COLUMN: Lafayette and Emancipation

Editor’s note: This is the tenth in a series of articles leading up to the Lafayette Farewell Tour Bicentennial celebration. Previous articles are available at suffolkva250.com/history.

By Frank and Gloria Womble

Lafayette’s legacy extends beyond his military service, including a lifelong human rights commitment. His earliest concern was for the enslaved men and women he encountered during the American Revolution. By the mid-1780s, Lafayette was a committed anti-slavery activist. He purchased plantations in French Guiana to experiment with gradual emancipation. Joining anti-slavery societies on both sides of the Atlantic, he frequently corresponded with leading political figures about abolition. In 1791, he was influential in passing a decree in the French National Assembly giving limited citizenship rights to free men of color in French colonies.

During his 1824—1825 return to America, Lafayette made many symbolic gestures that conveyed his interest in the welfare of African Americans, including visiting the African Free School in New York City, shaking hands with Black veterans of the War of 1812 in New Orleans, and greeting enslaved people and free Black people he had known during the Revolution.

Lafayette was personally involved in gaining the freedom of James Armistead Lafayette, the patriot spy and double agent who provided critical information to him and disinformation to British commander Lord Cornwallis in the events leading up to the victory at Yorktown. By the end of July 1781, James had successfully gained access to Cornwallis’ inner circle as a servant to the British commander. He later described in a petition to the Virginia legislature that “he often at the peril of his life found means to frequent the British Camp, by which means he kept open a channel of the useful communications.” He used that channel to convey “enclosures from the Marquis [La Fayette] into the enemies lines, of the most secret & important kind,” although, as La Fayette reported to George Washington, Cornwallis “is so shy of his papers that my honest friend says he cannot get at them.” Nevertheless, Lafayette informed Washington near the end of August that it was through James that he learned of Cornwallis’ move from Portsmouth to Yorktown, the British army’s fortification of the town, and the untenable tactical position that the British would be in if the French fleet could cut off Cornwallis’ escape or reinforcement by sea.

With the end of the fighting came the end of James’ service to Lafayette, so he returned to the life of an enslaved person owned by William Armistead. Unfortunately for James, because he was a spy and not an enlisted soldier, the 1782 law passed by the Virginia legislature to provide for the freedom of enslaved people who had served in the war did not apply to him. Lafayette, however, found a way to show his personal gratitude to James in November 1784 when he gave his “honest friend” a handwritten testimonial:

“This is to certify that the Bearer has done essential services to me while I had the honor to command in this State. His Intelligence from the ennemy’s [sic] camp were industriously collected and most faithfully delivered. He perfectly acquitted himself with some important commissions I gave him and appears to me entitled to every reward his situation can admit of.”

As a result of his valuable service, James was granted his freedom by the Virginia Assembly in 1787. When Lafayette visited America in 1824, James “expressed a great desire to see the Marquis at the approaching festival at Yorktown” but required financial assistance “to equip himself for the occasion,” according to a Richmond Compiler article that was reprinted in newspapers as far away as Bangor, Maine. One presumes that he received the required aid because the Richmond Enquirer reported that during the event at Yorktown, James “was recognized by [the Marquis] in the crowd, called to him by name, and taken into his embrace.”

Frank and Gloria Womble are life members of the American Friends of Lafayette. Frank is a retired Army lieutenant colonel. Gloria is the America250 chair of Constantia Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, in Suffolk.

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