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  Lafayette’s letter to Adrienne mentioned somebody else: “Among the general’s aides-de-camp is a young man whom I love very much and about whom I have occasionally spoken to you; that man is Colonel Hamilton.” Hamilton had grown increasingly frustrated in what he regarded as a servant’s job, and wanted a fighting command. Lafayette, Laurens, and Greene all believed Washington was holding him back.

  On his way to deliver a letter to Tilghman on February 16, 1781, Hamilton passed Washington on the stairs. “He told me he wanted to speak to me. I answered that I would wait upon him immediately,” Hamilton explained to his father-in-law. On the way back, Lafayette stopped him and they “conversed together about a minute.” Washington met him at the head of the stairs and accused the aide of making him wait ten minutes. Then the general said angrily, “I must tell you, sir, you treat me with disrespect.” Hamilton bristled and answered, “I am not conscious of it, sir; but since you have thought it necessary to tell me so,” he resigned his position. Washington accepted that and returned to his office. “I sincerely believe my absence,” Hamilton claimed, “which gave so much umbrage, did not last two minutes.”

  Washington’s temper, and his disregard for the feelings of others except Lafayette, had gotten the better of him. He sent Tilghman to make peace with the young aide, but Hamilton was too stubborn to budge, although he agreed to stay until Washington found a replacement. Lafayette, who felt guilty about his role, intervened without success. He ended up apologizing to Washington for the other’s behavior, but the split was complete.9

  Hamilton remained the rest of the winter, the air frosty whenever he and Washington were in the same room, but headquarters was too busy to nurse bruised egos. Something had to be done about Arnold in Virginia. When a storm wrecked a British squadron at Gardiner’s Bay, Long Island, it gave the French naval superiority off the middle states. Washington urged the chevalier Destouches, the new naval commander, to sail to the Chesapeake, and Rochambeau to put a thousand troops on the ships. He would send about 1,200 men from his own army to cooperate with them. The French commanders promised to send a squadron.10

  “Arnold, now a British general,” Lafayette told Adrienne, “has disembarked in Virginia with a corps of that nation that seems quite content to serve under his orders. One must not dispute about matters of taste.” With the savage hostility of a traitor, Arnold led 1,600 men to Richmond, the new state capital, on January 5, burned everything he could, then withdrew. His vandalism was aided by Governor Thomas Jefferson’s failure to mobilize the state. Light-Horse Harry Lee snorted that it would “scarcely be credited by posterity” that the governor of the oldest state in the Union “was driven out of its metropolis…and that its archives, with all its munitions and stores, were yielded to the will of the invader.”11

  Greene put Steuben in charge in Virginia. Brigadier General Thomas Nelson Jr., a veteran of the Continental Army, commanded the state troops. On January 7, he told Steuben that he had only “a few tired militia” trying to keep in touch with the enemy, as most of his troops had been put out of action by heavy rain and a lack of arms. The next day, Arnold routed his forces at Charles City Court House. Jefferson occupied himself writing letters to Washington, praising Steuben. The Prussian had a dimmer outlook, because the militia ran at the first shot, and he could not raise men or supplies or obtain intelligence. It was impossible to describe the situation he was in, he complained, “in want of every thing; and nothing can be got from the state, rather for want of arrangement than any thing else.” Arnold rampaged as freely as a weasel in a henhouse until he retired to Portsmouth.12

  When news of the situation reached Washington early in February 1781, he reassembled the Light Division to send to Virginia under Lafayette. He detailed a masking force to make Clinton think that Lafayette was going to raid Staten Island. The marquis and 1,200 men slipped out and covered the 100 miles to Trenton in under a week. It was amusing to see them traveling, Lafayette told La Luzerne. “We haven’t a sou, a horse, a cart, or a wisp of hay.” He expected to get to Virginia and back by impressing horses, boats, and supplies without spending any money. Marching on the cheap, he was having a grand time.13

