The Marquis de Lafayette was a wealthy orphan who defied his king, bought his own ship and sailed to fight in the American Revolution. This episode explores how his father’s death at British hands, Masonic ideals and a fateful dinner with the Duke of Gloucester drove him to America, where he became a surrogate son to George Washington.

We follow him from Brandywine and Valley Forge to Yorktown and his diplomacy that brought French troops and money to the cause. Then we trace his attempt to hold the middle ground in the French Revolution, the tragedy of the Champ de Mars, his years in an Austrian prison, and his later fight against slavery.

• Why serving without pay won Lafayette a commission in the Continental Army
• How he drafted the Declaration of the Rights of Man with input from Thomas Jefferson
• The tricolor cockade and the balcony gesture that calmed a mob at Versailles
• His wife Adrienne’s devotion during his imprisonment
• His 1824 tour of America and why his legacy differs between the United States and France