitted
me, to be useful to him upon a greater scale. As he is obliged to march
slow in order to attend his troops, and as I am here only a volunteer,
I will have the honour to wait upon your excellency as soon as
possible, and I'll set out to-day: it will be a great pleasure for me
to find myself again with you.

With the most tender affection and highest respect I have the honour to
be,

LAFAYETTE.

I must tell, too, that the riflemen had been the whole day running
before my horse, without eating or taking any rest.

I have just now a certain assurance that two British officers, besides
those I spoke you of, have died this morning of their wounds in an
house; this, and some other circumstances, let me believe that their
lost may be greater than I told to your excellency.


Footnotes:

1. All the letters addressed to General Washington, as well as to other
Americans, were written in English. Since the death of General
Washington, his family have returned to General Lafayette the original
letters he had addressed to him, and these are now in our possession.
The originals of Washington's letters were almost all lost in the
French revolution; but M. de Lafayette, during his last journey to the
United States, had a great number of them copied from minutes preserved
by Washington himself: they have been inserted in the collection we
have so frequently quoted from, published by Mr. Sparks.



TO THE DUKE D'AYEN.

Camp Gulph, Pennsylvania, Dec. 16th, 1777.

This letter, if it ever reaches you, will find you at least in France;
some hazards are averted by this circumstance, but I must not indulge
in many hopes. I never write a letter for Europe without deploring
before hand the fate most probably awaiting it, and I labour,
undoubtedly, more for Lord Howe than for any of my friends. The bad
season is fortunately drawing near; the English ships will be obliged
to quit their confounded cruising stations; I may then receive letters,
and forward them from hence with some degree of security; this will
make me very happy, and will prevent my wearying you by a repetition of
events which I wish you to be acquainted with, but which I do not wish
to remind you of each time I write. I am very anxious for the account
of your journey. I depend principally on Madame de Lafayette for its
details; she well knows how interesting they will be to me. The
Marshall de Noailles tells me, in general terms, that the letters he
receives from Italy assure him the travellers are all in good health.
From him I have also learnt the confinement of Madame Lafayette; he
does not speak of it as if it were the happiest of all possible
circumstances; but my anxiety was too keen to be able to make any
distinction of sex; and by kindly writing to me, and giving me an
account of the event, he rendered me far, far happier than he imagined,
when he announced to me that I had only a daughter.~[1] The Rue de St.
Honore has now for ever lost its credit, whilst the other Hotel de
Noailles has acquired new lustre by the birth of Adrian.~[2] It is
truly an ill-proceeding on my part to throw that disgrace on a family
from whom I have received so much kindness. You must now be freezing on
the high roads of France; those of Pennsylvania are also very cold, and
I endeavour vainly to persuade myself that the difference of latitude
betwixt this and Paris ought to give us, comparatively speaking, a
delightful winter: I am even told that it will be more severe. We are
destined to pass it in huts, twenty miles from Philadelphia, that we
may protect the country, be enabled to take advantage of every
favourable opportunity, and also have the power of instructing the
troops by keeping them together. It would, perhaps, have been better to
have entered quietly into real winter quarters; but political reasons
induced General Washington to adopt this half-way measure.

I wish I had sufficient skill to give you a satisfactory account of the
military events passing in this country; but, in addition to my own
incapacity, reasons, of which you will understand the weight, prevent
my hazarding in a letter, exposed to the capture of the English fleet,
a relation which might explain many things, if I had the happiness of
conversing with you in person. I will, however, endeavour to repeat to
you, once more, the most important events that have occurred during
this campaign. My gazette, which will be more valuable from not
containing my own remarks, must be preferable to the gazettes of
Europe; because the man who sees with his own eyes, even if he should
not see quite correctly, must always merit more attention than the man
who has seen nothing. As to the gazettes which the English shower upon
us, they appear to me only fit to amuse chairmen over their mugs of
ale; and even these men must have indulged in liberal potations, not to
perceive the falsehoods they contain. It seems to me that the project
of the English ministry was to cut in a line that part of America which
extends from the bay of Chesapeak to Ticonderoga. General Howe was
ordered to repair to Philadelphia by the Elk river; Burgoyne to descend
to Albany, and Clinton to ascend from New York by the North river: the
three generals might in this manner have joined hands; they would have
received, or pretended to receive, the submission of the alleged
conquered provinces; we should only have retained for our winter
quarters the interior of the country, and have depended solely for our
resources on the four southern states. An attack on Charlestown may
also, perhaps, have been intended: in the opinion of the cabinet of the
King of England, America was thus almost conquered. Providence
fortunately permitted some alterations to take place in the execution
of this finely-conceived project--to exercise, probably, for some time,
the constancy of the British nation.

