Marc Cole
It has been said that a hero is one who rises to the occasion and then slips quietly away. That’s a pretty good summary of the life of John Penn of North Carolina, signer of the Declaration of Independence. We know him today because he signed his name to the Declaration. Nothing more, nothing less.
We know that he received little formal education, but taught himself enough to pass the bar. We know that he moved to North Carolina in 1775, and set up a legal practice. We know that he achieved enough notoriety as a lawyer to be elected as a delegate to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, along with fellow North Carolinians William Hooper and Joseph Hewes. And we know that during the war which followed the Declaration, Penn was responsible for the defense of western North Carolina when Cornwallis’ troops rampaged the area.
After the revolution, Penn’s public life was basically done and he died in 1788, at the age of 46.
Many years later, a half-American, half-English war leader would pay this memorable tribute to the near-anonymous pilots in the Royal Air Force who defended the British Isles from the onslaught of the German Luftwaffe:
“Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”
The same could be said about the life of John Penn, as well as all of the men who sacrificed and fought for American Independence.
Check out Mark’s book: Lives, Fortunes, Sacred Honor: The Men Who Signed the Declaration of Independence
