On 23 March 1775, at the second Virginia Revolutionary Convention at St. John’s Church in Richmond, Patrick Henry delivered his famous “give me liberty or give me death” speech to Virginia delegates. Toward the end, he dramatically cried out the phrase, seemed to hold a dagger in his upraised hand, plunged it downward into his heart, and slumped forward, leaving the delegates spellbound. The speech was credited with gaining enough votes to establish a Virginia militia. Twenty-eight days later, on 19 April 1775, the first shots of the Revolution were fired, bringing Virginia into the war. Growing colonial discontent over British taxation, trade and commerce restrictions, courts of law, and other issues had already spread threats of rebellion through the thirteen colonies. On 5 September 1774, the colonies, without Georgia delegates, had joined for the first time at Carpenter’s Hall in Philadelphia to form the First Continental Congress, draft a list of grievances, and send it to the King, whose reply was to dispatch British troops, identified here as Hessians, to America to quell the colonials. The American Revolution lasted eight years, from 1775 to 1783, and ended with the colonies emerging as the free and independent United States of America.