BY KAREN BOSSICK
Sun Valley resident Marc Onetto grew up in France where he developed a deep love for maritime history and the connections between French and American history.
And tonight he will talk about Hermione, the boat that brought Gen. Lafayette to America in 1780 to support American colonists in their war of independence against the British Empire.
The free presentation will start at 5:30 p.m. tonight—Thursday, July 25—at Ketchum’s Community Library. To see it in person, RSVP at https://thecommunitylibrary.libcal.com/event/12336133. It also will be livestreamed and recorded to watch later at https://vimeo.com/event/4439081.
“The boat was the fastest ship in the French Navy at the time it was commissioned and it was very much one of the heroes of the Independence of America, although that story is better known in France than America,” said Onetto, a Parisan native who has both French and American citizenship. “I’ll be speaking about the man Lafayette and the construction of the replica of the Hermione, which is currently undergoing repairs so it can return for the 250th anniversary of America in 2026.”
Hermione, now nicknamed “The Freedom Frigate,” was one of four identical 32-gun Frigates built for the French Navy in 1778. Known for its exceptional speed and maneuverability, it took on the role of modern destroyers.
Under command of a young Marquis de Lafayette, it sailed directly from France to Massachusetts in 38 days to deliver its secret message that, yes, France would aid the colonies.
It helped America defeat the British at Yorktown in October 1781, then conducted several additional successful combats and missions, including helping the colonists battle the British Navy blockade. It returned to Franch in 1982 where it continued serving in the French Navy until 1793 when it sank outside the Loire estuary in France.
Lafayette was just 23 when he was given command of the boat by the King of France, said Onetto. But the young nobleman had come to America when he was just 19 to volunteer in the Continental Army. And he gained the confidence of Gen. George Washington as he fought at Valley Forge, Albany and the Battle of Brandywine where he was shot in the leg.
In 1997 the keel was laid in Rochefort, France, for what would become a precise replica of the original Hermione using the same tools and 18th century technology that built the first ship. The ship came to America in 2015 to commemorate the voyage of the original Hermione that brought Lafayette to the America. And it continued to sail for five years before repairs were needed to address a slow-growing fungus on the wood.
“When I heard about this boat being repaired right now in France, I did a deep dive into the history of the boat,” said Onetto, who has watched the ship building every time he’s traveled to the southwest of France to visit his mother. “It’s an amazing ship built in same shipyard where she was originally built with the same trees and woods. One of the companies involved with this is fixing the roof of Notre Dame Cathedral so you have the best people in France involved in the woodworking.”
This isn’t Onetto’s first talk at the library. Earlier he did a presentation he called “Cruising to Idaho” that told of his adventure taking his boat from the Pacific Ocean to Lewiston via the Columbia and Snake rivers. The boat is named Laperouse after a French naval captain named Jean-Francois de Galaup, comte de Laperouse, who distinguished himself in during the American War of independence but was lost at sea in 1785 while leading a voyage of scientific discovery for Louis XVI.