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Old Sunday, March 20, 2011
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The Stamp Act of 1765


In 1764 the sugar-duties were somewhat reduced, as a boon to the colonies, but new duties were imposed on articles which had hitherto been imported free; at the same time, Lord Grenville proposed a new impost in the form of a stamp-tax. All pamphlets, almanacs, newspapers, all bonds, notes, leases, policies of insurance, together with all papers used for legal purposes, in order to be valid were to be drawn on stamped paper, to be purchased only from the king's officers appointed for that purpose. This plan met with the entire approbation of the British Parliament, but its enactment was deferred until the following year, in order that the colonies might have an opportunity of expressing their feelings on the subject. Though deference was thus apparently paid to their wishes, the intention of the British government was no longer concealed. The preamble of the bill openly avowed the intention of raising revenue from "his majesty's dominions in America;" the same act gave increased power to the admiralty courts, and provided more stringent means for enforcing the payment of duties and punishing their evasion.

The colonies received the news of these proposed measures with strong indignation. Massachusetts instructed her agent in London to deny the right of Parliament to impose duties and taxes on a people who were not represented in the House of Commons. "If we are not represented," said they, "we are slaves." A combination of all the colonies for the defence of their common interests was suggested.

Otis, who had published a pamphlet on Colonial Rights, seeing the tide of public indignation rising very high, inculcated "obedience" and "the duty of submission;" but this was not a doctrine which the Americans were then in a state of mind to listen to. Better suited to their feeling was Thacher's pamphlet against all Parliamentary taxation. Rhode Island expressed the same; so did Maryland, by the secretary of the province; so did Virginia, by a leading member of her House of Burgesses. Strong as the expression of resentment was in the colonies, addresses in a much milder strain were prepared to the king and Parliament from most of them, New York alone expressing boldly and decidedly the true nature of her feelings, the same tone being maintained by Rhode Island.

But the minds of the British monarch and his ministers were not to be influenced either by the remonstrances and pleadings of the colonies or their agents in London, or of their few friends in Parliament. Grenville, the minister, according to prearrangement, brought in his bill for collecting a stamp-tax in America, and it passed the House of Commons five to one, and in the House of Lords there was neither division on the subject nor the slightest opposition. This act was to come into operation on the 1st day of November of the same year. It was on the occasion of its discussion in the House of Commons that Colonel Barre, who had fought with Wolfe at Louisburg and Quebec, electrified the House with his burst of eloquence in reply to one of the ministers who spoke of the colonists as "children planted by our care, nourished by our indulgence, and protected by our arms." "They planted by your care!" retorted Barre. "No; your oppression planted them in America. They nourished by your indulgence! They grew up by your neglect of them. They protected by your arms! Those sons of liberty have nobly taken up arms in your defence. I claim to know more of America than most of you, having been conversant in that country. The people, I believe, are as truly loyal subjects as the king has, but a people jealous of their liberties, and who will vindicate them should they ever be violated."

The day after the Stamp Act had passed the House, Benjamin Franklin, then in London as agent for Philadelphia, wrote the news to his friend Charles Thomson. "The sun of liberty," said he, "is set; you must light up the candles of industry and economy." "We shall light up torches of quite another kind," was the reply.

Although the British Parliament had passed, and refused to repeal, highly oppressive acts regarding commerce and manufactures, it had never hitherto attempted to levy direct taxes. The nearest approach to this was in the rates for postage; but in these the pay was voluntary and for services rendered, and it provoked no opposition. The proposition, therefore, to lay a direct tax on the colonies was received by them all with disapproval, though the degrees of outspoken dissent widely differed. In Boston, which had always been the centre of democratic sentiment in America, the protest was made in no uncertain tone. The House of Representatives resolved, "That the imposition of duties and taxes by the Parliament of Great Britain, upon a people not represented in the House of Commons, is absolutely irreconcilable with their rights." The pamphlet issued by James Otis, mentioned in the preceding article, vigorously asserted this principle, and declared, "If we are not represented, we are slaves." He maintained, as one of the "natural rights of man," that taxes could not be levied upon the people "but by their consent in person or by deputation." The energetic protests published greatly intensified the feeling of resistance to the Parliamentary scheme. The passage of the Stamp Act, therefore, was regarded throughout America as a high-handed violation of the liberties of the people.
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Old Monday, March 21, 2011
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The history of the Sons of Liberty

