You're listening to an Airwave Media Podcast. Hello and thank you for joining the American Revolution.

This week episode 257 the French Army in America.

Now back in episode 246 we discussed Lafayette's return to America from France.

Lafayette had arrived in Boston in late April of 1780 and made it down to General Washington's

headquarters at Morristown, New Jersey by early May.

The young general from France was pleased to announce that a French army would soon

arrive to support the continentals in a final push to defeat Britain.

General Washington of course was elated with the news, but also concerned since his army had fallen to only a few thousand men.

The southern army had been captured at Charleston and the state seemed in no

hurry to send new soldiers. Further, the army did not have the food or supplies

to take care of the few soldiers that they did have.

Washington spent the next few months desperately trying to build up his army for a major campaign

with French cooperation during the summer of 1780, but the men and resources simply were not there.

The news of the arrival of the French Army spurred him to do whatever he could to prepare, but there wasn't much he could do.

Leading the French army was Jean Baptiste donation Dave Vumir, better known as the Camp de Rochemeau.

Lafayette had requested command of the Army, but the Continental

Major General had left France as a captain in the French Army.

The King of France was not going to turn over an entire army to a kid still in his

20s, no matter how impressive an impact he had made in America. General Rochambault was an older and much more experienced officer.

Like most officers of the era, Rochambault came from aristocracy.

He was the third son of the Marquis de Rochimboe who came from a prominent military family that could

trace its ancestry to officers who had led in the Crusades.

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