Revolutionary Brothers

In a narrative both panoramic and intimate Tom Chaffin captures the four-decade friendship of Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette.Thomas Jefferson and the Marquis de Lafayette shared a singularly extraordinary friendship one involved in the making of two revolutions―and two nations. Jefferson first met Lafayette in 1781 when the young French-born general was dispatched to Virginia to assist Jefferson then the state’s governor in fighting off the British. The charismatic Lafayette hungry for glory could not have seemed more different from Jefferson the reserved statesman. But when Jefferson a newly-appointed diplomat moved to Paris three years later speaking little French and in need of a partner their friendship began in earnest. As Lafayette opened doors in Paris and Versailles for Jefferson so too did the Virginian stand by Lafayette as the Frenchman became inexorably drawn into the maelstrom of his country''s revolution. Jefferson counseled Lafayette as he drafted The Declaration of the Rights of Man and remained a firm supporter of the French Revolution even after he returned to America in 1789. By 1792 however the upheaval had rendered Lafayette a man without a country locked away in a succession of Austrian and Prussian prisons. The burden fell on Jefferson along with Lafayette''s other friends to win his release. The two would not see each other again until 1824 in a powerful and emotional reunion at Jefferson’s Monticello. Steeped in primary sources Revolutionary Brothers casts fresh light on this remarkable often complicated friendship of two extraordinary men.