John Laurens and Francis Kinloch
This post is a compilation of the information I have gathered about the Laurens-Kinloch relationship, their subsequent “breakup,” and their post-breakup interactions. This was honestly one of my favorite posts to research and write. It’s a long one, but I promise you that it’s worth your time (there are some quotes that rival that Hamilton-Laurens correspondence in terms of affection). Some of the quotes I have in this post are from transcripts sent to me by Massey and are generally not publicly accessible. If anyone wants me to post the whole transcripts of the letters, just let me know, and I’d be happy to oblige.
Anonymous asked:
Hello! Sorry to bother, I just want to say that I love this blog, and if you maybe know what his time in prison and after was like for lafayette cause I found some fairly contradicting texts and I'm confused. Thank you for your time!
Hello, Nony.
Gilbert’s imprisonment always grieves my heart. It’s a story very few people know about. I’ll try to make some sense of it here from what I’ve gathered from multiple books and sources. Part of the miscommunication lies in the fact that Lafayette’s captors moved him to different prisons to prevent possible friends of the Frenchman from discovering his location. Lafayette didn’t write about his own experience until much later and his first-hand account is not only subject to his age, but is touched on with such brevity that it made me wonder if it was a topic he wanted to avoid discussing in great length. Lafayette, when remembering later, often went into painful amounts of detail…down to what colors people were wearing. The account of his imprisonment in his memoirs touch more on episodes within that time that broke up the monotony: his escape attempt, his wife’s arrival, etc. All that to say, I’ll do my best and as I do more research, I may have to go back and edit later.
- From bad to worse. – The first real prison stay for Lafayette was at Wesel. Better treatment was offered if he would swear to renounced republicanism. Lafayette ardently refused. His Prussian captors also plied him for any information they could get regarding French military secrets and tactics. Again, he was silent. The authorities then transferred Lafayette to Magdeburg where he was imprisoned for about a year. Here, he later described being ‘doomed to moral and bodily decay.’ By one account, the cell he was held in was about 4 ft. wide and 8 ft. tall. He suffered in the cold, dark, and damp. There was no sunlight in the cell, and guards stood on constant watch. His spirits dampened, Lafayette nonetheless continued to refuse offers of better treatment in exchange for abandoning his principles.
- Losing hope. After his time in Magdeburg, he was briefly moved to Neisse, still under Prussian supervision. His friends and family were completely in the dark as to his fate. No one had been told where he was being kept. It was as if he’d fallen off the face of the earth and he was left to fear for his family without word. To add to his misery, he contracted a fever that nearly killed him. In Unger’s book, Lafayette (which I haven’t read in full yet), he describes how Lafayette gradually grew dangerously despondent. “Lafayette believed his captors were planning his secret execution–that he would simply disappear and no one would know where or when. He found a sliver of wood, moistened it, and dipped it in soot to write his last words: ‘Adieu, then, my dear wife, my children, my aunt…whom I shall cherish to my last breath.’”
- Hell. Olmütz, where Lafayette spent four years incarcerated, was situated in Austrian held territory. He arrived on May 17, 1794. It was not a prison, but a dungeon equal to anything you’ve seen on TV. Once again, Unger paints a pretty dismal picture. “The prison was part of the city wall over the Morawa River, which carried the city sewerage and filled the prison above it with a suffocating stench and swarms of disease-carrying mosquitoes and flies. Lafayette…[was] chained in solitary confinement…forbidden to talk, in rags, and with no personal possessions.” They gave him and the two other French officers with him numbers and did not address them by name. If memory serves, Lafayette was State Prisoner #2. He was not given a chamber pot and had to eat with his hands in such filth. Bathing was also prohibited.
- Escape? The fever Lafayette had spawned in Magdeburg had not left him by the time he moved to Olmütz and gradually grew worse. As his health deteriorated, a doctor was finally called for. This doctor, as luck would have it, was a part of an escape organized by many friends of the ailing Frenchman, including Angelica Church (formerly Schuyler). The doctor brought with him a note detailing the scheme. Lafayette used his own blood to write a reply and sent the physician on his way. The doctor demanded that Lafayette be allowed outside from time to time and the authorities eventually complied. During one of these outings, two of the conspirators burst from the woods. A skirmish broke out. One of the guards tackled Lafayette and bit his finger so badly that he nearly lost it. He managed to scramble away, hopped on a horse, and took off. Adorably (and unfortunately), he misunderstood his accomplices’ English and went to the wrong town. Believing himself to be in friendly territory, he announced his identity and need to a farmer…who promptly sold him out to the authorities. Lafayette was immediately arrested and dragged back to prison.
