19. GW to PC, NOV 1, 1777, ILA 1:140–41. See also Thayer, Nathanael Greene, 187–88, and Flexner, George Washington American, 267.
20. De Kalb to Pierre de Saint-Paul, NOV 7, 1777, ILA 1:145–49. Saint-Paul was first secretary of the Ministry of War, investigating Laf’s departure for America and his conduct after arrival.
21. Laf to Adr, NOV 6, 1777, ILA 1:142–45.
22. Laf to HL, NOV 18 and 20, 1777, ILA 1:152–55.
23. Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 80–85; Callahan, Daniel Morgan, 153–54; Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:100.
24. NG to GW, NOV 26, 1777, ILA 1:158–59; and in Greene, Nathanael Greene 1:527–28.
25. Laf to GW, NOV 26, 1777, ILA 1:156–58.
26. GW to PC, NOV 26, 1777, ILA 1:158–59.
27. Laf to HL, NOV 29, 1777, ILA 1:160–61.
28. PC to GW, DEC 1, 1777, and Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:100, 165; Journals of Congress, DEC 1, 1777, quoted Tower, 254; General Orders NOV 20 and DEC 4, 1777, FGW 10:88–89, 138. Stephen was dismissed on NOV 20.
29. Laf to HL, DEC 14, 1777, ILA 1:183–87.
30. Quoted Unger, Lafayette, 51.
31. BS, SD, and Lee to Committee of Foreign Affairs, DEC 18, 1777, Wharton 2:452–55.
32. Laf to d’Ayen, DEC 16, 1777, ILA 1:188–95.
33. Laf to Adr, JAN 6, 1778, ILA 1:222–26.
34. Laf to Adr, DEC 22, 1777, and JAN 9, 1778, ILA 1:198–99, 457–58; Laf to JA, JAN 9, 1778, Wharton 2:468; Adr to BF, AUG 3, and SEP 19 and 21, 1778, LBF 27:200–4, 427, 440–45.
35. Laf to RM, DEC 30, 1777, and JAN 9, 1778, ILA 1:201–2, 228–29; Moré de Pontgibaud, in Chinard, George Washington as French, 30–31.
36. HL to Laf, DEC 6, 1777, ILA 1:176–79.
37. Boatner, 704–5; NG to Jacob Greene, JAN 3, 1778, quoted Thane, Fighting Quaker, 120.
38. Risch, Quartermaster Support, 29–35; Trussell, Birthplace.
39. Laf, Memorandum on a winter campaign, DEC 3, 1777, ILA 1:173–76.
40. JL to HL, DEC 3, 1777, in Commager and Morris, Spirit 1:639.
41. Narrative attributed to James Sullivan Martin, ibid. 1:643.
42. Freeman, George Washington 4:565. The account of Valley Forge relies on Trussell, Birthplace; Risch, Quartermaster Support, 29–35; Clary, These Relics, ch. 1; Ganoe, History, 50–53; CIG 1:85–88. A recent reinterpretation is Fleming, Washington’s Secret War.
43. Surgeon Albigence Waldo of the Connecticut Line recorded in his diary DEC 21, “Provisions scarce…. My skin and eyes are almost spoiled with continual smoke. Ageneral cry thro’ the camp this evening among the soldiers, ‘No meat! No meat!’ The distant vales echoed back the melancholy sound—‘No meat! No meat!’ Immitating the noise of crows and owls, also, made a part of the confused musick.” He wrote on DEC 22, “My eyes are started out from their orbits like a rabbit’s eyes, occasioned by a great cold and smoke. What have you got for breakfast, lads? ‘Fire cake and water, Sir.’ The Lord send that our commissary of purchases may live [on] fire cake and water till their glutted gutts are turned to pasteboard.” Commager and Morris, Spirit 1:641–42.
44. Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:170; Pierre-Etienne Duponceau, aide to FVS, in Chinard, George Washington as French, 15.
45. Varnum to NG, FEB 12, 1778, and GW to PC, DEC 23, 1777, in Commager and Morris, Spirit 1:644, 650–51.
46. Laf to HL, JAN 2 and 15 (two letters), 1778, and to Henry, JAN 3, 1778, ILA 1:209–12, 236–38.
47. Laf, Memoir of 1779, Laf to Adr, JAN 6, 1778, to GW and to Adam Hubley, both JAN 20, 1778, ILA 1:169, 222–26, 238–41; Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 105–6.
