Patrick Henry

The Colonial Dames of WV and the Craik Patton house in Charleston WV combined talents to host a fund raiser for the Craik Patton House Saturday June 27 at Berry Hills.  It was a lovely event.  The featured speaker was Bob Gleason portraying Patrick Henry.  Our speaker was excellent and I absolutely learned new aspects of the Revolutionary War.

Patrick Henry is of special interest to me because during the Revolution, he moved his family which included a second wife and 16 children.  According to the Smithsonian his first wife had died from:

Historians do not know the exact cause of Patrick Henry's first wife's death. Sarah Shelton Henry died at 37 years old in the spring of 1775 at the family's Scotchtown plantation. She had been struggling with severe mental illness following the birth of their sixth child. Because her condition was kept highly private—with Patrick Henry caring for her at home rather than committing her to an asylum—the exact medical reason for her death remains a mystery. Some historical accounts speculate that suicide may have played a role, but official documentation is lacking. 

The information about why and when Patrick Henry bought his land in what is now Henry County, Virginia was confusing to me.  But what was of great interest is that he would have been a neighbor to both my Sammons Family and to my Morrison family as well as my Witcher family.  It seems that Patrick Henry was removing his family from the more Eastern part of Virginia to remove them from the possible dangers of the war.