When I arrived at the army, in the month of August, I was much
astonished at not finding any enemies. After having made some marches
into Jersey, where nothing occurred, General Howe embarked at New York.
We were encamped, and expecting their descent, on the Chester side,
when we learnt that they were at the mouth of the Elk river. General
Washington marched to meet them, and after having taken up several
stations, resolved to wait their arrival upon some excellent heights on
the Brandywine stream. The 11th of September the English marched to
attack us; but whilst they were amusing us with their cannon, and
several movements in front, they suddenly detached the greater part of
their troops, the choicest men of their army, with the grenadiers,
under the command of General Howe, and Lord Cornwallis, to pass a ford
four miles distant on our right. As soon as General Washington became
aware of this movement, he detached his whole right wing to march
towards them. Some unfounded reports, which had all the appearance of
truth, and which contradicted the first accounts received, arrested for
a length of time the progress of that wing, and when it arrived, the
enemy had already crossed the ford. Thus it became necessary to engage
in an open field with an army superior in numbers to our own. After
having for some time sustained a very brisk fire, though many were
killed on the side of the English, the Americans were obliged to give
way. A portion of them was rallied and brought back: it was then that I
received my wound. In a word, to cut the matter short, everything went
on badly on both sides, and General Washington was defeated--because he
could not gain the first general battle which had been fought during
the war. The army reassembled at Chester; but having been carried to a
distance from it, I have not been able to follow its different
movements. General Howe took advantage of the disorder which a
tremendous rain had occasioned in our army to pass the Schuylkill; he
repaired to Philadelphia, to take possession of it, and stationed
himself between that town and Germantown. General Washington attacked
him on the 4th of October; and we may assert that our general beat
theirs, although their troops defeated ours, since he surprised him,
and even drove back the English for some time; but their experience
proved again triumphant over our unpractised officers and soldiers.
Some time before this event, an American brigadier, placed in
detachment on the other side of the river, had been attacked at night
in his camp, and had lost some of his men. These are the only important
events which took place on our side during the six weeks that I was
absent from the camp, whilst obliged to keep my bed from my unclosed
wound: at that time we received good news of General Burgoyne. When I
first rejoined the army, whilst General Howe was on the water, I learnt
that Ticonderoga had been precipitately abandoned by the Americans,
leaving there several cannons and a quantity of ammunition. This
success inflamed the pride of General Burgoyne, and he issued a pompous
proclamation, for which he has since paid very dearly. His first act
was to send a detachment, which was repulsed; he was not, however,
discouraged, but marched on, through immense forests, in a country
which contained but a single road. General Gates had under his orders
fifteen or sixteen thousand men, who distressed the enemy by firing
upon them from behind the trees. Whether conqueror or conquered,
General Burgoyne's force became gradually weakened, and every quarter
of a league cost him many men. At length, surrounded on all sides, and
perishing with hunger, he was obliged to enter into a convention, in
virtue of which he was conducted by the New England militia into that
same state of Massachusets in which it had been asserted in London he
was to take up his winter quarters. From thence he is to be conveyed,
with whatever troops he may have remaining, to England, at the expense
of the king his master. Ticonderoga has been since evacuated by the
English.

General Clinton, who had set out rather late from New York, after
having taken and destroyed Fort Montgomery, on the north river,
endeavoured to reach the rear of Gates; but, hearing of the convention,
he returned on the same road by which he had advanced. If he had been
more rapid in his march, the affairs of General Gates would not have
ended so fortunately.