Before the stamps reached America, symptoms of a violent ferment appeared. A great elm in Boston, at the corner of the present Washington and Essex Streets, under which the opponents of the Stamp Act were accustomed to assemble, soon became famous as "liberty tree." Those persons supposed to favor the ministry were hung in effigy on the branches of this elm. A mob attacked the house of Oliver, secretary of the colony, who had been appointed stamp-distributor for Massachusetts, broke his windows, destroyed his furniture, pulled down a small building supposed to be intended for a stamp office, and frightened Oliver into a resignation. Jonathan Mayhew, the able minister of the West Church in Boston, . . . preached a warm sermon against the Stamp Act, taking for his text, "I would they were even cut off which trouble you!" The Monday evening after this sermon the riots were renewed. The mob attacked the house of Story, registrar of the Admiralty, and destroyed not only the public files and records, but his private papers also. Next they entered and plundered the house of the controller of the customs; and, maddened with liquor and excitement, proceeded to the mansion of Hutchinson, in North Square. The lieutenant-governor and his family fled for their lives. The house was completely gutted, and the contents burned in bonfires kindled in the square. Along with Hutchinson's furniture and private papers perished many invaluable manuscripts relating to the history of the province, which Hutchinson had been thirty years in collecting, and which it was impossible to replace.

These acts were disclaimed by the more respectable citizens. Yet the rioters, though well known, went unpunished, and had undoubtedly the secret sympathy of the community.

Throughout the Northern colonies, associations on the basis of forcible resistance to the Stamp Act, under the name of "Sons of Liberty," sprang suddenly into existence. Persons of influence and consideration, though they might favor the object, kept aloof, however, from so dangerous a combination, which consisted of the young, the ardent, those who loved excitement and had nothing to lose. The history of these "Sons of Liberty" is very obscure; but they seem to have spread rapidly from Connecticut and New York into Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, and to have taken up as their special business the intimidation of the stamp officers. In all the colonies these officers were persuaded or compelled to resign; and such stamps as arrived either remained unpacked, or else were seized and burned. The Assembly of Pennsylvania unanimously adopted a series of resolutions denouncing the Stamp Act as "unconstitutional, and subversive of their dearest rights." Public meetings to protest against it were held throughout the colonies. The holding of such meetings was quite a new incident, and formed a new era in colonial history.
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The Repealing of the Stamp Act of 1765

The first day of November, appointed for the Stamp Act to go into operation, came and went, but not a stamp was anywhere to be seen. Two companies of rioters paraded that evening the streets of New York, demanding the delivery of the stamps, which Colden, on the resignation of the stamp-distributor and his refusal to receive them, had taken into the fort. Colden was hung in effigy. His carriage was seized, and made a bonfire of under the muzzles of the guns; after which the mob proceeded to a house in the outskirts, then occupied by Major James, of the Royal Artillery, who had made himself obnoxious by his free comments on the conduct of the colonists. James's furniture and property were destroyed, as Hutchinson's had been. General Gage, the commander-in-chief of the British forces in America, was at New York, but the regular garrison in the fort was very small. Alarmed for the safety of the city, and not willing to take any responsibility, as Sir Henry Moore, the recently-appointed governor, was every day expected, Colden agreed, by Gage's advice, the captain of a British ship of war in the harbor having refused to receive them, to give up the stamps to the mayor and corporation. They were accordingly deposited in the City Hall, under a receipt given by the mayor.

A committee was next day appointed which soon brought forward an agreement to import no more goods from Great Britain till the Stamp Act was repealed,--the commencement of a system of retaliation on the mother-country repeatedly resorted to in the course of the struggle. This non-importation agreement, to which a non-consumption agreement was presently added, besides being extensively signed in New York, was adopted also in Philadelphia and Boston. At the same time, and as part of the same plan, a combination was entered into for the support of American manufactures, the wearing of American cloths, and the increase of sheep by ceasing to eat lamb or mutton.

Business, suspended for a while, was presently resumed. Stamped papers were required in judicial proceedings, but by continuing the cases before them, or going on without notice of the deficiency, even the judges, after some hesitation, concurred in nullifying the act.

A change in the English ministry, news of which now reached America, encouraged the colonists in their policy of resistance. Grenville, the promoter of the Stamp Act, had been succeeded by the Marquis of Rockingham.

In the address from the throne at the opening of the session, the new ministry brought the state of colonial affairs before Parliament. They produced the correspondence of the colonial governors and other papers relating to the late disturbance. Numerous petitions from British merchants for the repeal of the Stamp Act were also presented to the two Houses.

