Patrick Henry – 1736-1799

A radical leader of the independence movement in Virginia, Henry was less important to the American Revolution as a political thinker than as an orator of electrifying eloquence. He is best remembered for the speech he delivered at the second Virginia Convention on March 23, 1775. After introducing uncompromising resolutions for the funding of the Virginia militia to fight the British, he concluded: “I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.”