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the present representative of the earldom of Dunmore during the past year is fresh in the memory of the public. The three sons of Lord Dunmore were students in the College of William and Mary in 1774. Captain Foy had served with distinction in the battle of Minden, and, subsequently, as Governor of New Hampshire. The arrival of the family of Lord Dunmore was celebrated with an illumination of the city of Williamsburg, and the people with acclamations welcomed them to Virginia. When the Assembly met in May following, the capital presented a scene of unwonted gayety, and a court-herald published a code of etiquette for the regulation of the society of the viceregal court. At the beginning of the session, the Burgesses, in an address, congratulated the Governor on the arrival of his Lady, and agreed to give a ball in her honor on the 27th of the month; but the horizon was again suddenly overcast by intelligence of the act of Parliament shutting up the port of Boston. The Assembly made an indignant protest against this act, and set apart the 1st of June, appointed for the closing of the port, as a day of fasting, prayer, and humiliation, in which the divine interposition was to be implored to protect the rights of the Colonies and avert the horrors of civil war, and to unite the people of America in the common cause. On the next day Dunmore dissolved the Assembly. The Burgesses repaired immediately to the Raleigh Tavern, and in the room called "the Apollo" adopted resolutions against the use of tea and other East India commodities, and recommended an annual congress of representatives of the Colonies. Notwithstanding the ominous aspect of affairs, Washington dined with the Governor on the 25th of May, and attended the ball, which was given, as proposed, to Lady Dunmore on the 27th. The Burgesses, remaining in Williamsburg, on the 29th of the month held a meeting, at which Peyton Randolph presided, and they issued a circular, recommending a meeting of deputies to assemble in convention there on the first of August following. In April, 1774, the Indians renewed their hostilities upon the frontiers of Virginia. In September, Dunmore, with two regiments under Colonels William Fleming and Charles Lewis, marched to the relief of the inhabitants. General Andrew Lewis later marched with eleven hundred men. Dunmore concluded a peace with the Delawares in October; but a band of Delawares, Mingoes, Cayugas, Iowas, Wyandots, and Shawnees, under the Chief Cornstalk, had determined to surprise the camp of Lewis with an attack. An engagement, known as the battle of Point Pleasant, took place on the 10th of October, in which the Virginians lost between forty and seventy-five in killed and one hundred and forty wounded. The loss of the savages was unascertained. Dunmore, later, concluded a treaty with the several Indian tribes. Logan, the Cayuga chief, assented to the treaty, but, still indignant at the murder of his wife in

the preceding spring, refused to attend the camp. In the charge by Jefferson, in his Notes on Virginia, that this tragic event was instigated. or committed by Captain Michael Cresap, when it was known to him. that one Greathouse was the author of the bloody deed, he most unworthily maligned the memory of a brave soldier, a useful pioneer, and an honorable man. In the beginning of 1775, the people of Virginia were still in a state of anxious suspense, expecting civil war. The second convention assembled at Richmond on the 20th of March. Here, in the venerable St. John's Church, Patrick Henry sounded the tocsin of liberty. Militia, called minute men, were established. On the 20th of April, Lord Dunmore caused the removal of the powder from the magazine at Williamsburg to an English ship. This proceeding produced great excitement, the people took arms under Patrick Henry, and Dunmore was forced to compromise the affair by paying for the powder. June 6th, he fled with his family, and took refuge on board the "Fowey" man-of-war. Rallying a band of tories, runaway negroes, and British soldiers, he collected a naval force, and carried on a petty warfare, plundering the inhabitants along the James and York rivers, and carrying off their slaves. December 9th, 1775, his followers suffered a severe defeat at the battle of Great Bridge, near Norfolk; and on the following night Dunmore took refuge on board his fleet. January 1st, 1776, he set on fire and destroyed Norfolk, then the most flourishing and populous town in Virginia. Continuing his predatory warfare, he established himself early in June on Gwynn Island, in the Chesapeake Bay, whence he was dislodged by the Virginians, July 8th, being wounded in the leg by a splinter. He shortly afterward returned to England, and in 1786 was appointed Governor of Bermuda. He died at Ramsgate, England, in May, 1809. He was a man of culture, and possessed a large and valuable library, volumes from which frequently appear in auction sales of books. The armorial book-plate from one of these is reproduced in the illustrations in this work. His portrait, which we also present, is from the portrait in oil in the State library at Richmond, and has never before been engraved. It may be trite to notice also, in connection with the last royal Governor of Virginia, the chair of the Speaker of the Colonial House of Burgesses, now also preserved in the State library at Richmond, and of which we present a faithful semblance from a photograph specially made for us. It has never before been pictured. According to a statement by Edmund Randolph in a MS. and unpublished History of Virginia, in the collections of the Virginia Historical Society, the Speaker's chair was originally richly decorated with various insignia of royalty, of which it was denuded in the beginning of our struggle for independence by the hasty hands of fervent patriots, to whom all tokens of royalty were obnoxious.

