“Give me liberty, or give me death:” Remembering Patrick Henry, the Forgotten Founder Patrick Henry was enormously popular during the American Revolution. Even Thomas Jefferson, who over time developed a deep loathing of Henry (some would say jealousy), had to admit that “it is not now easy to say what we should have done without Patrick Henry.” Edmund Randolph, a patriot leader in his own right, explained that “It was Patrick Henry … awakening the genius of his country, and binding a band of patriots together to hurl defiance at the tyranny of so formidable a nation as Great Britain.” Yet, today, Patrick Henry is ill-remembered; most Americans might recall at best perhaps a snippet from a famous speech: “give me liberty, or give me death.” The reasons for our historic forgetfulness are several: after the Revolution, Henry chose to oppose ratification of the U.S. Constitution, believing that it created a distant and too-powerful government, and he refused proffered position in George Washington’s administration, diminishing his historic memory. Equally important, Henry died in 1799 shortly after a political campaign in which, at Washington’s behest, he opposed Jefferson’s and James Madison’s ill-advised radical states’ rights attack on the U.S. government, and Jefferson spent the next twenty-six years systematically attacking Henry’s legacy. Patrick Henry, who helped to ignite a revolution, deserves better. This course will explore how he over¬came challenges to reach the pinnacle of Virginia politics and unite Americans behind a challenge to Britain – the eighteenth century’s super-power, why he opposed the U.S. Constitu¬tion, and why he then came out of retirement to defend the people’s Constitution against the attacks of Jefferson and Madison. Participants should evaluate Henry’s role in proclaiming a revolution and consider whether he had an equally important role in saving it. The course should also develop an improved appreciation for the complex political, economic, and religious forces that shaped the early republic. As a biographical course, it also demonstrates how personalities play an important role in even the most foundational national history. Image Attribution: The background image for this webpage is Patrick Henry before the Virginia House of Burgesses by Peter F. Rothermel (1851) with special thanks to the owner, the Patrick Henry Memorial Foundation. The painting of Patrick Henry's 1765 "Caesar had his Brutus" speech (discussed in the second lecture) is entirely romanticized -- neither Henry nor the House of Burgesses looked at all like this -- but it does show that hagiography of Henry, almost god-like veneration, began shortly after this death.
Retirement: Children, Education, and Land
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From the course by University of Virginia
Patrick Henry: Forgotten Founder
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From the lesson
Patrick Henry Legacy
Meet the Instructors
John RagostaFellow
Virginia Foundation for the Humanities
Patrick Henry finally leaves the Virgina House of Delegates in 1791, and
says he won't be re-elected again.
It's not because he's unpopular.
He continues to be one of the most popular politicians in Virgina.
But he's decided he's at an age, and at a point in his life
where he needs to provide for his family and his children.
I've mentioned that he continues to be raising a large family with his
second wife, Dorothea.
He has children born in 1790, 1792, 1794,
1796, 1798, 17 children in all when done, 11 with Dorothea.
When he dies in 1799, 11 of his children are still alive.
Now that's a very large number by 18th century standards.
He thought 12 were alive.
His daughter Annie, whom he loved dearly, died shortly before he does,
and they wouldn't tell Henry because he was very ill, essentially on his deathbed.
Now, when he enters retirement, initially he's living at Pleasant Grove
in Prince Edward County; it's a 1,700 acre plantation.
Henry always loves his role as a plantation owner, a farmer.
In 1792, he moves to Long Island in Campbell County,
eventually over 3,500 acres there.
In 1794, he moves to Red Hill,
in Charlotte County; it's a 700 acre plantation.
It's on the Roanoke River.
While he's there, he's adding territory, he's adding land,
expanding to almost 3,000 acres by his death.
He refers to Red Hill as the "Garden Spot of Virginia."
By the time Henry dies, he has almost 50,000 acres of land.
He's living happily as a plantation manager.
One son-in-law says, "I am positive I never saw him at a passion, nor
apparently out of temper.
Circumstances which would have highly irritated other men had no
visible effect on him."
So Patrick Henry's enjoying his retirement.