When my wound permitted me, after the space of six weeks, to rejoin the
army, I found it stationed fifteen miles from Philadelphia; our
northern reinforcements had arrived; General Howe was much incommoded
by two forts, one on the Jersey side, the other on the little Island of
Mud, that you will find on your map, below the Schuylkill. These two
forts defended the chevaux de frise of the Delaware; they held out for
a long time, against all the efforts of the English troops, both by sea
and land. Two young Frenchmen, who were acting there as engineers,
acquired much glory by their conduct; MM. de Fleury, of the regiment of
Rouergue, and Mauduit Duplessis, who had also at the same time the
command of the artillery: he is an artillery officer in France. Some
Hessians, commanded by Count Donop, attacked the fort in which Mauduit
was stationed, and were repulsed with considerable loss. Count Donop
was taken and received a mortal wound. These forts, after having made a
vigorous resistance, were at length evacuated. Lord Cornwallis then
passed into Jersey with five thousand men. The same number of our
troops was stationed there, under one of our
major-generals. As I was only a volunteer, I went to reconnoitre the
ground, and having met, accidentally, with a detachment near the
enemy's post, the good conduct of my soldiers rendered an imprudent
attack justifiable. We were told that his lordship had been wounded. He
then again re-crossed the river, and we also did the same. Some days
afterwards our army assembled at Whitemarsh, thirteen miles from
Philadelphia. The whole army of General Howe advanced to attack us: but
having examined our position on every side, they judged it more prudent
to retire during the night, after four days of apparent hesitation. We
then executed the project of crossing over on this side of the
Schuylkill, and after having been delayed on the opposite side, from
finding on this shore a part of the enemy's army, (although they only
fired a few cannon balls at us,) they left us a free passage the next
day, and we shall all repair unto our huts for the winter.

Whilst remaining there, the American army will endeavour to clothe
itself, because it is almost in a state of nudity,--to form itself,
because it requires instruction,--and to recruit itself, because it is
feeble; but the thirteen states are going to rouse themselves and send
us some men. My division will, I trust, be one of the strongest, and I
will exert myself to make it one of the best. The actual situation of
the enemy is by no means an unpleasant one; the army of Burgoyne is fed
at the expense of the republic, and the few men they may obtain back,
for many will be lost upon the road, will immediately be replaced by
other troops; Clinton is quite at ease in New York, with a numerous
garrison; General Howe is paying court to the belles of Philadelphia.
The liberty the English take of stealing and pillaging from friends as
well as foes, places them completely at their ease. Their ships at
present sail up to the town, not, however, without some danger, for,
without counting the ship of sixty-four guns and the frigate which were
burnt before the forts, and without counting all those that I trust the
ice will destroy, several are lost every day on the difficult passage
they are obliged to undertake.

The loss of Philadelphia is far from being so important as it is
conceived to be in Europe. If the differences of circumstances, of
countries, and of proportion between the two armies, were not duly
considered, the success of General Gates would appear surprising when
compared to the events that have occurred with us,--taking into account
the superiority of General Washington over General Gates. Our General
is a man formed, in truth, for this revolution, which could not have
been accomplished without him. I see him more intimately than any other
man, and I see that he is worthy of the adoration of his country. His
tender friendship for me, and his complete confidence in me, relating
to all military and political subjects, great as well as small, enable
me to judge of all the interests he has to conciliate, and all the
difficulties he has to conquer. I admire each day more fully the
excellence of his character, and the kindness of his heart. Some
foreigners are displeased at not having been employed, (although it did
not depend on him to employ them)--others, whose ambitious projects he
would not serve,--and some intriguing, jealous men, have endeavoured to
injure his reputation; but his name will be revered in every age, by
all true lovers of liberty and humanity; and although I may appear to
be eulogising my friend, I believe that the part he makes me act, gives
me the right of avowing publicly how much I admire and respect him.
There are many interesting things that I cannot write, but will one day
relate to you, on which I entreat you to suspend your judgment, and
which will redouble your esteem for him.

America is most impatiently expecting us to declare for her, and France
will one day, I hope, determine to humble the pride of England. This
hope, and the measures which America appears determined to pursue, give
me great hopes for the glorious establishment of her independence. We
are not, I confess, so strong as I expected, but we are strong enough
to fight; we shall do so, I trust, with some degree of success; and,
with the assistance of France, we shall gain, with costs, the cause
that I cherish, because it is the cause of
justice,--because it honors humanity,--because it is important to my
country,--and because my American friends, and myself, are deeply
engaged in it. The approaching campaign will be an interesting one. It
is said that the English are sending us some Hanoverians; some time ago
they threatened us with, what was far worse, the arrival of some
Russians. A slight menace from France would lessen the number of these
reinforcements. The more I see of the English, the more thoroughly
convinced I am, that it is necessary to speak to them in a loud tone.