PATRICK HENRY.

In vigor of intellect, in its varied exemplifications, in true manhood, and in illustrious and material service in church, state and the army, in the one sex, and in the typical exhibition of the sweet graces and exalted virtues characteristic of Virginia and the Southern States, in the other and gentler, no citizen of the Old Dominion, within its annals or traditions, has been more honored in his descendants, including the present generation, than John Henry, a native of Aberdeen, Scotland, and son of John Henry and his wife Jane, the sister of William Robertson, D.D., the divine, scholar and historian. He was a cousin of David Henry, the publisher of the Gentleman's Magazine, and through Dr. Robertson, the cousin of the distinguished Lord Brougham. The late British Premier, William Ewart Gladstone, is also of the same lineage. John Henry settled in Virginia some time prior to 1730. He enjoyed the friendship and patronage of Governor Robert Dinwiddie, who introduced him to the acquaintance of Colonel John Syme, of Hanover county, who dying, his widow, née Winston, John Henry in time married. John Henry was a most useful citizen of Hanover county, serving as Colonel of militia, surveyor, and presiding magistrate for many years. He had been liberally educated, was well grounded in the classics, and, withal, was endowed with an excellent judgment and a vigorous mind. He executed a map of Virginia, which was published in London, in 1770. A copy of it was in the possession of Joseph Horner, Esq., Warrenton, Virginia, a few years since. Charles Campbell (History of Virginia, p. 521), says that "appended to it is an epitome of the state and condition of Virginia. The marginal illustration is profuse and, like the map, well executed." Soon after the settle

ment of Colonel John Henry in Virginia, Patrick, a minister of the Church of England followed him, and in April, 1733, by his brother's interest, became rector of St. George's parish in the county of Spotsylvania. He was subsequently rector of St. Paul's parish, in Hanover county. The wife of Colonel John Henry, says Wirt, "possessed in an eminent degree, the mild and benevolent disposition, the undeviating probity, the correct understanding and easy elocution," for which the ancient family of Winston is distinguished. Her brother, William Winston, an officer in the French and Indian war, is said to have been noted for his oratorical powers. The grave of Colonel Henry, and presumably that of his wife, is at "Studley," their latest residence in Hanover county. Patrick, the second son and the youngest of the family of nine children, of Colonel John and Sarah (Winston-Syme) Henry, was born at "Studley," May 29, 1736. Under the tuition of his father he received the basis of a sound English education, with a knowledge. of mathematics, and of the Greek and Latin, a well-thumbed copy of