- Lockdown. Lafayette’s memoirs describe the punishment for his escape best. “Lafayette was put in irons, and suffered the most excruciating torture. He was in a feeble state, overcome by fatigue, and suffering greatly from the bruises and wounds received in his late attempt to escape. His anxieties, his anguish (and despair we may almost say,) at finding himself again in the power of his unrelenting jailor, so affected his nerves, that his fever returned with increased and alarming violence. In this state he was allowed nothing but a little damp and mouldy straw; irons were put round his feet, and round his waist was a chain, fastened to the wall, which barely permitted him to turn from one side to the other. No light was admitted into his cell; and he was refused even the smallest allowance of linen.” “Worn down by disease and the rigour of the season, his hair fell from his head, and he was emaciated to the last degree. To these physical distresses were soon super added those mental anxieties, which perhaps, were still more difficult to endure.” After some time–and influence from friends abroad–he was unchained from the wall and allowed to walk one hour a day. No one was allowed to speak to him.
- Adrienne saves his life. Two years in, Adrienne arrived with their daughters, Virginie and Anastasie, and refused to leave during her husband’s confinement. One of his girls wrote later: "We got out at the house of the commandant of the city. We did not see him. He sent the officer who was charged with keeping the prison, to conduct us. After we had gone through the first gate we passed down long corridors to two padlocked doors that opened into my father’s room. ‘I don’t know,’ my mother said the night before, ‘how I can support what we are going to feel.’ My father had not been notified of our coming. He had been given no letter at all from my mother. Three years of imprisonment, the last passed in complete solitude (for since his attempt at escape he had not seen his servant), anxiety for all he loved, sufferings of all kinds, had deeply affected his health. The change in his looks was frightening. My mother was hard hit by it; but nothing could diminish the delirium of her joy except the bitterness of her irreparable losses. My father, after the first happiness of reunion, did not dare to ask any questions. He knew of the reign of terror in France, but he did not know the names of the victims. The day passed without his daring to question her concerning his fears or her being able to muster strength to tell him. Only in the evening, after my sister and I had been shut into the next room, not connected, did she tell my father that she had lost on the scaffold, her grandmother, her mother, and her sister.’
Lafayette and his family were released on September 19, 1797. What happened afterwards will have to be a post for another time. I’ll try to get that together as soon as possible. As to the conflicting reports you might have gone over, it’s because very few people were actually able to contact Lafayette or his family. I hope this shed some light on things. I’m crying now. Dear me.
(1) abt ur post in the lams tag: its actually even more interesting than that; the whole "i want a wife here's the qualities she needs" portion of this letter is taken out of context. Hamilton had known laurens for a couple years by this point, had roomed together, even, and just NOW he is finding out, not even from Laurens himself, but letters he had to pass to him, that Laurens has a wife and CHILD in england! (he had sex with her once, evidently, and married her 5 months into her pregnancy
(2) and then… went out of his way to not see her in person (she wanted to see him while he was in france, he more or less avoided her). Basically, this is hamilton saying, “ I heard you had a wife, well guess what, you’ve got to find ME a wife now. Make sure to tell her how big my dick is and how GREAT I am at sex and how I – ( REDACTED ) … really though, Do I want a wife? No. ” It wasn’t Hamilton trying to make Laurens jealous; Hamilton was the jealous one. I love it.
(3, kinda) oh! It is worth mentioning that Laurens did send letters to his wife, and addressed her as his “dear girl.” He called hamilton his “dear boy” on SEVERAL occasions. These were the only people he used this moniker with.
Yes! this!
Thank you for adding this. you are absolutely right. i should have put that part of the letter in there for context. but you have hit it exactly on the head. Thanks, bb.
