University of Virginia Library

Patrick Henry, Henry Clay, and Col. Baylor, were all natives of Hanover county.
The latter was at one time aid to Washington. His regiment of light dragoons,
which were from Virginia, while sleeping in a barn near the line of New Jersey and
New York, were surprised, Sept. 28th, 1778, and nearly all of them cruelly massacred.
Col. Baylor was dangerously wounded, and made prisoner. He was noted for his bravery.
The birthplace of Henry Clay is in a poor piny region, called the Slashes of Hanover,
about 3 miles from the court-house, on the turnpike to Richmond.

The Rev. Samuel Davies, "the father[1] of the Presbyterian church in Virginia," was

born in Delaware, in 1724, in humble circumstances. In 1748, he accepted a call from
the Presbyterians of this neighborhood to settle among them. He gained great credit for his
knowledge, address, and eloquence, in an argument which he had with Peyton Randolph,
the king's attorney-general, on the subject of the rights of Protestant dissenters from the
established church in Virginia. When he went to England in 1753, he obtained from the
king and council a declaration, under authority, that the provisions of the act of toleration
did extend to Virginia. The Old Fork Church in which he preached is, or was
lately, standing on the South Anna Branch, near Ground Squirrel Bridge, in this county.

The home of Mr. Davies was in this county, about 12 miles from Richmond; but his
occasional labors were greatly extended over a considerable part of the colony; and he
acquired an influence greater, probably, than any other preacher of the gospel in Virginia
ever possessed. It was the influence of fervent piety and zeal, directed by a mind
of uncommon compass and force. He took no little pains to instruct the negroes, and
to this day the descendants of his negro converts manifest the happy effects of the pious
instructions of their parents.

In 1753, Mr. Davies accompanied the Rev. Gilbert Tennent on a mission to England,
to solicit donations for the College of New Jersey, at Princeton, where he met with a
success that astonished himself. He preached frequently, and with great applause. The
following anecdote is related of him: The king, (George II.,) being curious to hear a
preacher from the wilds of America, attended on one occasion, when he was so much
struck with his commanding eloquence that he expressed his astonishment loud enough
to be heard half-way over the house. Davies observing that the king was attracting
more attention than himself, paused, and looking his majesty full in the face, gave him,
in an emphatic tone, the following rebuke: "When the lion roareth, let the beasts of the
forest tremble; and when the Lord speaketh, let the kings of the earth keep silence."
The king shrunk back in his seat and remained quiet during the remainder of his discourse;
and the next day sent for Mr. Davies, and gave him fifty guineas for the college,
observing at the same time to his courtiers: "he is an honest man! an honest man!"

Shortly after the return of Mr. Davies, in 1755, the presbytery of Hanover was erected,
and he was appointed to open the presbytery, which was directed to meet in Hanover,
on the 3d of December of that year. The limits of the presbytery originally comprehended
the whole of Virginia, and a considerable part, if not the whole, of North Carolina.
Through this extensive region there were scattered numerous settlements of Protestant
dissenters, besides many who had originally belonged to the established church,
but had chosen to leave it and to join the dissenters. Of this whole dissenting interest,
Mr. Davies was the animating soul. He made his influence to be felt everywhere; he
transfused his own spirit into the bosoms of his associates, and roused them by the force
of his example. His popularity in Virginia was almost unbounded; so that he was invited
and urged to preach in almost all the settled portions of the colony.

But he did not content himself merely with the discharge of pastoral duties. The
country was alarmed and agitated to the highest degree, by the French and Indian war.
At this time he delivered several patriotic sermons, one of which, under the title of
"Religion and Patriotism the constituents of a good soldier," was addressed in Hanover
to Capt. Overton's company of independent soldiers. In it he uttered the prophetic remark
respecting Washington. (See p. 99.) On another occasion he preached a sermon
"to the militia of Hanover county, in Virginia, at a general muster, May 8th, 1759,
with a view to raise a company for Capt. Samuel Meredith." At its close, a company
was made up in a few minutes, and many more offered their names than the law allowed.
As Mr. Davies left the muster-ground for the tavern, to get his horse, the whole
corps followed him, pressing around to catch every word that fell from his lips. Observing
their desire, he again addressed them from the tavern porch until he was exhausted
with speaking.