48. Laf to GW, JAN 13, 1778, ILA 1:233–36.
49. Laf to GW, JAN 5, 1778, ILA 1:219–22.
50. Laf to Adr, JAN 6, 1778, ILA 1:222–26.
51. Boatner, 276–78; Bodinier, Dictionnaire, 105–6; Flexner, George Washington American, 262, 268; Weigley, History, 50–51; GW to Richard Henry Lee, OCT 17, 1777, FGW 9:388; AH quoted Flexner, Young Hamilton, 210. Besides Flexner’s two books, the Conway Cabal is covered in Chadwick, George Washington’s War, 261–67; CW, 22–31; CIG 1:61–85; Rossie, Politics, 188–202; Higginbotham, War, 216–22; Betz, “Conway Cabal”; and Brenneman, “Conway Cabal,” among others. Wilkinson’s part is covered in Jacobs, Tarnished Warrior, ch. 2; JL’s in Massey, John Laurens, 89–92; and NG’s in Golway, Washington’s General, 154–57.
52. Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 67–72; HL to Laf, DEC 6, 1777, and Laf to HL, DEC 14, 1777, ILA 1:176–79, 183–88.
53. GW to Richard Henry Lee, OCT 17, 1777, FGW 9:387–89.
54. The documents on all this are reproduced in Sanger, Inspector-General’s Department, 228–29.
55. Patterson, Horatio Gates, 216–19; Commager and Morris, Spirit, 1:651–52.
56. GW to Conway, NOV 9, 1777, FGW 10:29.
57. Commager and Morris, Spirit 1:651–52; Laf to HG, DEC 14, 1777, Laf to HL, DEC 18, 1777, Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:171–72, 182, 195–97.
58. Laf to HL, NOV 18, 1777, and HL to Laf, DEC 6, 1777, ILA 1:176–69.
59. Sanger, Inspector General’s Department, 228–29; CW, 2–31; CIG 1:68–75; Wright, Organization, 195–96; AH quoted Kapp, Life of Steuben, 121–22.
60. See Francis Lightfoot Lee to Richard Henry Lee, DEC 15, 1777, and William Ellery to William Whipple, DEC 21, 1777, Smith 8:417, 453, as examples of thinking in Congress.
61. NG to HL, JAN nd 1778, Thayer, Nathanael Greene, 216–18; Flexner, George Washington American, 258–59, 262–63; Higginbotham, War, 218–20; JS and others to GW, DEC 31, 1777, and NG to PC, DEC 16, 1777, both quoted Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 100–1; JS to GW, DEC 30, 1777, ILA 1:208n.
62. Conway to HG, JAN 4, 1778, ILA 1:208n; GW to PC, JAN 2, 1778, FGW 10:249; GW to PC, JAN 3, 1778, quoted Palmer, General von Steuben, 133; Sanger, Inspector General’s Department, 229.
63. Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 74–77, 90–91, 95–97.
64. Laf to GW, DEC 30, 1777, ILA 1:204–7. In Sparks 5:488 this was revised for clarity and so lost much of its charm.
65. GW to Laf, DEC 31, 1777, ILA 1:207–8.
66. Laf to GW, DEC 31, 1777, ILA 1:209.
67. See as examples Laf to HL, JAN 2, 1778, HL to Laf, JAN 12, 1778, Conway to HG, JAN 4, 1778, Laf to GW, JAN 5, 1778, Laf to RM, JAN 9, 1778, and others, ILA 1:209–33; NG to Jacob Greene, JAN 3, 1778, Greene, Nathanael Greene, 1:544; Tilghman to John Cadwalader, JAN 18, 1778, in Rankin, American Revolution, 173.
68. Abraham Clark to William Alexander (Lord Stirling), JAN 15, 1778, Smith 8:597.
69. Rossie, Politics, 188–202; NG quoted Rankin, American Revolution, 201–2; Massey, John Laurens, 90–92; AH quoted Flexner, Young Hamilton, 214.
