1. His birth name was extremely long.
The future hero of the American Revolution was born Marie-Joseph-Paul-Yves-Roch-Gilbert du Motier de La Fayette in an expansive chateau in Chavaniac, France, on September 6, 1757. “It’s not my fault,” he joked in his autobiography. “I was baptized like a Spaniard, with the name of every conceivable saint who might offer me more protection in battle.”
2. King George III’s brother convinced Lafayette to fight against Great Britain.
3. Lafayette was only 19 years old and without combat experience when he arrived in America.
4. He was shot in the leg during his first battle.
During the Battle of Brandywine, near Philadelphia, on September 11, 1777, Lafayette was shot in the calf.
5. Lafayette named his only son after George Washington.
6. Hounds that Lafayette sent to Washington helped to create a new breed of dog.
In 1785, Lafayette sent seven large French hounds across the Atlantic Ocean as gifts for Washington. the future first president of the United States bred the hunting dogs with the imports. The combination of the hounds helped to create the American Foxhound.
7. Lafayette co-authored the Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen.
8. Lafayette is an honorary American citizen.
In 1784, Maryland conferred honorary citizenship upon Lafayette, and other colonies followed suit. The U.S. State Department, however, determined in 1935 that the measures did not result in the marquis becoming a United States citizen following the ratification of the U.S. Constitution. That changed in 2002 when Lafayette became the sixth foreign national to be given honorary American citizenship by Congress.
9. At the age of 72, he was still a revolutionary leader.
10. Lafayette was buried in France underneath dirt taken from Bunker Hill.
After the 76-year-old Lafayette died in Paris on May 20, 1834, he was laid to rest next to his wife at the city’s Pic pus Cemetery. To carry out the request of “The Hero of the Two Worlds” to be buried in both American and French soil, his son covered his coffin with dirt they had taken from Bunker Hill in 1825 when the marquis laid the cornerstone to the monument that still marks the battlefield