  Once he heard that Destouches had detached a squadron to the Chesapeake, Washington gave Lafayette his orders. The marquis was to proceed “with all possible dispatch” to Head of Elk. Once he had transport and cover from the French he was to sail down the bay to Virginia. When he arrived at his destination he must act “as your own judgment and the circumstances shall direct,” he told him, in a great departure from the orders before Barren Hill. If Rochambeau sent troops, he should cooperate with their commander appropriately. Above all, he was to do “no act whatever with Arnold that directly or by implication may skreen him from the punishment due to his treason and desertion, which if he should fall into your hands, you shall execute in the most summary way.” Finally, he wished the young general “a successful issue to the enterprise and all the glory which I am persuaded you will deserve.”14

  As Lafayette’s division slogged through rain and mud and swollen rivers, Washington alerted Greene, Steuben, and Jefferson that he was on the way. He sent an additional brigade of New Jersey Continentals to join him, and ordered a battalion of Wayne’s Pennsylvanians to go along. He soon raised that to the whole force, about a thousand men, as soon as Wayne could get them organized. Meanwhile, the French squadron commander entered the Chesapeake, found the waters at its upper end too shallow, and returned to Newport. He had captured a smaller British vessel, which he planned to refit and return to the bay. His ships might not be able to escort Lafayette south from Head of Elk.15

  On March 1 Washington told Lafayette that he had heard from the French commanders, who planned to take their whole fleet into the Chesapeake, along with 1,100 troops. They expected to sail on March 5, and Lafayette should reach Head of Elk before them. The French admiral, however, seemed “to make a difficulty, which I do not comprehend about protecting the passage of your detachment down the bay.”

  Greene had reported that Cornwallis and 2,500 men were heading toward Virginia, and his army was too small to stop them. “This intelligence and an apprehension that Arnold may make his escape before the fleet can arrive in the bay,” Washington told Lafayette, “induce me to give you greater latitude than you had in your original instructions.” He granted the marquis freedom to move into North Carolina, cut Arnold off, intercept Cornwallis, and support Greene. This, he believed, should be a “secondary object” to be pursued only if Arnold retreated to New York, or if his works at Portsmouth were too stout to challenge. “There should be strong reasons to induce a change of our first plan against Arnold, if he is still in Virginia…. You will remember that your corps is a part of this army and let this idea have proper weight in your determinations.”16

  Thomas Jefferson, by C.W. Peale, 1791–92. As governor of Virginia, Jefferson was of little help to Lafayette’s struggle with Cornwallis, but they became lifelong friends anyway, and conspirators in the early French Revolution. (INDEPENDENCE NATIONAL HISTORICAL PARK)

  Lafayette began what became a lifelong friendship with Thomas Jefferson, starting with an exchange of flattering letters. Lafayette made obeisance to the governor, then asked for help raising men and supplies. Jefferson answered with praise for the “nobleman who has already so much endeared himself to the citizens of these states,” then excused the state’s not doing its part. He wrote Steuben on March 10 with a lame justification: “We can only be answerable for the orders we give, and not for their execution.” He told Lafayette, “Mild laws, a people not used to war and prompt obedience, a want of the provisions of war & means of procuring them render our orders often ineffectual.”

  Lafayette answered, “Long since have I been used to those inconveniences that are so far compensated by the numberless blessings of a popular government.” He did not “question the good intentions of the state.” Utterances such as that caused Jefferson to sing Lafayette’s praises as a defe
nder of self-government for the rest of his life, but he did little to stave off the invader. Jefferson and his government were constitutionally incapable of meeting the demands of war.17

  The marquis hurried on to Head of Elk, where his men arrived on March 2—ahead of schedule, as he boasted to Washington. They were mostly fed and clothed but short of shoes. The transports promised by the quartermasters were nowhere to be seen. The marquis appealed to Mordecai Gist, a Baltimore businessman, and to the governor and council of Maryland. Gist seized “everything that floats” in the Baltimore area, and a flotilla was ready by March 7. Governor Thomas Sim Lee rounded up provisions. When the French fleet failed to show, he looked for protection for the marquis’ flotilla. Lafayette boarded his men and guns on the eighth, and the French sailed out of Newport the same day.18