Pitt, for some time past withdrawn by sickness from public affairs, was unconnected, at this moment, with either Grenville's or Rockingham's party. He now appeared in his place in the House of Commons, and delivered his opinion "that the kingdom had no right to levy a tax on the colonies." "The Commons in America, represented in their several Assemblies, have invariably exercised the constitutional right of giving and granting their own money; they would have been slaves if they had not; at the same time, this kingdom has ever possessed the power of legislative and commercial control. The colonies acknowledge your authority in all things, with the sole exception that you shall not take their money out of their pockets without their consent."

This decisive avowal by Pitt made a profound impression on the House. After a long pause, Grenville rose to vindicate the Stamp Act. The tumults in America bordered, he averred, on open rebellion; but if the doctrines now promulgated were upheld, they would soon lose that name, and become a revolution. Taxation was a branch of the sovereign power, constantly exercised by Parliament over the unrepresented. Resorting, then, to a method of intimidation common with politicians, "the seditious spirit of the colonies," he said, "Owes its birth to the faction in this House." This invidious assault was met by Pitt with characteristic intrepidity. "A charge is brought against gentlemen sitting in this House of giving birth to sedition in America. The freedom with which they have spoken their sentiments against this unhappy act is imputed to them as a crime. But the imputation shall not discourage me." "We are told America is obstinate--America is almost in open rebellion. Sir, I rejoice that America has resisted. Three millions of people so dead to all the feelings of liberty as voluntarily to submit to be slaves, would have been fit instruments to make slaves of all the rest." "The Americans have been wronged! They have been driven to madness by injustice! Will you punish them for the madness you have occasioned? No! Let this country be the first to resume its prudence and temper; I will pledge myself for the colonies, that on their part animosity and resentment will cease."

The new ministry were under no obligation to support the policy of their predecessors. Anxious to escape the difficulty by the readiest means, they brought in a bill for repealing the Stamp Act. Franklin, summoned to the bar of the House as a witness, testified that the act could never be enforced. His prompt and pointed answers gained him great credit for information, acuteness, and presence of mind. In favor of repeal, Burke, introduced into Parliament by Rockingham, to whom he had been private secretary, and for one of whose rotten boroughs he sat, gave his eloquent support. In spite of a very strenuous opposition on the part of the supporters of the late ministry, the bill of repeal was carried in the Commons by a vote of two hundred and seventy-five to one hundred and sixty-seven.

But the ministers by no means went the length of Pitt. They placed the repeal on the ground of expediency merely, and they softened the opposition by another bill previously passed, which asserted the power and right of Parliament "to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever." Lord Camden, formerly Chief-Justice Pratt, made a vigorous opposition to this bill in the House of Lords. "My position in this--I repeat it; I will maintain it to the last hour--taxation and representation are inseparable. The position is founded in the law of nature. It is more; it is itself an eternal law of nature." Lord Mansfield, on the other hand, maintained the sovereign power of Parliament as including the right to tax,--an idea quite too flattering to the pride of authority to be easily relinquished.
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The Boston Massacre

THE sound of the rejoicings called forth by the repeal of the Stamp Act had hardly died away before it was seen how little had really been gained beyond immediate and temporary relief. The Stamp Act was gone, but the Declaratory Act, and the Sugar Act, and the Mutiny Act, requiring quarters to be provided for English troops, and recently extended to the colonies, remained unmodified and unchanged. The Rockingham ministry was dissolved; Pitt came again to the helm, and was made the Earl of Chatham. The clouds of his strange illness gathered about the prime minister, and the conduct of affairs fell into the hands of Charles Townshend, a believer in the Stamp Act, and with no faith in Pitt's distinction between internal and external taxation. He was determined to pursue the policy of Grenville, and laid his plans to quarter garrisons in the large towns of America and have them supported by the colonial Assemblies, and to exact a revenue from the colonies. The trouble had, indeed, already begun in New York, where the Assembly, which had passed a limited act for the supply of two regiments in December, 1766, refused to provide for quartering troops, and stood firm through a long controversy with Sir Henry Moore. In the following spring, Parliament, under the lead of Townshend, suspended the legislative powers of New York, as a punishment for their disobedience. This was a warning which could not be mistaken. In the other colonies, even when requisitions were complied with, there was careful evasion of obedience to the terms of the act, and sympathy with New York spread far and wide, carrying with it deep disquiet and indignation. Not content with beginning to enforce the Mutiny Act, Townshend carried measures to impose port duties on wine, oil, and fruit from Spain and Portugal, and on glass, paper, lead, colors, and tea. The revenue thus raised was to be used for the payment of the crown officers, and for the establishment of a civil list. This was a blow at the most vital rights of the colonies, for it took from them the control of their governments. The new policy, unchecked by the death of Townshend in the autumn of 1767, excited the utmost apprehension in America, and fanned into flame the smouldering embers of the opposition to the Stamp Act. Again non-importation agreements were discussed, but without combination or effect; and Massachusetts, thoroughly alarmed at the prospect of independent crown officers, determined on stronger measures. The Assembly resolved to send a petition to the king, and letters to the statesmen of England. In the petition, drawn, probably, by Samuel Adams, the Assembly set forth the conditions of their settlement, argued against taxation without representation, and protested against the presence of a standing army, and the project of rendering the judicial and executive officers independent of the people. They followed this action by a resolve inviting the other colonies to unite with them in petitions to the king against the new taxation. At every step Bernard and Hutchinson resisted the Assembly, which moved forward steadily, cautiously, and firmly, making no mistakes, and giving no openings. Bernard and the crown officers met the action of the Assembly by a counter-memorial, inveighing against the freedom and independent temper of the colonists, and advising the immediate presence of fleets and armies,--supporting their requests with tales of projected riots, for the people had begun to be restless, although there was really no danger of any serious outbreak.

