Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry ( * May 29, 1736 in Hanover County, Virginia; † June 6, 1799 on Red Hill Plantation in Brookneal, Virginia ) was a prominent representative of the American Revolution.

Henry joined in 1763 as an attorney in a trial on the tobacco tax, whose output was understood as an encouragement for the independence movement. In 1765 he was elected to the House of Burgesses in Virginia. On March 23, 1775, he stopped in front of the Virginia Convention at St. John 's Church in Richmond a speech, the last sentence, " I know not what course others take june; but as for me, give me liberty, or give me Death! " went down in the history of the United States. From 1776 to 1779 and from 1784 to 1786, he served as governor of Virginia, respectively.

Later, he was an outspoken opponent of the Constitution of the United States; Antiföderalist as he was of the opinion they give the federal government too much power. In 1795 he declined the offer of George Washington, to be foreign minister. Due to the increasing radicalism of the French Revolution in the late 1790s, he feared that the United States could face a similar fate and changed his mind. He was a supporter of the Federalist Party and supported by that date, the policies of Washington and Adams.

Patrick Henry died in 1799 at age 63 at the Red Hill Plantation in Virginia. According to him, the U.S. (living) settlement Patrick Henry Village in Heidelberg is named.