  Lafayette did not need a fleet to protect his little navy. Arnold wanted the Royal Navy to attack his transports, but he was rebuffed. He and Captain Thomas Symonds had fallen out over a division of prize money for some ships taken in the James River. Arnold complained to Clinton, making himself so obnoxious in his letters, accusing Symonds of cowardice, that the captain flatly refused to sail against Lafayette.19

  The marquis also could be temperamental. With his men sitting in their boats and no French ships in sight, he fumed to Washington that it was all a plot. Rochambeau intended to steal his glory, fighting the enemy on his own, while he sat in the middle of nowhere. When Gist found him a twelve-gun sloop the next day, he decided to sail his troops to Annapolis, about halfway down the bay, while he went ahead with thirty men in a fishing boat armed with swivel guns. He reached Yorktown on March 14, 1781. Without naval support, the young general was discouraged. He ordered Wayne to go on to join Greene in North Carolina, and advised Washington that catching Arnold was a lost cause. When he heard that French ships had been sighted, however, he deployed Steuben’s militia and prepared to bring his own troops from Annapolis for an assault on Portsmouth. It turned out that the ships were British, not French.20

  Recommending that Washington recall the division to the Main Army, on March 23 Lafayette explained that he had gone ahead to Virginia to assess the situation firsthand and reduce the time required either to advance his detachment to Virginia or to send it back to New York. “I hope, my dear general, that my conduct will meet with your approbation, and it is the thing I the most heartly wish for.” He faced a greater British force at Portsmouth than had been there a few days earlier. Not until the twenty-fifth did he learn that was because of something that had happened nine days earlier.21

  Destouches had sailed from Newport on March 8, aiming for Chesapeake Bay. British admiral Marriot Arbuthnot took out after him, thirty-six hours behind, and beat him to the bay entrance. At the Battle off Cape Henry (First Battle off the Virginia Capes) on March 16, the fleets engaged for about an hour and a half. The furious cannonade tore up the sails and rigging on both sides. Destouches got the better of his opponent, but he decided that his damage was severe enough to abandon the expedition against Portsmouth, and he lit out for Newport. Arbuthnot limped into Lynnhaven Bay. With the seaway cleared, Clinton sent 2,000 troops under General William Phillips to reinforce Virginia and take command from Arnold. Lafayette’s two personal enemies, the man who had killed his father and the one who had betrayed his adoptive father, stood before him, and he was not strong enough to tackle them. He decided to return to the Main Army.22

  The marquis told Washington that the naval engagement had been in the French fleet’s favor, and he was “sorry they did not pursue their advantage.” British reinforcements scotched any hope of operating against Arnold, but if “the detachement from Newyork is strong that place must be weak, and it increases my desire to join your Excellency.” Looking back, he wished he had not advanced his troops to Annapolis, “but the arrival of the french fleet could not then be questioned.” He was afraid that he was exiled to a sideshow and that the main action would be against New York. He did not want to miss that.23

  “I am truly unhappy that so much trouble, so many expenses have been the only result of our enterprise to relieve Virginia,” Lafayette complained to Jefferson, and left for Annapolis after endorsing a plan circulated by Steuben to round up all available militia from Virginia. He would march them to North Carolina to help Greene contain Cornwallis. Greene, who had thumped the British at Guilford Court House on March 15, 1781, urged Lafayette to march south. He knew the Main Army was weak, he said, but if Washington understood “the critical situation of the southern states he would consent to your coming to our relief.” It was too late. Lafayette had already headed north, leaving Steuben in Virginia, where the government would not let him take the militia out of state.24

