[LAFAYETTE, Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, ...

[LAFAYETTE, Marie Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de (1757-1834)]. A ticket to dine with the Major General of the Continental Army, Exchange Coffee House, Boston, 22 August 1824. On cardstock (83 x 114 mm), accomplished in manuscript, small dampstain at right margin, some marring on verso. Lafayette was a French aristocrat, who at the age of 13, became convinced that the American revolutionary cause was noble and traveled to the Colonies, joining George Washington’s Continental Army as a major general at the age of 19. He would command the troops in the decisive Siege of Yorktown in 1781, which was the Revolutionary War’s final major battle that secured American independence. He would return to France and become a key figure in the French Revolution of 1789 and is often known as “The Hero of the Two Worlds”. In 1824, President James Monroe invited him to the United States as the nation’s guest, where he visited all 24 states in the union. He is buried in Paris at Picpus Cemetery, under soil from Bunker Hill.