the Testament, in the former language, which was through life a prized possession, being still preserved by a descendant. The pecuniary cir cumstances of Colonel Henry impelled him to qualify his sons at an early age to support themselves. With this view, Patrick was placed, at the age of fifteen, with a country merchant. In the year following, his father was encouraged by his apparent qualifications to purchase for his two sons, William and Patrick, a small adventure of goods, to "set them up in trade." The chief management of this mercantile venture devolved upon Patrick, whose levity of disposition, and proclivities for the chase and for social gatherings, illy comported with his responsibilities. The result was a very natural one; one year put an end to the business of the store, but Patrick was engaged for two or three years following, in winding up the disastrous experiment. Notwithstanding his misfortunes, at the early age of eighteen he married Sarah Shelton, the daughter, it has been said, of the keeper of a house of entertainment at the county seat of Hanover. By the joint assistance of their parents the young couple were settled on a small farm, and Mr. Henry, with the assistance of one or two slaves, again essayed the struggle for a livelihood, but his want of agricultural skill and his aversion to systematic labor, drove him, necessarily, after a trial of two years, to abandon this pursuit. Selling out for cash, at a sacrifice, his little possessions, he resumed his inauspicious mercantile pursuits, which he continued until some time in the year 1759, as evidenced by the memorial illustration in this work-reduced fac-similes from the originals, of an account in his autograph, and of a quaint pair of iron-framed spectacles, said to have been possessed and worn by him in advanced life. The second mercantile venture was more unfortunate than the first, involving him in absolute bankruptcy. His situation was indeed lamentable; penniless, with an increasing family, and with the resources of his friends exhausted, nevertheless he was sustained by innate fortitude and buoyancy of heart. Jefferson, who first made the acquaintance of Mr. Henry after his disasters in the winter of 1759-60, states that they were "not to be traced either in his countenance or conduct," and that his passion was "music, dancing and pleasantry." Mr. Henry now determined on the study of law, "and at last found the path for which he was designed, and into which he had been driven by the severe but kindly discipline of Providence." Within the alleged, but absurdly inadequate time of six weeks only in preparation, he obtained a license to practice at the age of twenty-four. According to Wirt, Mr. Henry was but little employed in his profession for several years; his family was chiefly maintained during this period by his father-in-law, Mr. Shelton, who kept a tavern at Hanover Court House, Mr. Henry lending his assistance in the entertainment of the guests, and that his talent remained unknown until it blazed forth like a meteor, as the advocate of the people in the famous "Parson's Cause," tried at the November term, 1763, of Hanover Court. The opposing counsel

was Peter Lyons, subsequently of the Supreme Court of Appeals, of the State.

The story is a winning one, but Mr. Wirt was mistaken as to the facts. Patrick Henry came to the bar in the latter part of 1760. His fee books, now in the possession of his family, show that his practice was extensive from the beginning. They disclose, according to a recent publication by his grandson, William Wirt Henry, that "from the September of 1760, when he came to the bar, to the 31st of December, 1763," Patrick Henry charged fees in 1,185 suits, besides many fees for preparing papers out of court, indicating that his success was remarkable and his talents appreciated. In 1764 Mr. Henry removed his family to the county of Louisa, residing at a place called "Roundabout." In the fall of that year he had the opportunity of a new theater for his genius, as the advocate before the House of Burgesses, at Williamsburg, of Nathaniel West Dandridge, who contested the seat in that body, on the charge of bribery and corruption, of James Littlepage, who had been returned from Hanover County. Here Mr. Henry distinguished himself by a copious and brilliant display on the great subject of the rights of suffrage, superior to any thing that had been heard before within those walls." The same year, 1764, is memorable as that of the passage of the Stamp Act, and for the origination of the great question which finally led to American Independence, to which, says Jefferson, "Mr. Henry gave the first impulse." On the 1st of May, 1765, Mr. Henry entered the House of Burgesses as the representative from Louisa County. His first address to the House was upon the proposition for a public Loan Office, devised by John Robinson, the Speaker, to allow the public money to be loaned out to individuals, on security. It was a scheme to hide certain misappropriations, which Robinson, as Treasurer, had made and wished to conceal. Henry opposed it with such vigor and eloquence that it was lost on the first vote. On the 20th he was added to the committee for courts of justice. A few days afterward his celebrated resolutions on the Stamp Act were offered. The original, hastily written upon the fly-leaf of an old law book, is now in the possession of Mr. William Wirt Henry. In the stormy debate which ensued, Patrick Henry vehemently exclaimed "Cæsar had his Brutus; Charles the First, his Cromwell, and George the Third"-"Treason!" cried the Speaker; the cry was echoed from every part of the House-" may profit by their example!* If this be treason, make the most of it." The resolutions were carried, the last by a majority of one only.

* In a MS. History of Virginia, by Edmund Randolph, who was present on this memorable occasion, he renders the final clause of this memorable menace so as to greatly diminish its strength, reporting instead, "may he never have either."

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