After having wearied you with public affairs, you must not expect to
escape without being wearied also with my private affairs. It is
impossible to be more agreeably situated than I am in a foreign
country. I have only feelings of pleasure to express, and I have each
day more reason to be satisfied with the conduct of the congress
towards me, although my military occupations have allowed me to become
personally acquainted with but few of its members. Those I do know have
especially loaded me with marks of kindness and attention. The new
president, Mr. Laurens, one of the most respectable men of America, is
my particular friend. As to the army, I have had the happiness of
obtaining the friendship of every individual; not one opportunity is
lost of giving me proofs of it. I passed the whole summer without
accepting a division, which you know had been my previous intention; I
passed all that time at General Washington's house, where I felt as if
I were with a friend of twenty years' standing. Since my return from
Jersey, he has desired me to choose, amongst several brigades, the
division which may please me best; but I have chosen one entirely
composed of Virginians. It is weak in point of numbers at present, just
in proportion, however, to the weakness of the whole army, and almost
in a state of nakedness; but I am promised cloth, of which I shall make
clothes, and recruits, of which soldiers must be made, about the same
period; but, unfortunately, the last is the most difficult task, even
for more skilful men than me. The task I am performing here, if I had
acquired sufficient experience to perform it well, would improve
exceedingly my future knowledge. The
major-general replaces the lieutenant-general, and the field-marshal,
in their most important functions, and I should have the power of
employing to advantage, both my talents and experience, if Providence
and my extreme youth allowed me to boast of possessing either. I read,
I study, I examine, I listen, I reflect, and the result of all is the
endeavour at forming an opinion, into which I infuse as much common
sense as possible. I will not talk much, for fear of saying foolish
things; I will still less risk acting much, for fear of doing foolish
things; for I am not disposed to abuse the confidence which the
Americans have kindly placed in me. Such is the plan of conduct which I
have followed until now, and which I shall continue to follow; but when
some ideas occur to me, which I believe may become useful when properly
rectified, I hasten to impart them to a great judge, who is good enough
to say that he is pleased with them. On the other hand, when my heart
tells me that a favourable opportunity offers, I cannot refuse myself
the pleasure of participating in the peril, but I do not think that the
vanity of success ought to make us risk the safety of an army, or of
any portion of it, which may not be formed or calculated for the
offensive. If I could make an axiom, with the certainty of not saying a
foolish thing, I should venture to add that, whatever may be our force,
we must content ourselves with a completely defensive plan, with the
exception, however, of the moment when we may be forced to action,
because I think I have perceived that the English troops are more
astonished by a brisk attack than by a firm resistance.

This letter will be given you by the celebrated Adams, whose name must
undoubtedly be known to you. As I have never allowed myself to quit the
army, I have not been able to see him. He wished that I should give him
letters of introduction to France, especially to yourself. May I hope
that you will have the goodness of receiving him kindly, and even of
giving him some information respecting the present state of affairs. I
fancied you would not be sorry to converse with a man whose merit is so
universally acknowledged. He desires ardently to succeed in obtaining
the esteem of our nation. One of his friends himself told me so.

Footnotes:

1. Madame Charles de Latour-Maubourg.

2. A son of the Viscount de Noailles, who was the son of Marshal de
Mouchy, and married the eldest daughter of the Duke d'Ayen.



TO GENERAL WASHINGTON.~[1]

(ORIGINAL)

Camp, 30th December, 1777.

MY DEAR GENERAL,--I went yesterday morning to head-quarters with an
intention of speaking to your excellency, but you were too busy, and I
shall lay down in this letter what I wished to say.

I don't need to tell you that I am sorry for all that has happened for
some time past. It is a necessary dependence of my most tender and
respectful friendship for you, which affection is as true and candid as
the other sentiments of my heart, and much stronger than so new an
acquaintance seems to admit; but another reason, to be concerned in the
present circumstances, is my ardent and perhaps enthusiastic wishes for
the happiness and liberty of this country. I see plainly that America
can defend herself if proper measures are taken, and now I begin to
fear lest she should be lost by herself and her own sons.

When I was in Europe I thought that here almost every man was a lover
of liberty, and would rather die free than live a slave. You can
conceive my astonishment when I saw that toryism was as openly
professed as whiggism itself: however, at that time I believed that all
good Americans were united together; that the confidence of congress in
you was unbounded. Then I entertained the certitude that America would
be independent in case she should not lose you. Take away, for an
instant, that modest diffidence of yourself, (which, pardon my freedom,
my dear General, is sometimes too great, and I wish you could know, as
well as myself, what difference there is between you and any other
man,) you would see very plainly that if you were lost for America,
there is no body who could keep the army and the revolution for six
months. There are open dissensions in congress, parties who hate one
another as much as the common enemy; stupid men, who, without knowing a
single word about war, undertake to judge you, to make ridiculous
comparisons; they are infatuated with Gates, without thinking of the
different circumstances, and believe that attacking is the only thing
necessary to conquer. Those ideas are entertained in their minds by
some jealous men, and perhaps secret friends to the British Government,
who want to push you in a moment of ill humour to some rash enterprise
upon the lines, or against a much stronger army. I should not take the
liberty of mentioning these particulars to you if I did not receive a
letter about this matter, from a young good-natured gentleman at York,
whom Conway has ruined by his cunning, bad advice, but who entertains
the greatest respect for you.

