Patrick Henry: Difference between revisions - Wikipedia

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In 1754, Henry married Sarah Shelton, reportedly in the parlor of her family house, [[Rural Plains]]. (It also became known as Shelton House.) As a wedding gift, her father gave the couple six slaves and the {{convert|300|acre|km2|adj=on}} [[Pine Slash|Pine Slash Farm]] near [[Mechanicsville, Virginia|Mechanicsville]]. Pine Slash was exhausted from earlier cultivations, and Henry worked with the slaves to clear fresh fields. The latter half of the 1750s were years of drought in Virginia, and after the main house burned down, Henry gave up and moved to the [[Hanover Tavern]], owned by Sarah's father.{{sfn|Mayer|pp=45–48}}

Among other duties, Henry often served as host at Hanover Tavern as part of his duties, and entertained the guests by playing the fiddle. Among those who stayed there during this time was the young [[Thomas Jefferson]], aged 17, en route to his studies at the [[College of William and Mary]], and who later wrote that he became well acquainted with Henry then, despite their age difference of six years.{{sfn|Mayer|p=50}} Jefferson in 1824 told [[Daniel Webster]], "Patrick Henry was originally a bar-keeper", a characterization that Henry's biographers have found to be unfair. [[William Wirt (Attorney General)|William Wirt]], Henry's earliest biographer, rejected Jefferson's suggestion that Henry's profession then was a bartender, but noted it would have been "very natural in Mr. Henry's situation" to do what was necessary to ensure that guests were properly seen to.{{sfn|Kukla|pp=31–32}}

== Revolutionary lawyer and politician (1760—1775) ==