Today the United States celebrates the 250th—or semiquincentennial—anniversary of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence.
While July 4 marks the day Thomas Jefferson’s revised draft of the Declaration of Independence was adopted, it would take months for the document to be signed by all 56 men who would eventually affix their names to it.
Several key figures in American history—George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison, among others—don’t appear among the signatories of the Declaration of Independence at all, having been serving in military roles or other capacities at the time.
None of the 56 signers died as a result of their signature, but before the war was over, five would be captured, 12 would have their homes destroyed, and 17 would lose their entire fortunes. None of the 56 signatories ever renounced the cause of independence of their own free will….