PREFACE
TO REVISED EDITION
I have gladly used the opportunity afforded by a new edition of this book to give the text a minute revision from beginning to end, and to make numerous changes both in its substance and in its form.
During the eleven years that have passed since it first came from the press, considerable additions have been made to our documentary materials for the period covered by it, the most important for our purpose being the publication, for the first time, of the correspondence and the speeches of Patrick Henry and of George Mason, the former with a life, in three volumes, by William Wirt Henry, the latter also with a life, in two volumes, by Kate Mason Rowland. Besides procuring for my own pages whatever benefit I could draw from these texts, I have tried, while turning over very frequently the writings of Patrick Henry's contemporaries, to be always on the watch for the means of correcting any mistakes I may have made concerning him, whether as to fact or as to opinion.
In this work of rectification I have likewise been aided by suggestions from many persons, of whom I would particularly mention the Right Rev. Joseph Blount Cheshire, Jr., D. D., Bishop of North Carolina, and Mr. William Wirt Henry.
M. C. T.
CORNELL UNIVERSITY, 31 March, 1898
CONTENTS
CHAP. PAGE I. EARLY YEARS 1 II. WAS HE ILLITERATE? 10 III. BECOMES A LAWYER 22 IV. A CELEBRATED CASE 36 V. FIRST TRIUMPHS AT THE CAPITAL 56 VI. CONSEQUENCES 77 VII. STEADY WORK 90 VIII. IN THE FIRST CONTINENTAL CONGRESS 101 IX. "AFTER ALL, WE MUST FIGHT" 128 X. THE RAPE OF THE GUNPOWDER 153 XI. IN CONGRESS AND IN CAMP 168 XII. INDEPENDENCE 189 XIII. FIRST GOVERNOR OF THE STATE OF VIRGINIA 214 XIV. GOVERNOR A SECOND TIME 240 XV. THIRD YEAR IN THE GOVERNORSHIP 257 XVI. AT HOME AND IN THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES 271 XVII. SHALL THE CONFEDERATION BE MADE STRONGER? 298 XVIII. THE BATTLE IN VIRGINIA OVER THE NEW CONSTITUTION 313 XIX. THE AFTER-FIGHT FOR AMENDMENTS 339 XX. LAST LABORS AT THE BAR 357 XXI. IN RETIREMENT 382 XXII. LAST DAYS 407 LIST OF PRINTED DOCUMENTS CITED IN THIS BOOK 424 INDEX 431
PATRICK HENRY