This is an I-Heart podcast.

Guaranteed Human.

On this episode of News World, the lives of these men are essential to understand the American

form of government and our ideals of liberty.

The founding fathers all played key roles in securing American independence

from Great Britain and in the creation of the government of the United States of America.

And now the life of Thomas Payne.

Although Thomas Payne is now considered an American hero, at the time of his death, only six people attended his funeral, and papers wrote negatively about him. He was not popular and his reputation had been destroyed. His obituary ended with, quote,

he had lived long, did some good and much harm. And yet pain was extraordinarily important in the American Revolution and was really very different from the founding fathers.

As you'll see, he's a man who had a very complicated life, very complicated beliefs,

was deeply opposed to the British government, and was enormously helpful to George Washington.

But in the end, he was more of an opponent to order than he was an advocate of a new order.

Payne was born on January 29, 1737, in the small village of Thetford and Norfolk, England, to Joseph Payne and Francis Cockpane.

He was an only child. His father was a staymaker, a maker of whalebone

components for women's corsets. Payne attended seven years of formal education at the Thetford Grammar School.

He left school around the age of 12 or 13 and began an apprenticeship with his father. He worked the trade for six years

before running away from home to seek an adventure at sea. The first time he tried to win away,

his father stopped him. On a November morning in 1756, at the age of 16, he attempted to join the British privateer terrible,

but his father found him in London and talked him out of joining the crew. Payne later wrote,

quote, from this adventure, I was happily prevented by the affectionate and moral remonstrance

of a good father, who from his own habits of life,

being of the Quaker profession, must begin to look upon me as lost.

...