The celebrated Patrick Henry has spoken in terms of enthusiasm of Mr. Davies. It
has been supposed that he first kindled the fire, and afforded the model of Henry's elocution,
as he lived from his 11th to his 22d year in the neighborhood where the patriotic
sermons of Mr. Davies were delivered, which produced as powerful effects as those ascribed
to the orations of Demosthenes.

In 1759, Mr. Davies accepted the appointment of president of New Jersey College,

at Princeton. The services he rendered as president of that institution were very important.
President Davies died on the 4th of February, 1762, having remained in office
about eighteen months. He was about fourteen years in public life, and died in the
thirty-seventh year of his age. He possessed the advantages of superior genius; and
was much distinguished as a laborious scholar. He dreaded to preach without proper
preparation. When pressed to speak extemporaneously he sometimes replied: "It is a
dreadful thing to talk nonsense in the name of the Lord." He declared that "every
discourse of his which he thought worthy of the name of a sermon, cost him four days
hard study in the preparation." It was by this combination of talent and diligence that
he became the most eloquent and accomplished pulpit-orator that our country ever produced,
and he was more successful as a preacher than almost any other individual of
his day. Since his death, his sermons have passed through numerous editions, both in
this country and Britain, and probably there are no sermons in the language more extensively
read or more deservedly popular.[2]

As you approach Newcastle, the country becomes more gay. This little capital of a
small district contains 25 or 30 houses, some of which are pretty enough. We continued
our journey to Hanover court-house. We arrived before sunset, and alighted at a tolerably
handsome inn; a very large saloon, and a covered portico, are destined to receive
the company who assemble every three months at the court-house, either on private or
public affairs. . . . The county of Hanover, as well as that of New Kent, had still reason
to remember the passage of the English. Mr. Tilghman, our landlord, though he lamented
his misfortune in having lodged and boarded Lord Cornwallis and his retinue,
without his lordship's having made the least recompense, could not yet help laughing at
the fright which the unexpected arrival of Tarleton spread amongst a considerable number
of gentlemen, who had come to hear the news, and were assembled in the courthouse.
A negro on horseback came full gallop to let them know that Tarleton was not
above three miles off. The resolution of retreating was soon taken; but the alarm was
so sudden, and the confusion so great, that every one mounted the first horse he could
find, so that few of those curious gentlemen returned upon their own horses. The English
who came from Westover had passed the Chickahominy at Button's Bridge, and
directed their march towards the South Anna, which Lafayette had put between them
and himself.

The next morning the Marquis left the court-house, and arrived about noon at Oakley,
near the North Anna River, the seat of the then ex-governor Nelson, where he passed
two or three days in the enjoyment of the hospitalities of the family. He eulogizes the
patriotism and zeal of the governor, whose acquaintance he had made at the siege of
York, and compliments the beauty, artlessness, and music of the young ladies, describing
them as "pretty nymphs, more timid and wild than those of Diana."

The Marquis then goes on to describe the venerable ex-secretary Nelson, the father of
Gov. Nelson, whose elegant house, being occupied by Lord Cornwallis during the siege
of York, was at last almost entirely destroyed by the cannon-shot of the Americans.
The two sons of the secretary were in the American army, and sent a flag to the British
general requesting permission for their father to leave the town, which request Cornwallis
humanely granted. The tranquillity which had succeeded these unhappy times,
by giving him leisure to reflect upon his losses, had not embittered the recollection. He
lived happily on his plantation, where in six hours he could assemble seventy of his posterity,
all inhabitants of Virginia.

Patrick Henry, the second son of John and Sarah Henry, and one of nine children,
was born on the 29th of May, 1736, at the family seat, called Studley, in Hanover
county. At the age of ten years he was taken from the school where he had learned to
read and write, and taught Latin by his father, who had opened a grammar-school in
his own house. At the same time he acquired some proficiency in mathematics. Passionately
addicted to the sports of the field, he could not brook the toil and confinement
of study. And the time which should thus have been employed, was often passed in

the forest with his gun, or over the brook with his angling-rod. "His companions frequently
observed him lying along, under the shade of some tree that overhung the sequestered
stream, watching for hours, at the same spot, the motionless cork of his fishing-line,
without one encouraging symptom of success, and without any apparent source of
enjoyment, unless he could find it in the ease of his position, or in the illusions of hope;
or, which is most probable, in the stillness of the scene, or the silent workings of his own
imagination." This love of solitude in his youth was a marked trait in his character.

[ILLUSTRATION]

Fac-simile of the signature of Patrick Henry.

