It's Monday... At work it used to be called, Learning Day

Today we are going to learn to...Remember.

We as Americans are very quick to mention our part in World War II, and rightly so, yet often times the people we are reminding are..The French. How many times have you heard someone say, either in person or in a movie, that we saved their Bacon, We gave them back their Country, or If it weren't for us...

Let's take a step back in time a bit before World War Two, or World War one, or the Spanish American War, The Civil War..let's go back to The Revolutionary war...

In the American Revolutionary War France fought beside us, against the British, from 1778 on.

At first their aid was covert, Military aid, (Mainly Gun powder) was sent to us through a French Company, Hortalez & Cie starting in the Spring of 76. By the end of the year over 5 million Livres were received.

There are French names we have heard over the years, the one we heard about most was Lafeyette, School usually notes he came over with other French to help fight the British, but that's about all the schools teach...here's a little bit more about...those names. French Volunteers who crossed an ocean to fight along side of us, names such as Pierre Charles L'Enfant who came over to fight and later became George Washingtons City Planner, amoungst the parks and streets was the National Mall.

General Jean Baptiste Donatien de Vimur, Comte de Rochambeau arrived at Newport in the summer of 1780, a dim period in the revolution. His own talents coupled with the 5,500 man force he brought with him, were to help decide the final campaign of the war for the United States. At one point with the United States in desperate shape he lent George Washington $20,000 to pay the American soldiers.

Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette served as a Major General under George Washington and also pushed for increased aid from France to the United States.

 After the French Army had been built up, France was ready and in 1778 France Recognised the United States of America as a Sovereign Nation, They signed a Military Alliance and went to war with Britain. France also built Coalitions with the Netherlands and Spain thus depriving Britain of any Significant Allies. France provided grants, arms, and loans, plus sent an Army to serve under George Washington and a Navy which, during the battle of Yorktown deprived the British Second Army an escape. France spent roughly 1.3 billion Livres (today's value would be roughly 13 Billion American Dollars).

French Monies, munitions, soldiers, and navy proved to be vital in the American Victory and earned France little except large debts. The intense debt it accumulated was a major cause in the hard times which followed for that country and helped lead to the French Revolution. So maybe we are overly quick to remind the French, who were not separated from a hostile neighbor by an ocean, that we saved their country for them twice...Maybe we should be quicker at remembering...if it weren't for the French... We would not exist as a Sovereign Nation...We would be as Canada and Australia were for so long...a Colony of the Crown.

 

Pre - Maple Leaf Canadian Flag

Australian Flag

What do you suppose our's would have on it?