v39_0373 - LAFAYETTE (MARIE-JOSEPH-PAUL-ROCH-YVES-GILBERT MOTIER, MARQUIS OF) Médaille de LaFayette

LAFAYETTE (MARIE-JOSEPH-PAUL-ROCH-YVES-GILBERT MOTIER, MARQUIS OF)

(1757-1834)

La Fayette was born in 1757 in the castle of Saint-Roch de Chavagnac (Haute-Loire). Orphaned at the age of thirteen, he finds himself at the head of a great fortune. He was a second lieutenant in the regiment of Noailles, before marrying the second daughter of the Duke of Agen in 1774. He fought alongside the American insurgents and distinguished himself alongside Washington. In 1787 he took part in the Assembly of Notables and in 1789 he was elected deputy of the nobility to the Estates General by the Seneschal of Riom. He was at the origin of the Declaration of the Rights of Man. After the storming of the Bastille, he was elected commander of the bourgeois militia, organized the national guard and had the tricolor corcarde adopted. After the execution of Louis XVI, he left France and was captured by the Austrians and imprisoned in Olmütz. Released in 1797, he returned to France. In 1818 he became deputy for Sarthe. At the time of the July Revolution, he was elected Commander-in-Chief of the National Guard and facilitated the accession to the throne of the Duke of Orleans. He died in Paris in 1834.