His Younger Years

Lafayette, as he is most often referred to today, was born and baptized in 1757 with the name of Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier de La Fayette, but his family and friends knew him simply as “Gilbert.” Lafayette was born in Chavaniac, a district of south-central France, in a castle called Château Chavaniac which had been the home of his family for hundreds of years. Far from Paris, Chavaniac was in a remote area of hills and pastures which was populated mostly by the peasants who gave allegiance to the Lafayette family. It was in this countryside far from the French ruling aristocracy where Lafayette spent his childhood years with peasant children as his playmates. 

Lafayette’s parents were high ranking members of the French nobility. His father, Gilbert du Motier, carried the inherited title of Marquis de Lafayette and was descended from a long line of military men dating back to the Crusades.  At the time of young Lafayette’s birth, his father was a colonel in the French Grenadiers, an elite army of the French King. 

Lafayette’s mother, Marie Louise Jolie de La Rivière (known as Julie), was the daughter of a wealthy French aristocratic family who traced their lineage to King Louis IX. Julie had grown up in a grand house in Paris, but when she married the Marquis de Lafayette in 1754, she left her family, friends, and a busy social life to live in the remote Château Chavaniac. Lafayette’s father was rarely home as he was most often away with his regiment, and Julie was left in the company of her mother-in-law and infant son.  

When Lafayette was not yet two years old, his father was killed while fighting against the British during the Battle of Minden in the Seven Years’ War. It was at that time the young Lafayette assumed the title of Marquis. Grief-stricken, Lafayette’s mother returned to Paris to live with her family, leaving her son at Chavaniac to be raised by his grandmother and aunts. When he was seven a local priest was hired to educate the growing boy.    

Even as a child, Lafayette wanted to be a soldier like the men in his father’s family. Although the children who lived near the chateau were peasants and not nearly of the same noble rank as young Lafayette, he loved to play war games with them in the fields of south-central France. 

When Lafayette was ten, his mother sent for him to join her in Paris where she was living with her family in a group of apartments in the Luxembourg Palace. He was enrolled in school and began a formal classical education. At first, the change from rural life with only peasants as playmates was not easy for the young man with clumsy manners and a country accent. In addition to school, Lafayette’s grandfather enrolled him in a military training program.

Tragically, after Lafayette had been living in Paris for only two years, his mother suddenly died, followed a few weeks later by the death of his grandfather. This unexpected turn of events left the young Marquis, the only heir on both sides of his family, a fabulously wealthy young man. For the next few years, appointed guardians were in control of Lafayette’s estate. 

At age thirteen, Lafayette was commissioned to serve in the King’s Musketeers and began his military education in earnest at the Military Academy at Versailles. Here he learned horsemanship and military drills which prepared him for his later service in America’s Continental Army. 

When Jean de Noailles, duc d’Ayen, head of one of the most powerful families in France, heard of the death of Lafayette’s mother and grandfather, he saw an opportunity for the future of his own family. Jean de Noailles and his wife had five daughters who needed husbands. The oldest daughter had already married, but his second daughter, Adrienne, he thought, would be perfect for the match for Lafayette. Duc d’Ayen began negotiations with Lafayette’s guardians to arrange a marriage to his daughter. The only problem was that Adrienne was only twelve years old and Lafayette was only fourteen. 

An agreement was made for the marriage with certain stipulations including that Lafayette and Adrienne would not have knowledge of the arrangement until they were older. In the meantime, Lafayette would live with the de Noailles family in Versailles near the King’s palace.  There Lafayette would be raised like a son of the de Noailles family until he and Adrienne were old enough to marry.  

Because of their rank in the French aristocracy, the de Noailles family was close to the King and part of the Royal Court. Although Lafayette was extremely wealthy, he had not been raised at court and his future in-laws saw to it that he was educated in an elite school for the future leaders of France; among his classmates were the royal princes. He was given lessons to teach him the proper way to bow, eat, drink, laugh, and how to engage in witty conversation. His dancing lessons proved him awkward, and his classmates noted his lack of grace and considered him a country bumpkin. Lafayette was unhappy with his artificial life at Versailles, but he found happiness when his future father-in-law secured an appointment for him in the Noailles Dragoons Regiment as a Captain. He was sent to camp where he read manuals on strategy and tactics and drilled with the troops. This is where he was happy and where he excelled.  Around this time, he was also introduced to the idea of liberty, equality and the rights of man, a concept that never left him.

In 1773, Lafayette and Adrienne were finally told that they were to be married. Fortunately, because of their time living together in the same household, the two had come to know and love each other. They were married when Lafayette was sixteen and Adrienne was fourteen. A year later their first child, Henriette, was born. 

About the same time Lafayette and Adrienne married, King Louis VXI and Queen Marie Antoinette were also married. They were all about the same age, and Adrienne and Marie Antoinette were friendly. Adrienne spent a great deal of time at court attending dances, card parties, and outings. Lafayette, true to form, hated the social life at Versailles and was not good at conversation or dancing. At one ball, when he was dancing with Marie Antoinette, he stepped on her toes, causing the queen to burst out laughing. 

Because Adrienne and the de Noailles family were so closely tied to the Royal Court, Lafayette was forced to endure a life that was not to his liking. He became silent and withdrawn, resenting the courtly life he had been forced to lead. By the time he was eighteen, Lafayette’s relationship with his father-in-law became strained when Lafayette refused to accept a position in the entourage of the Comte de Provence, the King’s brother. Lafayette’s only ambition was to be a military officer so he had different plans for his future.