Major Peter Charles L’Enfant: Artist and Engineer of the Revolution
Originally published in the Journal of the American Revolution on January 30, 2024
Major Peter L’Enfant is most well-known for his 1791 “wholly new” plan for the Federal City that would become Washington, DC. Fewer are aware of his previous experience during the Revolutionary War where he served as an aide-de-camp, engineer, and sometimes as an artist and light infantry officer. This military service, coupled with his fine arts education and post-war career as an architect were the near-perfect prerequisites for his most famous role as the author of the most important civic design project in American history.
Pierre Charles L’Enfant was born in Paris on August 2, 1754, and descended from a long line of artists. His father, also named Pierre, was a “Painter in Ordinary” to King Louis XV.[1] Before his son’s birth, he was appointed an academician to the Academie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture.[2] By 1771, the younger Pierre was at the academy receiving a fine arts education which also included the study of architecture, landscape architecture, science, and mathematics.[3] In contrast to many French officers who would serve in America as engineers or in the artillery service, there is no record that L’Enfant ever received any pre-war education or training as a soldier or engineer.
L’Enfant’s entrée into the American war was a social connection with the playwright (and covert agent) Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais. By mid-June 1776, Beaumarchais had received funding for the Roderigue Hortalez & Cie, a front organization whose sole purpose was secretly procuring and delivering French and Spanish arms and war materiel to American rebels.[4] By August, L’Enfant’s name was on a list of several dozen men to serve in America with the promise of commission in the Continental Army.[5] In December 1776, he was on board the Amphitrite, the first Beaumarchais ship to sail for America.[6] Before departure, he was commissioned a brevet lieutenant in the French colonial troops, ostensibly to provide him a degree of protection from imprisonment should he be captured at sea.[7] On the ship, L’Enfant was under the temporary command of artillery expert Gen. Phillipe Charles Tronson du Coudray. It was likely at the latter’s insistence that the Amphitrite returned to port after a few weeks due to a lack of provisions.[8] L’Enfant was in Nantes in February 1777, where Beaumarchais was worried about the young officer, ordering an assistant to provide him with funds for his sustenance.[9] The Amphitrite soon departed without L’Enfant, arriving in Portsmouth, New Hampshire in April, 1777.
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