I have been surprised at first, to see the few establishments of this
board of war, to see the difference made between northern and southern
departments, to see resolves from congress about military operations;
but the promotion of Conway is beyond all my expectations. I should be
glad to have new major-generals, because, as I know, you take some
interest in my happiness and reputation it is, perhaps, an occasion for
your excellency to give me more agreeable commands in some interesting
instances. On the other hand, General Conway says he is entirely a man
to be disposed of by me. He calls himself my soldier, and the reason of
such behaviour to me is, that he wishes to be well spoken of at the
French court, and his protector, the Marquis de Castries, is an
intimate acquaintance of mine; but since the letter of Lord Stirling I
inquired in his character. I found that he was an ambitious and
dangerous man. He has done all in his power, by cunning manoeuvres, to
take off my confidence and affection for you. His desire was to engage
me to leave this country. Now I see all the general officers of the
army against congress; such disputes, if known by the enemy, would be
attended with the worst consequences. I am very sorry whenever I
perceive troubles raised among the defenders of the same cause, but my
concern is much greater when I find officers coming from France,
officers of some character in my country, to whom any fault of that
kind may be imputed. The reason of my fondness for Conway was his being
by all means a very brave and very good officer. However, that talent
for manoeuvres, and which seems so extraordinary to congress, is not so
very difficult a matter for any man of common sense who applies himself
to it. I must pay to General Portail, and some French officers, who
came to speak me, the justice to say, that I found them as I could wish
upon this occasion; for it has made a great noise among many in the
army. I wish, indeed, those matters could be soon pacified. I wish your
excellency could let them know how necessary you are to them, and
engage them at the same time to keep peace, and simulate love among
themselves till the moment when those little disputes shall not be
attended with such inconveniences. It would be, too, a great pity that
slavery, dishonour, ruin, and unhappiness of a whole world, should
issue from some trifling differences between a few men.

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Turkey is restoring the citizenship of its most famous 20th century poet Nazim Hikmet over 50 years after it branded him a traitor.

Hikmet, a communist who died in exile in Moscow in 1963, was imprisoned in Turkey for more than a decade. He was stripped of his Turkish nationality in 1951 because of his communist views, but despite a ban on his poetry which remained in place until 1965, has remained one of Turkey's best-loved poets. His work, much of which was written in prison, including his masterpiece Human Landscapes, has been translated into more than 50 languages.

"This is very good news," said Richard McKane, Hikmet's English translator. "The restoration of his Turkish citizenship is long overdue: the people of Turkey and his readers are owed that."

Immortalised by Pablo Neruda, with whom he shared the Soviet Union's International Peace Prize in 1950, with the lines "Thanks for what you were and for the fire / which your song left forever burning", Hikmet was also supported by Jean-Paul Sartre and Pablo Picasso. Nobel laureate Orhan Pamuk, when given the editorship for a day of Turkish newspaper Radikal two years ago, used the example of Hikmet in his cover story to criticise the lack of freedom of expression in Turkey. In 2000, 500,000 Turks petitioned the government to restore Hikmet's citizenship rights and repatriate his remains.

Deputy prime minister Cemil Cicek told the Associated Press that it was time for the government to change its mind about Hikmet. "The crimes which forced the government to strip him of his citizenship at that time are no longer considered a crime," the BBC quoted him as saying.

Hikmet, whose remains are currently in Russia, had said that he wished to be buried in Turkey in his 1953 poem Testament, translated by Ruth Christie. "Friends if it's not my lot to see the day / of independence... / if I die before that day / - and it seems I will - / bury me in a village graveyard in Anatolia / and if it's fitting / and a plane tree grows at my head, / then there's no need for a gravestone or anything else."

Cicek said that Hikmet's family would now decide whether to ship his remains back to his homeland.

Hikmet introduced free verse to Turkey in the 1930s, with his themes ranging from war to love. Despite his imprisonment he retained a deep passion for Turkey. "I love my country", he wrote in one of his poems. "I swung in its lofty trees, I lay in its prisons. Nothing relieves my depression like the songs and tobacco of my country."

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