In 2024-2025 the American Friends of Lafayette will be supporting events to commemorate the bicentennial of Lafayette’s Farewell Tour when this true hero of the American Revolution and constant friend of the United States returned after a 40-year absence. During his return, this 67-year-old, last surviving major general of the Continental Army, visited all 24 states and Washington City (as well as Wheeling, Virginia, later part of West Virginia). Lafayette became a household name among roughly 12,000,000 Americans, about a fourth of whom rushed to get a glimpse of him, and if possible, to clasp his hand.
Contemporaries saw Lafayette’s Farewell Tour as a unique event in our history, indeed in world history. Edward Everett, an American politician, educator, college president, and author wrote in the North American Review in 1830 that the Farewell Tour was “an event, taken in all its parts, unparalleled in the history of man.” Hezekiah Niles wrote in Niles Weekly Register in 1824: “the
volumes of history furnish no parallel – no one like La Fayette has ever re-appeared in any country.”
Salem Towne Junior of Charlton MA wrote to his wife encouraging her to come to Boston where Lafayette would be greeted with a tremendous parade on August 24, 1824
…there never was nor will be such a meeting in this or any country ……
He could not have known that Lafayette would actually be in Charlton just over a week after the Boston parade. The reception there was smaller than the one in Boston or the reception in Worcester just hours before, but no less enthusiastic. The Rider Tavern where Lafayette stopped has had a display about his visit for many years. In 2018 the Charlton Historical Society partnered with the American Friends of Lafayette to commemorate the visit as a sort of trial run for the bicentennial.
In 1824 Lafayette arrived in Massachusetts in the evening of August 23. He stayed in Roxbury that night and then in Boston. He was in New Hampshire for most of September 1 visiting Portsmouth and riding all night in his carriage to arrive in Boston on September 2. He spent the night of September 2 in Bolton MA and passed into Connecticut late on September 3 spending the night in Stafford. He returned to Massachusetts in June 1825 when he laid the cornerstone for the Bunker Hill Monument on the 50th anniversary of the battle.
We will be taking a long detour from the tax world in the next few posts as we provide a day by day, town by town account of Lafayette in Massachusetts in 1824
Lafayette in Massachusetts In 1824 -Auguste 23 – Walpole Dedham Roxbury
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 24 Roxbury Boston
Lafayette In Massachusetts 1824 – August 25 Cambridge Harvard Commencement
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 26 Boston Cambridge Harvard Phi Beta Kappa
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 27 Charlestown
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 2? Dorchester
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 28 Medford
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 29 Milton Quincy
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 30 Boston
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 31 Chelsea
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 31 Lynn
Lafayette In Massachusetts in 1824 – August 31 Marblehead
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 31 Salem
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 31 Beverly
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 31 Ipswich
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – August 31 Newburyport
Lafayette In Massachusetts in 1824 – September 2 Boston
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 2 Arlington
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 2 Lexington
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 2 Concord
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 2 Stow
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 2-3 Bolton
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 3 Lancaster
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 3 Sterling
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – Septermber 3 West Boylston
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 3Worcester
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 3 Rochdale (Leicester)
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 3 Charlton
Lafayette In Massachusetts In 1824 – September 3 Sturbridge
Note On Sources
The most important source in compiling this account was: Lafayette, guest of the Nation; a contemporary account of the triumphal of General Lafayette through the United States in 1824-1825, as reported by the local newspapers by Edgar Ewing Brandon is available on line from Hathi Trust Digital Library and is a very detailed source.
Manuscript Journal of the Visit of General Lafayette To The United States 1824-1826
This mostly hand-written journal (there are also pasted in newspaper items) was given to the Grand Lodge of Masons of Massachusetts by John B Whitney in 1970. It is attributed to General William Barton, but that is uncertain. I have not gone through the whole journal, but in the parts that I have looked at it is pretty clear that the hand written part is also taken directly from newspaper accounts. It is mostly identical to Brandon, without the citation to the newspaper, but there are a few things that Brandon did not include.
I supplemented those with individual newspaper accounts off Newspapers.com and through visits to Boston Public Library and the American Antiquarian Society.
Lafayette in America in 1824 and 1825 – Journal of a Voyage to the United States by Auguste Levasseur translated by Alan R. Hoffman is also useful. Levasseur is not really strong on detail, however.
Complete History of the Marquis De Lafayette Major General in the Army of the United States in the War of The Revolution by an Officer in the Late Army published in 1846 is available on Google Books was also useful.
The website of The Lafayette Trail Inc. is an important resource
Memoirs of General Lafayette With an Account of His Visit to America, and of His Reception by the People of the United States; from His Arrival, August 15th, to the Celebration at Yorktown, October 19th, 1824 Samuel Lorenzo Knapp 1824 available on Google Books
One of the fascinating things about Lafayette’s visit is that it was a major national event, but much of the story of it is buried in local history. Town histories can be a great resource and sometimes they have preserved newspaper accounts that are otherwise lost. To the extent that they rely on the memories of the oldest residents of the town they can be a little iffy, but that can be where some of the best anecdotes come from.
Other works I consulted are:
Records From the Life of S.V.S. Wilder, published by the American Tract Society in 1865
History of the Town of Lancaster by Rev. Abijah P. Marvin,
Historical Sketches of the Town of Leicester, Massachusetts, During the First Century from Its Settlement by Emory Washburn
A Historical Sketch of Sturbridge and Southbridge by George Davis.
Reminiscences of Worcester from the Earliest Period by Caleb Arnold Wall..
“Lafayette’s Visit To The Harvard Chapter, A Century Ago” Phi Beta Kappa Key Vol. 5 No. 8 (May 1924)
Old Charlestown – Historical Biographical Reminiscent by Timothy T. Sawyer – James H West Company Boston 1902
Major Wainwright’s quelling of the Charlestown State Prison riot a few months before Lafayette’s visit never seems to get old. You can find a pretty thorough account in “You Have Three Minutes! Marines End a Prison Riot” by MSgt Jeff Dacus USMCR(Ret) in Leatherneck (Magazine of the Marines) Vol. 103 No. 7 July 2020. Dacus notes that generations of school children became familiar with the story from its inclusion in McGuffey’s Fifth Eclectic Reader.
For the account of the meeting with John Adams see A Revolutionary Reunion: Lafayette and John Adams by Amanda M. Norton – Adams Papers – May 8, 2019
Stow, Massachusetts 1683-1933 by Olivia S Crowell
For information on the bicentennial of Lafayette’s tour check out lafayette200.org.