Henry Laurens
| Henry Laurens | |
|---|---|
 |
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| 5th President of the Continental Congress | |
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In office November 1, 1777 – December 9, 1778 |
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| Preceded by | John Hancock |
| Succeeded by | John Jay |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
March 6, 1724 Charleston, Province of South Carolina |
| Died | December 8, 1792 (aged 69) Charleston, South Carolina, U.S. |
| Spouse(s) | Eleanor Ball (m. 1750; b. 1731 – d. 1770) |
| Children |
John Laurens Martha Laurens Ramsay Henry Laurens, Jr. James Laurens Mary Eleanor Laurens Pinckney |
| Signature |  |
Henry Laurens (March 6, 1724 [O.S. February 24, 1723] – December 8, 1792) was an American merchant and rice planter from South Carolina who became a political leader during the Revolutionary War. A delegate to the Second Continental Congress, Laurens succeeded John Hancock as President of the Congress. He was a signatory to the Articles of Confederation and President of the Continental Congress when the Articles were passed on November 15, 1777.
Laurens had earned great wealth as a partner in the largest slave-trading house in North America (Austin and Laurens). In the 1750s alone, this Charleston firm oversaw the sale of more than 8,000 enslaved Africans. He was for a time Vice-President of South Carolina and a diplomat to the Netherlands during the Revolutionary War. He was captured at sea and imprisoned for some time by the British in the Tower of London.
His son John Laurens, a colonel in the Continental Army and officer on Washington's staff, believed that Americans could not fight for their own freedom while holding slaves. In 1779, he persuaded the Continental Congress to authorize the recruitment of a brigade (3000 men) of slaves, who would be given their freedom after the war. However, when he presented it to them, the South Carolina Provincial Congress overwhelmingly rejected the proposal, and instead voted to use confiscated slaves as payment to recruit more white soldiers. John Laurens was killed in a skirmish in South Carolina in 1782.
Henry Laurens’s forebears were Huguenots who fled France after the Edict of Nantes was revoked in 1685. Henry’s grandfather Andre Laurens left earlier, in 1682, and eventually made his way to America, settling first in New York City and then Charleston, South Carolina. Andre’s son John married Hester (or Esther) Grasset, also a Huguenot refugee. Henry was their third child and eldest son. John Laurens became a saddler, and his business eventually grew to be the largest of its kind in the colonies. In 1744 he sent Henry to London to augment the young man’s business training. John Laurens died in 1747, bequeathing twenty-three-year-old Henry a considerable estate
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