and yes, that thing about Laurens using ‘dear boy’ gets me, especially because Ham called Laurens Demosthenes, who was one of the best orators of ancient Greece, which sounds like a very sweet, very high compliment. but also, Demosthenes played the erastes role to his erômenos lovers. ie, he was the older man in his homosexual couplings with young boys. Laurens was only a few months older than Hamilton, but still. ‘Dear boy’ becomes a bit more suggestive in that light. :D
Sodomy, Sensibility, and Male Friendships in Late Eighteenth Century America, Part III
The best way to understand the nature of Alexander Hamilton’s relationship with John Laurens is to compare it to his other close relationships. Because most of what we know about their friendship comes from their letters, I will compare them to letters Hamilton wrote other close male and female friends. I will interpret these letters from the perspective developed in previous essays. The flowery language of sensible friendship should be taken at face value as the expression of strong emotion, and that proscriptions against sodomy were neither strong nor consistently enough enforced in America to make it risky or shameful for upper class romantic friends to become lovers if they wanted. Hamilton writes all the people he cares about using common terms of endearment, such as “my dear”, and expresses warm, sincere affection. But he plays with literary conventions to express a range of intensity that leaves little doubt of the specific dimensions of his feelings in each case. His letters to Laurens employ syntactical and rhetorical strategies shared only with letters he wrote to the female objects of his flirtation and love.
the marquis de la fayette is Trying and I give him credit for that
galacticredcoat
praise my son
Well is some countries with their historical leaders… And Hetalia XD
nordiii-deactivated20180121
im p sure we’re all familiar with the video so here’s a dennor version of it
when people are hating on your Eurovision song but you don’t even care because you’re Australian and it’s honestly all about the winning and fucking shit up a bit
Canadians’ view on the US have changed for the worse since the election of Donald Trump, according to a new survey.
Fewer than half of those surveyed have a “favourable view” of the US, the lowest in the 35 years the survey has been asking the question about the US-Canada relationship.
The survey was a follow up to a similar one conducted in October 2016 ahead of the US election.
In addition, nearly 20 per cent of survey respondents said they were changing travel plans that included the US. They cited the political climate as a primary reason for doing so.
About eight per cent were considering changing travel plans as well.
Source: independent.co.uk
aislinggreyy-deactivated2021081
These Aren’t Safe Schools
I wish that I was past being surprised by how low we continue to sink in Australia; and surely after today I can’t be shocked anymore. But the news that broke while I was at school in a class with 28 students today, about the proposed alternative to Safe Schools - “minus the ideology” hit me like a punch to the gut. Firstly, I have always rejected and continue to reject the idea that any of the 80 odd students I’ve worked closely with over the past year weren’t ready to tackle the content which we are told they are “too young” for. Any 7 year old in a classroom can tell you that all kinds of families are valid; whether they have one parent, two heterosexual parents, only grandparents, foster parents, two mums, two dads, or any other configuration. They know that every kid wants to have fun, have friends and be happy. Diversity is celebrated in schools today. What’s so hard to get? There’s no risk here - it’s the pearl clutching and moral panic over the supposed “rise” of LGBT people demanding things they don’t desrve like EQUALITY that is the danger to Australia’s young people. The kind of society that targets marginalised, at risk groups and makes them a scapegoat is the greatest danger I can imagine and as a teacher is a society I actively oppose in my classroom.
The sparkly new Celebrity Endorsed © Safe Schools alternative is a compromise, and some may argue that a compromise is what is called for. But a compromise with the terms dictated exclusively by the ACL who lead the witch hunt against the program? I don’t think that’s a compromise worth having. And frankly, I don’t think a compromise is acceptable at all. There are some things that aren’t worth compromising on, and the happiness and quality of life of vulnerable people - vulnerable CHILDREN - is paramount to me.
When Ben Grubb, Missy Higgins, Troye Sivan, Joel Creasey et al. propose that rather than reaching for acceptance, we should settle for the tolerance of LGBT people in the community, this doesn’t just stall progress, it actively undoes it. Tolerance calls to mind cohabitation without integration; it is reminiscent of ‘separate but equal’ ideologies. Toleration necessarily implies a level of unhappiness - I don’t like it but I’ll tolerate it for not wanting to make a fuss; I’ll tolerate my neighbours loud music because it’s too early to complain; I’ll tolerate my housemate watching fishing shows because I made her watch hours of Pretty Little Liars.
Tolerance was my all girls high school saying “You can use a classroom for a LGBT group but only outside of school hours, and you’re not affiliated with the school”. I’m not satisfied with the LGBT community being tolerated - I want - I demand acceptance, equality, support.
Ben Grubb would rather be tolerated than accepted and fine, that’s his prerogative. I’ll happily tolerate him so long as he stays out of my newsfeed in future. But to speak on behalf of the thousands of LGBT children who are voiceless because of their age; victim to the whims of adults and policy makers who apparently view them as pawns to be traded away for power; is frankly cruel. Has anybody asked any of the students they purport to care about, what they want? As adults, our job in the school is to make students feel safe, comfortable, and supported so they can learn and become the people they carry the potential to be. Crippled by fear - either as students questioning their sexuality/gender, or as students being raised in ignorance to hate without understanding why - children don’t get the opportunity to become these people.
