Almost from the home-made cradle, he was taught the idea of American solidarity. Braddock’s defeat was the theme of fireside talk of the Colonists, and from this grew in time the conviction that Americans, if united, could not only protect their homes from the savages and the French, but could defeat, if need be, the British themselves.
So thought John Marshall’s father and mother, and so they taught their children.
For the most part, the boy’s days were spent studying and reading, or rifle in hand, in the surrounding mountains and by the pleasant waters that flowed through the valley of his forest home. He helped his mother, of course, did the innumerable chores which the day’s work required, and looked after the younger children. He ate game from the forest and fish from the stream. Bear meat was plentiful.
Whether at home with his mother, or on surveying trips with his father, the boy continually was under the influence and direction of hardy, clear-minded unusual parents.
Their lofty and simple ideals, their rational thinking, their unbending uprightness, their religious convictions—these were the intellectual companions of John Marshall’s childhood and youth.
Give Me Liberty!
Thomas Marshall, John’s father, served in the Virginia House of Burgesses of which Patrick Henry was a member.
When Thomas Marshall returned to his Blue Ridge home, he described, of course, the scenes he had witnessed and taken part in. The heart of his son thrilled, we may be sure, as he listened to his father reciting Patrick Henry’s words of fire.
And again, when Patrick Henry became the voice of America, and offered the “Resolutions for Arming and Defense,” and carried them with that amazing speech ending with:—