The wants of a large family compelled his father to find employment for his sons.
At the age of fifteen Patrick was put behind the counter of a country merchant, and the
year following entered into business with his elder brother, William, with whom was to
devolve its chief management; but such were his idle habits, that he left the burden of
the concern to Patrick, who managed wretchedly. The drudgery of business became
intolerable to him, and then, too, "he could not find it in his heart" to disappoint any
one who came for credit; and he was very easily satisfied with apologies for non-payment.
He sought relief from his cares by having recourse to the violin, flute, and
reading. An opportunity was presented of pursuing his favorite study of the human
character, and the character of every customer underwent this scrutiny.

One year put an end to the mercantile concern, and the two or three following Patrick
was engaged in settling up its affairs. At eighteen years of age he married Miss Shelton,
the daughter of a neighboring farmer of respectability, and commenced cultivating
a small farm; but his aversion to systematic labor, and want of skill, compelled him to
abandon it at the end of two years. Selling off all his little possessions at a sacrifice, he
again embarked in the hazardous business of merchandise. His old business habits still
continued, and not unfrequently he shut up his store to indulge in the favorite sports of
his youth. His reading was of a more serious character; history, ancient and modern,
he became a proficient in. Livy, however, was his favorite; and having procured a copy,
he read it through at least once a year in the early part of his life. In a few years his
second mercantile experiment left him a bankrupt, and without any friends enabled to assist
him further. All other means failing, he determined to try the law. His unfortunate
habits, unsuitable to so laborious a profession, and his pecuniary situation unfitting him
for an extensive course of reading, led every one to suppose that he would not succeed.
With only six weeks' study, he obtained a license to practise, he being then twenty-four
years of age. He was then not only unable to draw a declaration or a plea, but incapable,
it is said, of the most common and simple business of his profession. It was not
until his twenty-seventh year, that an opportunity occurred for a trial of his strength at
the bar. In the mean time the wants and distresses of his family were extreme. They
lived mostly with his father-in-law, Mr. Shelton, who then kept a tavern at Hanover
court-house. Whenever Mr. Shelton was from home, Henry took his place in the tavern,
which is the identical public-house now standing at Hanover court-house. The occasion
on which his genius first broke forth, was the controversy between the clergy and
the legislature and people of the state, relating to the stipend claimed by the former.
The cause was popularly known as the parsons' cause. A decision of the court on a demurrer
in favor of the claims of the clergy, had left nothing undetermined but the amount
of damages in the cause which was pending. Soon after the opening of the court, the
cause was called. The scene which ensued is thus vividly described by Wirt:

From this time Mr. Henry's star was in the ascendant, and he at once rose to the
head of his profession in that section. In the autumn of 1764, having removed to Roundabout,
in Louisa county, he was employed to argue a case before a committee on elections
of the House of Burgesses. He distinguished himself by a brilliant display on the
right of suffrage. Such a burst of eloquence from a man of so humble an appearance,
struck the committee with amazement, and not a sound but from his lips broke the
deep silence of the room.

In 1765, he was elected a member of the House of Burgesses, when he introduced his
celebrated resolutions on the Stamp Act. Among his papers there was found, after his
decease, one sealed and thus endorsed:

It was in the midst of the above-mentioned debate that he exclaimed, in tones of
thunder, "Cæsar had his Brutus—Charles the First his Cromwell—and George the

Third—(`Treason!' cried the speaker—`Treason! treason!' echoed from every part of
the house. Henry faltered not for a moment; taking a loftier attitude, and fixing on
the speaker an eye of fire, he finished his sentence with the firmest emphasis)—"may
profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it." Henceforth Mr.

The old Court-House, Hanover.

[The Hanover Court-House is over a century old, and is built of imported brick. It is the building in
which Patrick Henry made his celebrated speech in "The Parsons' Cause."]

Henry was the idol of the people of Virginia, and his influence as one of the great
champions of liberty, extended throughout America. In 1769 he was admitted to the
bar of the general court. Without that legal learning which study alone can supply, he
was deficient as a mere lawyer. But before a jury, in criminal cases particularly, his
genius displayed itself most brilliantly. His deep knowledge of the springs of human
action, his power of reading in the flitting expressions of the countenance what was passing
in the hearts of his hearers, has rarely been possessed by any one in so great a degree.
In 1767 or '68, Mr. Henry removed back to Hanover, and continued a member
of the House of Burgesses until the close of the revolution, acting upon its most important
committees, and infusing a spirit of bold opposition in its members to the pretensions
of Britain. He was a delegate to the first Colonial Congress, which assembled
Sept. 4, 1774, at Philadelphia.

