Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Henry Armitt Brown (1844–78) was, as a boy, fixed upon the idea of pursuing a career in the military, spending much of his childhood studying and writing about military history. Instead, he entered Yale University in 1861, graduating in 1865, and, after attending Columbia Law School, practiced law in Philadelphia. In the years following, he established himself as a gifted orator, delivering commemorative speeches celebrating the nation’s history, the most famous of which include his address at Carpenters’ Hall in 1874 and his 1877 oration at the bicentennial of the formation of the Quaker town at Burlington, New Jersey. He delivered his last and best-known address, the oration at Valley Forge, on June 19, 1878, shortly before his death at age 33.