Lafayette in the Somewhat United States

The next day, a council of war drafted a letter to d’Estaing stating that his actions would shame France and that his withdrawal could damage the Franco-American alliance. Lafayette refused to sign the letter and supported d’Estaing.

American sentiment for the French soured after Newport. In Boston, a mob of locals fought with two French officers, killing one—Saint-Sauveur—during an argument. To placate d’Estaing after the killing, the people of Boston promise to build a monument in Saint-Sauveur’s honor, which was completed near the outbreak of World War I. The contrition that Boston showed after the killing helped assuage the suddenly tenuous relationship with France.

In January 1779, Lafayette visited France and stayed for a year. He began planning an attack on the British homeland, but it never amounted to anything more than talk. Lafayette and Adrienne conceived another child while he was visiting, a boy that they would name Georges Washington Lafayette. Vergennes sent Lafayette back to America to fight on March 5, 1780.

Charleston fell to the British shortly after Lafayette’s return, and the British took more than five thousand men as prisoners of war. Washington sent Lafayette to visit Rochambeau about a possible, cooperative attack on New York.