70. Higginbotham, War, 220. Flexner, George Washington American, 271–77, suggests that the affair became known as the “Conway Cabal” because the phrase rings. Neither “Mifflin Cabal” nor “Gates Cabal” trips over the tongue.
71. De Kalb to de Broglie, JAN 5, 1778, quoted Kapp, Life of John Kalb, 137. De Kalb and Laf drew together during the crisis, and separated from other French officers. “He is an excellent young man,” de Kalb told de Broglie, “and we are good friends. It is to be wished that all the Frenchmen who serve here were as reasonable as he and I. Lafayette is much liked; he is on the best of terms with Washington; both of them have every reason to be satisfied with me also.”
Chapter Six
1. Many biographers have portrayed AH as an abolitionist. As Flexner, Young Hamilton, 39–40, 257–63, points out, the record will not support the claim except by selective citation of the documents. On JL’s background in this area, see Townsend, American Soldier, 115–24.
2. HL to Laf, OCT 23, 1777, and Laf to BF, MAR 20, 1779, ILA 1:126–28, 2:241. Britain had taken Senegal from France in 1756 and held it under the treaty of 1763.
3. Quoted Higginbotham, War, 395; JL to HL nd spring 1776, quoted Townsend, American Soldier, 115–24; Flexner, George Washington Anguish, 116–17.
4. Quarles, Negr
o; Higginbotham, War, 394–97.
5. JL to HL, JAN 1, 1778, Townsend, American Soldier, 125.
6. AH to JJ, MAR 14, 1779, SAH 2:17–19.
7. JL to AH, JUL 14, 1779, and AH to JL, SEP 11, 1779, SAH 2:102–3, 165–69; GW to JL, MAR 22, 1782, Feinstone Collection, David Library; Massey, John Laurens, 128–53.
8. Ellis, His Excellency, 162–64, agrees that Laurens was the first person to affect GW’s thinking on slavery but that Laf would have even greater influence. Both encouraged a natural trend in his own thinking.
9. On the origins of the expedition, see Nelson, General Horatio Gates, 171–75. Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:245, states the case for conspiracy, and many authors have accepted his fantasies. For the Canadian side of the story, see Lanctot, Canada and the American Revolution.
10. Laf to GW, JAN 20, 1778, “a half past one,” ILA 1:238–39.
11. HL to Laf, JAN 22, 1778, and Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:245. Stark was a tough old Indian fighter, a veteran of Rogers’ Rangers during the French and Indian War, and the sort of character who generated legends in his own lifetime, many of them true. He served with distinction, mostly in the Northern Department, throughout the war. Boatner, Encyclopedia, 1052–3. Regarding his visit to HG’s headquarters, in at least two versions of Memoirs, and separately in an 1829 letter to Jared Sparks, Laf claimed to have stopped in on his way to see Congress. After the party had drunk toasts to Congress and the United States, he embarrassed the others into drinking the health of GW. For the rest of his life he boasted of this as a triumph, but there is no contemporary evidence that the incident ever happened. Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:245, and discussion at 248n.
12. Laf, Memoir of 1779, HG to Laf, JAN 24, 1778, and HL to Laf, JAN 24, 1778, ILA 1:245, 249–50, 252.
13. Laf to HL, JAN 26, 1778, ILA 1:253–56.
14. GM to HL, JAN 26, 1778, ILA 1:256, 258; Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 113–14. Scotsman McDougall had commanded a privateer at the age of twenty-four during the Seven Years’ War. A successful New York merchant, he served with distinction in the Hudson Highlands during most of the war. In 1779, at the age of forty-seven, he suffered an illness that kept him out of the Canada expedition. He was too much of a scrapper to stay out of the fight for long, however, and campaigned to the end of the war, after which he entered politics. Boatner, 690–91.
15. HL to Isaac Motte, JAN 26–30, 1778, ILA 1:256n.
16. Laf’s suspicions lace his letters during the campaign, as will be seen. As for the board’s motives in sending Conway, as also will be seen with HL’s inquiries, he had become an embarrassment because of the backlash in the army over the Conway Cabal.