  The marquis was back at Head of Elk in early April, when he received worse news. Letters from Vergennes said that there would be no second division to join Rochambeau and Destouches. They were authorized to call on the West Indies fleet under Admiral François-Joseph-Paul, comte de Grasse, who might provide support later in the season. The French government would not guarantee a loan of 25 million livres requested by Laurens, but instead it had granted a subsidy of 6 million livres. “I have reason to believe,” the foreign minister told Lafayette privately, “Mr. Washington will be satisfied with the efforts we are making for the support of the American cause and that he on his part will do everything in his power so that they will not be fruitless.” Lafayette should assure the general that the French government had “complete confidence in his zeal, his patriotism, and his talents” and was sure he would win his war. “Some clothing for your troops is coming, and still more will come, I hope.”25

  This was discouraging news, and Washington, Lafayette, La Luzerne, and Rochambeau all were disappointed. The need for naval superiority was a main point that Washington had wanted Laurens to bring up when he went to France. Now it all depended on de Grasse’s willingness to challenge the British fleet.26

  Lafayette took it personally. Instead of reinforcements, his government was sending clothes. Except for the idle Rochambeau and the ineffective Destouches, his adoptive father was alone. He wanted to return to him.

  IT IS PROBABLE I WILL BE IN THE SOUTHERN WILDERNESS UNTILL THE END

  Washington wanted Lafayette back, and on April 5, 1781, he ordered him home. He wished the detachment would move “as quickly as they can without injury to the troops.” The next day he reversed himself, after hearing from Greene and Steuben. He ordered the marquis to turn back and reinforce Greene, to block Cornwallis from joining Arnold and Phillips. His generals agreed unanimously that this was the best way to confront the expanding British campaign in the South. “Your being already three hundred miles advanced, which is nearly half way, is the reason which operates against any which can be offered in favr. of marching that detachment back and forming another—A plan which I once had in mind.”

  “I will now mention to you, in confidence,” Washington continued, “the reason which operated with me more than almost any other in favor of recalling your detachment and forming another.” He had received complaints from regimental officers about Lafayette’s taking French officers with his command, leaving Americans behind. Washington had pacified the gripers, but he expected the issue to come up again.27

  Lafayette answered that he would prefer to be there with his light infantry if Washington attacked New York. “But I think with you that these motives are not to influence our determination if this is the best way to help General Greene.” He told Hamilton that he feared that he was being diverted to the South to draw attention from New York. “It is probable I will be in the southern wilderness untill the end of the war—far from head quarters, from the french army, from my correspondence with France,” he complained.28

  Meanwhile, the governor and council urged Lafayette to keep some troops in Maryland, because British ships were raiding the ports. He could not do that, he told them, and worse, he was going to have to requisition wagons, horses, and supplies from the people of th
e state. His troops were out of food and almost naked. He went to Baltimore to get supplies, spent his last £500 there, and signed a note for £1,550, secured against his estate in France. Congress promised to take care of that, but in the end it was another loss to him.29

  This expedition was not starting well, the young general complained to Washington. When he issued orders to march southward, some of the troops rebelled. They were mostly New Englanders, already infested with southern mites, and they dreaded going south in the yellow fever season. After he crossed the Susquehanna, he caught three Tory spies in his camp and hanged one, then arrested some deserters. “But the idea of remaining in the southern states appears to them intolerable,” he said, “and they are amazingly averse to the people and the climate. I shall do my best,” but he feared desertion would continue to drain his corps of troops.30

  “You surely know that I am leaving for the South,” the marquis reminded La Luzerne. “Our officers and soldiers are not too happy about it.” They had no money, clothing, or shoes, and in a few days they would be living on green peaches. Their feet were torn for lack of shoes, and their hands itched with scabies. Lafayette thought also that his personal baggage had been captured (it had been). But all that would not prevent them from marching “if we must.”31

  Washington sympathized with Lafayette’s distress. He could not say what was really on his mind, because his letters could be intercepted. The youngster was not in a sideshow: he was about to become the star of the main event against the British. Washington did not tell Greene, Steuben, or Rochambeau, either. He wanted the enemy to think that he was planning to attack New York. He later told dictionary maker Noah Webster that his plan was “to misguide & bewilder Sir Henry Clinton…by fictitious communications, as well as by making deceptive provision of ovens, forage & boats in his neighborhood…. Nor were less pains taken to deceive our own army.”32