Upon Lord Dunmore's seizing the gunpowder at Williamsburg, in the night after the
battle of Lexington, Henry summoned volunteers to meet him; and marching down towards
the capitol, compelled the agent of Dunmore to give a pecuniary compensation
for it. This was the first military movement in Virginia. The colonial convention of
1775 elected him the colonel of the first regiment, and the commander of "all the forces
raised and to be raised for the defence of the colony." Soon resigning his command,
he was elected a delegate to the convention, and not long after, in 1776, the first governor
of the commonwealth, an office he held by successive re-elections until 1779,
when, without an intermission, he was no longer constitutionally eligible. While holding
that office he was signally serviceable in sustaining public spirit during the gloomiest
period of the revolution, providing recruits, and crushing the intrigues of the tories.

On leaving the office of governor, he served, until the end of the war, in the legislature,
when he was again elected governor, until the state of his affairs caused him to
resign in the autumn of 1786. Until 1794 he regularly attended the courts, where his
great reputation obtained for him a lucrative business. "In 1788 he was a member of
the convention of Virginia which so ably and eloquently discussed the constitution of the
United States. He employed his masterly eloquence, day after day, in opposition to the
proposed constitution. His hostility to it proceeded entirely from an apprehension that
the federal government would swallow the sovereignty of the states; and that ultimately
the liberty of the people would be destroyed, or crushed, by an overgrown and ponderous
consolidation of political power. The constitution having been adopted, the government
organized, and Washington elected President, his repugnance measurably
abated. The chapter of amendments considerably neutralized his objections: but,
nevertheless, it is believed that his acquiescence resulted more from the consideration of

a citizen's duty, confidence in the chief magistrate, and a hopeful reliance on the wisdom
and virtue of the people, rather than from any material change in his opinions."

In 1794 Mr. Henry retired from the bar. In 1796 the post of governor was once
more tendered to him, and refused. In 1798 the strong and animated resolutions of the
Virginia Assembly, in opposition to the alien and sedition laws, which laws he was in
favor of, "conjured up the most frightful visions of civil war, disunion, blood, and anarchy;
and under the impulse of these phantoms, to make what he considered a virtuous
effort for his country, he presented himself in Charlotte county as a candidate for the
House of Delegates, at the spring election of 1799," although he had retired to private
life three years previously.

His speech on this occasion, before the polls were opened, was the last effort of his
eloquence. "The power of the noon-day sun was gone; but its setting splendors were
not less beautiful and touching." Mr. Henry was elected by his usual commanding
majority, and the most formidable preparations were made to oppose him in the Assembly.
But "the disease which had been preying upon him for two years now hastened
to its crisis; and on the 6th of June, 1799, this friend of liberty and man was no more."

By his first wife he had six children, and by his last, six sons and three daughters.
He left them a large landed property. He was temperate and frugal in his habits of
living, and seldom drank any thing but water. He was nearly six feet in height, spare,
and raw-boned, and with a slight stoop in his shoulders; his complexion dark and sallow;
his countenance grave, thoughtful, and penetrating, and strongly marked with
the lines of profound reflection, which with his earnest manner, and the habitual knitting
and contracting of his brows, gave at times an expression of severity. "He was
gifted with a strong and musical voice, and a most expressive countenance, and he acquired
particular skill in the use of them. . . . He could be vehement, insinuating, humorous,
and sarcastic, by turns, and always with the utmost effect. He was a natural orator
of the highest order, combining imagination, acuteness, dexterity, and ingenuity,
with the most forcible action, and extraordinary powers of face and utterance. As a
statesman, his principal merits were sagacity and boldness. His name is brilliantly and
lastingly connected with the history of his country's emancipation."

"In private life, Mr. Henry was as amiable as he was brilliant in his public career.
He was an exemplary Christian, and his illustrious life was greatly ornamented by the
religion which he professed. In his will he left the following testimony respecting the
Christian religion: `I have now disposed of all my property to my family. There is
one thing more I wish I could give them, and that is the Christian religion. If they
have that, and I had not given one shilling, they would be rich; and if they have not
that, and I had given them the whole world, they would be poor.' "