17. Laf to HL, JAN 27, 1778, ILA 1:258–60. Laf asked RM to get him £2,000 “because I want immediately ressources for the northern expedition.” Laf to RM, JAN 29, 1778, ILA 1:263. Duer, born in 1749, was the son of a rich British family and a former army officer, adc to Clive in India in the 1760s. He visited New York as a timber buyer for the Royal Navy in 1768, and settled down there in 1773, becoming both richer and an American patriot, and served as an eloquent, hard-working delegate to Congress. He was not an enemy of GW. He rose from a sickbed to cast the deciding vote blocking nomination of a committee to remove GW from command. Laf’s objection to him might have grown out of rivalry for the attentions of “Miss Ketty,” whom Duer married in JUL 1779, GW giving the bride away. Duer prospered after the war, became a land speculator, and for six months in 1789 was AH’s assistant secretary of the treasury. He was sued later for peculation in that position. He spent the last seven years of his life in debtor’s prison, dying in 1799. Boatner, 339.
18. GW to Board of War, JAN 27, 1778, FGW 10:356.
19. HL to Laf, JAN 28, 1778, ILA 1:262–63. “Excellency” was the usual term of address to the commander of an army.
20. Laf to PC, and to HL (private), JAN 31, 1778, HG to Laf, JAN 31, 1778, with Instructions for the Marquis de Lafayette Major Genl. in the army of the United States of America and commanding an expedition to Canada, and Resolution of Congress, FEB 2, 1778, all ILA 1:263–73. His instructions were strange, considering it was a winter campaign. “You will constantly be in the woods at night, where the troops are so well acquainted with the mode of covering themselves, that you would find tents unnecessary and cumbersome.” Once he had taken either St. Johns or Montreal, he was to publish a notice to all Canadian citizens, inviting them to join the cause against Britain. If they declined, he should burn all their vessels and seize all stores. If they wanted to sign on, he should tell them to send delegates to Congress. If he took Montreal, “which is a principal object of this expedition,” he should seize all public arms, ammunition, stores, and so on. The instructions ended by saying the board “content themselves with suggesting, that the design of this expedition may not be misunderstood, that its grand object is to destroy, or possess the enemys vessels and stores of every kind upon Lake Champlain and in the city of Montreal; and all clothing and stores of every kind…. The consequences which may arise from success, are to be viewed in a secondary point of light, and therefore the holding the country or prevailing upon the inhabitants to confederate with the States, is not to be undertaken but with the greatest prudence, and with a prospect of durable success.” That contradicted the original purpose of the undertaking. Why it was not cancelled outright is not apparent, unless it was to avoid the political embarrassment of admitting error.
21. HL to John Rutledge, FEB 3, 1778, HL to JL and JL to HL, both FEB 9, 1778, in Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 126–27; GW to Thomas Nelson, FEB 8, 1778, and to HG, FEB 9, 1778, FGW 10:432, 437–41; AH to George Clinton, FEB 13, 1778, SGW 5:508.
22. Laf to Adr, FEB 3, 1778, ILA 1:273–76.
23. Laf to HL, FEB 3 and 4, and HL to Laf, FEB 5, 1778, ILA 1:276–77, 279–81. HL answered Laf’s reports, thanking him for the “pleasing accounts received from the spot from whence you are now wandering. If fretting or wishing, would rand the roads I would enter heartily upon so cheap a mode of scavaging—such as they are, may God conduct you, Noble Marquis, happily successfully, through them, that when, You shall think it proper, you may return & fill those tender breasts with joy which till that time will be the subjects of anxiety.” HL to Laf, FEB 7, 1778, ILA 1:284–85. One wonders whether Laf’s English grasped that “rand” meant melt, or that “scavaging” meant cleaning or clearing. Both terms were nearly obsolete by that time. No doubt he caught the reference to “tender breasts,” meaning the ladies of York, especially Miss Ketty. NG’s legendary sleeplessness, incidentally, was an effect of chronic asthma.
24. Troup to HG (two letters), FEB 6, 1778, ILA 1:282.
25. Laf to HG, FEB 7, 1778, ILA 1:283–84.
26. Laf to GW, FEB 9, 1778, ILA 1:287–88. Regarding the “neither-neither” usage, French lacks English’s contrasting “either-or,” “neither-nor,” and the like. Instead, repetitive “eithers” and “neithers” (or “ors” and “nors”) are used for the same purpose. Also, “pompous” (cognate pompeux) was not then pejorative as it is now, although Laf’s usage was facetious. It meant magnificent.