In this period, his love for fiddling and playing flute, for
music, and poetry is renewed.
It's said that he often writes little short poems or little short songs for
his young children and grandchildren, he has many grandchildren already,
for his children and grandchildren.
He's often found wrestling on the ground at Red Hill with his children and
grandchildren.
He, however, is conscious that maybe the "great Patrick Henry"
might be thought less of in writing these little ditties.
And so when he's done singing these songs or playing these tunes for
his children and grandchildren, he'll roll them up and throw them in the fires.
We don't have any of them preserved.
He burns them, saying that he's afraid it will "injure his reputation."
Patrick Henry's also engaged with many sons and grandsons in their formal
education, sending many of them to Hampden-Sydney College.
This is an era where, unfortunately, his daughters and
granddaughters are not going for that kind of a formal education.
He is very interested in seeing to it that they get the formal education which he did
not, even though as we discussed, his education was excellent.
He prizes the ability to send his children and
grandchildren to Hampden-Sydney College.
One of his grandchildren reports that he would check up on their work, and
in particular, he would check on their Latin.
And they far more feared Henry's review of their Latin work
than their Latin professor's.
Henry is also continuing to maintain his legal office at Red Hill.
And if you go visit Red Hill today, the legal office that Henry used
in the 1790s is still standing there, pretty much as it was.
He taught several of his sons and his grandsons law In that law office.
Remember, in the 18th century, the primary way to learn law is as an apprentice under
a young lawyer, or under a lawyer, Henry's no longer young.
Henry had read the law, he had pursued a different course.
But he's very happy to have the chance to teach some of his progeny the law.
He also continues to practice some law himself.
In this period, in addition to playing with his children and grandchildren, and
practicing law, and
being concerned about education, he becomes a great land speculator.
He obviously loves land.
He's talking in this period about if the federal government does become to powerful
and dangerous, he wants to be able to escape to some of his western lands.
And so this is one of the reasons he's buying lands,
as well as having plantations for each one of his sons when he dies.
One of his acquaintances says, "As for boasting, he was an entire stranger to it;
unless it be that in his latter days he seemed proud of the goodness of his lands."
As I mentioned, when Patrick Henry dies, he has almost 50,000 acres of land,
which he's going to bequest to his children.
Now, we might pause on one particular land deal that fell through.
It doesn't happen, but it's been wrongly used to cast aspersions on
Patrick Henry's integrity, both in various histories, as well as at the time.
Thomas Jefferson, again, being one of the culprits.
A very complicated land transaction,
we don't need to understand all of its details.
But Georgia, which still owned the territory that we know of as Alabama and
Mississippi, was selling off some of the lands in the far west.
Now, by the way, there was serious questions as to whether Georgia or
the Native Americans owned those lands,
but Georgia sells a very large tract of what's referred to as the Yazoo lands,
on the Mississippi and the Yazoo River,
to a consortium of buyers in which Patrick Henry is a member.
So Patrick Henry is joined with a number of other people to buy these very
speculative lands out on the Mississippi, in what is now Mississippi.
Well, that land deal falls through.
And we don't need to get into all the details of why it falls through.
There are going to be lawsuits; Patrick Henry and his partners bring lawsuits
against Georgia saying that Georgia reneged on the contract.
But the key thing is that deal falls through.
Well, since that land didn't sell to this consortium,
Georgia sells that land to a different group.
And in the second sale, as it turns out,
virtually every member of the Georgia legislature was bribed.
This becomes the great Yazoo Land Fraud.
It's a case that goes on for many years; it ends up at the Supreme Court.
And it was clearly a fraudulent transaction in which these
land speculators are bribing the members of the Georgia legislature.
But it's completely different and unrelated to Patrick Henry's effort to
buy the Yazoo lands; it was a different period.
And as I said, in history, including Thomas Jefferson's recollection
of some of the Yazoo land controversies, these two are confused.
And Henry never really, there's no real serious accusation
that he ever uses his government position or engages in bribery or
inappropriate activity to try to aggrandize his own wealth.
So he doesn't get the Yazoo lands, but he's not a part of the Yazoo land frauds.
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