Patrick Henry

Patrick Henry was an orator and politician who led the movement for independence in Virginia in the 1770s.

 A Founding Father, he served as the first and sixth post-colonial Governor of Virginia from 1776 to 1779, Henry was born in Studley, Hanover County, Virginia on May 29, 1736.  His father was John Henry, an immigrant from Aberdeenshire, Scotland, who had attended King's College, Aberdeen before immigrating to the Colony of Virginia in the 1720s. Settling in Hanover County, about 1732 John Henry married Sarah Winston Syme, a wealthy widow from a prominent Hanover County family of English ancestry. Patrick Henry was once thought to have been of humble origins, but he was actually born into the middle rank of the Virginiagentry.