Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette summary

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Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert du Motier, marquis de Lafayette, (born Sept. 6, 1757, Chavaniac, France—died May 20, 1834, Paris), French military leader. Born to an ancient noble family of great wealth, he was a courtier at the court of Louis XVI but sought glory as a soldier. In 1777 he went to America, was appointed a major general, became a close friend of George Washington, and fought with distinction at the Battle of the Brandywine. He returned to France in 1779, persuaded Louis to send a 6,000-man force to aid the colonists, and returned to America in 1780 to command an army in Virginia and help win the Siege of Yorktown. Hailed as “the Hero of Two Worlds,” he returned to France in 1782, became a leader of liberal aristocrats, and was elected to the Estates General in 1789. He presented the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen to the National Assembly. Elected commander of the national guard of Paris, he sought to protect the king, favouring a constitutional monarchy. When his guards fired on a crowd of petitioners in the Champ de Mars (1791), he lost popularity and resigned his position. He commanded the army against Austria (1792), then defected to the Austrians, who held him captive until 1797. Returning to France, Lafayette became a gentleman farmer. In the Bourbon Restoration, he served in the Chamber of Deputies (1814–24) and commanded the national guard in the July Revolution (1830).

Estates-General Summary

Estates-General, in France of the pre-Revolution monarchy, the representative assembly of the three “estates,” or orders of the realm: the clergy (First Estate) and nobility (Second Estate)—which were privileged minorities—and the Third Estate, which represented the majority of the people. The

army Summary

Army, a large organized armed force trained for war, especially on land. The term may be applied to a large unit organized for independent action, or it may be applied to a nation’s or ruler’s complete military organization for land warfare. Throughout history, the character and organization of

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United States Army, major branch of the United States armed forces charged with the preservation of peace and security and the defense of the country. The army furnishes most of the ground forces in the U.S. military organization. In the early months of the American Revolution, the first regular

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Government, the political system by which a country or community is administered and regulated. Most of the key words commonly used to describe governments—words such as monarchy, oligarchy, and democracy—are of Greek or Roman origin. They have been current for more than 2,000 years and have not