On Thursday it was the anniversary of the Battle of Yorktown, which won the Revolutionary War for the Americans.
I live not too far away from the statue of the Comte de Rochambeau, on the rue de Chaillot in the 16th. A few years ago, in my role as patriotic American mother overseas, I realized my France-raised kids knew virtually nothing about American history. It was up to me. I decided to teach a history lesson by explaining about Yorktown, how the Americans had the British cornered on the peninsula and how Rochambeau saved the day. "Imagine the dismay of the British as they realized that the sails belonged to the French navy and not the British!"
I bought a bouquet of flowers and dragged us all over solemnly to the little square at the rue de Chaillot, in front of the Post Office. The statue was gone from its socle. It had been taken away to be renovated.
Comments