27. Committee of Conference to PC, FEB 11, 1778, ILA 1:271n. GM was on the committee.
28. Laf, Memoir of 1779, Laf to Moses Hazen, and Hazen to Laf, both FEB 18, 1779, McDougall to Laf, FEB 18, and to NG, FEB 28, 1778, and Laf to Albany Committee, FEB 19, 1778, ILA 1:246, 288–84, 293n.
29. Albany Committee to Laf, FEB 19, 1778, ILA 1:303–4.
30. Laf to Conway, FEB 19, 1778, ILA 1:294–85.
31. Conway to HG, FEB 19, 1778, and to Laf, FEB 20, 1778, ILA 1:301–2, 312.
32. Laf to HL, FEB 19, 1778, ILA 1:295–98.
33. Laf to GW, FEB 19, 1778, ILA 1:299–301.
34. Laf to PC, FEB 20, 1778, ILA 1:305–8.
35. Laf to HG, FEB 20 and 23, and to George Clinton, FEB 23, 1778, ILA 1:311, 313–17.
36. See Laf to HL, JAN 27, FEB 23, APR 14 and 26, and to RM, JAN 29 and FEB 23, 1778, in ILA 1 chronologically, and discussed at 1:317�
��18.
37. Laf to HL, FEB 23, 1778, ILA 1:318–20.
38. Laf to GW, FEB 23, 1778, ILA 1:321–22. He wrote a similar letter FEB 27, repeating a rumor that “John Adams spoke very disrespectfully of your excellency in Boston. I do not know if it is true…. Give me leave to say my opinion, my dear general; those ennemy’s of yours are so low, so far under your feet, that it is not of your dignity to take much notice of ’em.” ILA 1:325–27.
39. Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 139–42.
40. Resolution of MAR 2, 1778, and HL to Laf, MAR 4, 1778, ILA 1:331–34 and 134n.
41. HL to Laf, MAR 4, 1778, ILA 1:331–34.
42. HL to Laf, MAR 6, 1778, ILA 1:336–38. Laf had lobbied Governor Clinton for his New York ambitions. Laf to George Clinton, MAR 3, and Clinton to Laf, MAR 8, 1778, ILA 1:327–30, 339–42.
43. HL to Laf, MAR 7, 1778, ILA 1:338–39.
44. GW to Laf, MAR 10, 1778, ILA 1:342–43.
45. Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:246–47; Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 143–46.
46. Laf, Memoir of 1779, ILA 1:247.
47. Ibid.; aide quoted Gottschalk, Lafayette Joins, 143–6; Laf to PC, MAR 20, 1778, ILA 1:362–65. Laf was proud of his Indian name, but he never spelled it correctly, giving it variously as Kayenlaa and Kayewla. ILA 5:260n.
48. Laf to HG, and to PC, both MAR 11, 1778, ILA 1:3443–6. See also Tower 1:288.
49. Laf to HG, to PC, and to HL, all MAR 12, 1778, ILA 1:347–52.
50. HL to Laf, MAR 13, 1778, ILA 1:373n; Laf to GW, MAR 13, 1778, GLW 33–35.
51. Laf to GW, to HL, and to PC, all MAR 20, 1778, ILA 1:362–72.
52. GW to Laf, MAR 20, and Laf to GW, MAR 22, 1778, ILA 1:372–76.
53. HL to Laf, MAR 24, 1778, ILA 1:377–79.
54. Laf to GW, MAR 25, 1778, ILA 1:380–81.
55. Quoted Freeman, George Washington 5:39.
56. HL to Laf, MAR 27, 1778, postscript dated APR 1, ILA 1:383.
57. Laf to FVS, MAR 12, 1778, ILA 1:352–53, and Memoir of 1779, ILA 2:9. However, he also told a French agent in America, “He takes the greatest pains to instruct our troops, and, since he has their confidence, I am convinced that he will be of the greatest service to them.” Laf to Lazare-Jean Théveneau de Francy, APR 10, 1778, ILA 2:20-22.
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