New Exhibit at Fredericksburg Area Museum Commemorates Lafayette's 1824 Visit to the City
Exhibit will also explore the diversity of those who contributed to the Revolutionary War.
by Adele Uphaus
MANAGING EDITOR AND CORRESPONDENT
Two hundred years ago this November, General Lafayette (formerly the Marquis de Lafayette) visited Fredericksburg.
Thanks to the meticulous detailing of Rufus B. Merchant, publisher of The Star newspaper, we know everything about that 1824 visit—from the corps of 40 officers who met Lafayette and his party at the Wilderness Tavern in Orange County and escorted them to Fredericksburg; to the procession through town, passing “tastefully illuminated” houses on Caroline Street; to the ball that was held at the Farmer’s Hotel in his honor; to the dinner he ate with the Gordon family at Kenmore.
Merchant published his account of Lafayette’s visit in a pamphlet now in the collection of the Central Rappahannock Heritage Center. It will be on display at the Fredericksburg Area Museum starting Friday, as part of an exhibit commemorating the bicentennial of Lafayette in Fredericksburg, titled “Lafayette’s World: Revolutionary Ideals and the Limits of Freedom.”
“This town really loves Lafayette,” Gaila Sims, FAM’s curator of African American history and special projects, recalls thinking when she started in her position back in August of 2022.
Sims has been working on the Lafayette exhibit since that time. It brings together souvenirs from the visit that were in the museum’s collection, as well as items on loan from the Heritage Center, the James Monroe Museum, the George Washington Foundation, the Fredericksburg Guard Association, Stratford Hall, and Lafayette College in Pennsylvania.
“We’re lucky that we’ve been able to receive some really beautiful items,” Sims said.
The exhibit also uses Lafayette as “an entry point” to explore a number of diverse people who served in the American Revolution, she said.
Visitors will learn about Deborah Samson, who disguised herself as a man, enlisted in the Continental Army, and served for 17 months before her sex was discovered. They’ll learn about Friedrich Wilhelm Von Steuben, a Prussian military officer who served as an advisor to George Washington and is considered to have been openly gay by 18th century standards.
They’ll learn about James Armistead Lafayette, an enslaved man who served under Lafayette in the Continental Army, acted as a double agent reporting on the activities of Benedict Arnold and Lord Cornwallis, and was later emancipated after Lafayette wrote a testimonial on his behalf.
Theresa Cramer, FAM’s coordinator of education and public programs, presented a lesson about James Armistead Lafayette to fifth graders at the city’s Hugh Mercer and Lafayette elementary schools earlier this year. As part of the lesson, the students wrote letters arguing for Armistead Lafayette’s emancipation, and these will be included in the exhibit.
Visitors will also learn about Lafayette’s abolitionist activities. He corresponded with Washington and with Thomas Jefferson, urging them to embrace the abolitionist movement.
“He was thinking about how to end slavery,” Sims said.
Lafayette purchased a plantation in South America with the intention of implementing his plan for “gradual emancipation.” He intended to provide the enslaved workers with education and a wage so that they would be prepared for freedom.
The FAM exhibit includes a reproduction of a register listing the names of all the enslaved workers at “La Belle Gabrielle,” the name of the plantation. Unfortunately, Lafayette was imprisoned by the French Revolutionary government, which seized all his property in South America, so he was never able to put his plan into action, Sims said.
Lafayette was a revered figure by the time of his 1824 visit to the United States, but he was only 19 years old when he first came to America in 1777 and volunteered to join the Continental Army.
Sims said his youth and enthusiasm comes across in an endearing, relatable way.
“He reads like a teenager,” she said. “He was in awe of George Washington and he wrote home to his wife that he was trying really hard to not to annoy him when they met.”
Lafayette’s infectious sense of humor comes across in other letters to his wife, Adrienne, that are reproduced in FAM’s exhibit, such as when he described doctors being “in ecstasies” over how beautifully the wound he sustained at the Battle of Brandywine was healing.
The exhibit’s interactive room will include a white board where visitors are invited to write down the names of all the towns, roads, buildings, and institutions that have been named for Lafayette in the centuries since he played such a huge role in the country’s formation.
“It feels like this is a big exhibit, and we’re excited and proud of it,” Sims said.
The FAM exhibit kicks off a commemorative period that will culminate the weekend of November 23-24, when Fredericksburg will recreate the events of Lafayette’s visit.
“Lafayette’s World: Revolutionary Ideals and the Limits of Freedom” opens to the public on Friday, with a reception from 5:30 to 7 p.m. Admission to FAM is free.
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This is all great stuff. I trust FAM will also make clear why the region had such fond memories of Lafayette in the first place. His popularity did not occur in a vacuum. It was directly related to his handling of the Virginia campaign in 1781.