None of the adult LGBT figures who have co-signed the petition being sent straight to the inbox of good ol’ Malc are at risk of being 'tolerated’ in their community - they are all white, conventionally attractive, and most importantly ADULT. They are celebrity, beloved. They are being held up as the bright future our youth can aspire to. They have nothing to lose, even if Safe Schools was to fold tomorrow. To them, it could be reduced to nothing more than a cause to back and if it were lost, to wax lyrical and mourn the loss. But to children? To the students who stand so much to lose, this program can be life or death.
I know that people don’t understand the Safe Schools programs; that there are those who genuinely are afraid and lash out in hatred at what they call indoctrination, Marxist propaganda. I am wracking my brain to view them with sympathy, but I’m blinded by my fear that the children I teach might grow up to be as hateful; or become those students who have nowhere to turn. I’m not naive, I know that Safe Schools has always had its detractors and probably always will but we have to look long range. The program we had held potential for a more accepting, harmonious, happy society in the long term; and what we need now is the nearest approximation. Today, I have felt betrayed, hurt, shocked. My heart breaks all over again for the children who are victim of adults playing for power. What these children - all children but especially these children - need is to know they are loved and accepted unequivocally. Tolerance is not enough.
“Sorry for you know, being late. Normally I’m never late. I’m the most on-time person ever. Believe me. But I was hard at work killing the poor,” Trump said as he finally met the Aussie PM, Malcolm Trumble.
“Oh, not at all,” Malcolm replied. “I understand completely as one conservative to another. It’s a constantly struggle trying to lower living conditions for the poor.”
The two shook hands then got out notepads and pens.
“So down to business. Tell me, how’d you get away with stopping people you don’t like from getting into your country?” asked Trump.
“Same way you’re trying to get rid of people’s healthcare: convince the voters that other people don’t deserve the same basic compassion and dignity as them.”
The two knocked back their heads and cackled at the ceiling before they returned to their notepads to quickly scribble down notes.
“We could learn a lot from each other” Trumble said excitedly.
Hey, long time fan of this blog, thanks for all the great work! I just wanted to quickly ask if you have any recommendations on Aussie news sources for people trying to get more informed about Australian politics? Or even just general Aussie political journalists you're a fan of that you'd recommend following on social media? I usually read the Guardian on my phone but I'm trying to expand a bit. Sorry if it's been answered before! Have a good one!
I don’t follow any specific journalists sorry. But for news sources: I generally read Guardian, ABC, Sydney Morning Herald, a little SBS. Sometimes it really depends like I will just Google “Malcolm Turnbull” and see what the most recent results are and read the same story multiple times to see what little details one news story excludes/includes compared to another.
Beleive me my Dear Son the present times present us with a variety of modes, which contribute to, & effectuate, the equalizing Estates which though very wicked are still infinitely preferable to burning a whole Town_
Henry Laurens to John Laurens, in a letter dated March 1, 1778
In January 1778, a fire had ravaged Charles Town. On February 24, John had written the following to his father:
I deplore the misfortune of Charles Town if it has fallen upon Individuals of moderate fortune;_ if it affects only a number of rich men & will contribute to equalizing estates I shall not regret it_
(via john-laurens)
interview with Australian Senator David Leyonhjelm on the topic of video game censorship and what the gaming industry can do to stop games getting banned.
What a rare moment where Leyonhjelm actually said something agreeable.
altonzm-deactivated20170213
french recipes: if you’re not making this in paris then what’s the point. fuck you
italian recipes: use the left leg meat of a pig from one of three farms in this specific area of tuscany, or from this day my grandmother will begin manifesting physically in your house
american recipes: buy these three cans of stuff and put them in a pan congrats you cooked
chinese recipes, as handed down from mother to child: season it with a pinch of this and some of that. you want to know the exact amount? feel it in your heart. ask the stars. yell into the void.
English recipes: boil and salt it. Okay that’s it enjoy
dianetti
Australian recipes: just…. fcki ng put the sprinkles…on the bread…. h oly shit fuccin gourmet cuisine right the re holy fuck
climbstudio
Anonymous asked:
Do you know any books similar to Warriors/the named that you would recommend?
The Sight & Fell, Fire Bringer, Guardians of Ga’hoole, Wings of Fire, Redwall, Tailchaser’s Song, His Dark Materials trilogy