Hillsborough, the new Secretary of State, and the king's friends were indignant at the action of Massachusetts, and letters were sent to the other colonies denouncing the Massachusetts circular, and to Bernard instructing him to order the House to rescind their resolve, and, if they refused, to dissolve them. Meantime, the excitement increased. John Hancock's sloop Liberty was seized, on the ground of evasion of the customs. There was a slight disturbance, and revenue officers, in pretended fear of their lives, took refuge on the Romney man-of-war, while the town and the governor quarreled about the affair. When the general court met, strengthened by the sympathy of Connecticut and New Jersey, and by the letter of Virginia, where their principles had been sustained by resolutions of the Burgesses, Hillsborough's letter was presented. The House, by an overwhelming vote, refused to rescind; the court was dissolved, and Massachusetts was left without a legislature. Boston town meeting took into its hands the power which Hillsborough and Bernard sought to crush. They called a convention of delegates from the towns of the province while troops were on their way to Massachusetts; and this convention came together, demanded in vain a general court, passed strong resolutions against taxation and a standing army, and adjourned. while the Council refused to make provision for the expected soldiers until the barracks were filled, and the old beacon was prepared as in the days of Andros. Soon after the convention dissolved, two regiments, presently increased to four, and artillery, landed and marched into the town. The Council refused quarters until the barracks were occupied; and, after camping for some time in the open air, the troops were finally quartered and supplied at the expense of the crown. No measure could possibly have been taken better calculated to produce civil war. The troops were sent to overawe, and they merely irritated the people. Into a peaceful town, into a province which had simply remonstrated and petitioned legally and properly in defence of their rights, were suddenly thrust royal regiments. The strong feeling of independence in a country where garrisons were absolutely unknown was outraged, while the bad character and licentious habits of the soldiery incensed a rigid, austere, and sober people. Attempts at military coercion and the presence of troops were sure to breed trouble; and, worse than this, they not only awakened the sympathy of the other colonies, but alarmed them for their own safety. It was outside pressure and peril in its strongest form, and nothing tended so strongly to produce the union which alone could be fatal to English rule.

In Virginia, when the Burgesses met, resolutions were passed declaring against taxation, and asserting the right to trial by a jury of the vicinage, and to combination among the colonies. Botetourt dissolved the Assembly, and the Burgesses met in convention and formed a stringent non-importation agreement. Virginia carried with her the Southern colonies, and her example was followed in Delaware and Pennsylvania, and when the general court came together again in Massachusetts they promptly adopted the resolutions. Some of the troops had been withdrawn; but two regiments were kept on Bernard's request, and he and the legislature were in no good humor when they met at Cambridge, whither the governor adjourned them. The House refused flatly to provide for troops, or to give a salary for the year to Bernard, who was recalled, and who soon after, having prorogued the refractory Assembly, departed from Boston, amid the noisy rejoicings of the populace, leaving Hutchinson to rule in his stead. While Massachusetts and Virginia were thus coming together and preparing the American Union, the ministry in England, halting and undecided, rather frightened at the results of their energetic policy, and desperately embroiled with Wilkes, decided to recede. They sent a circular to the colonies, promising to lay no more taxes, and to repeal the duties on glass, paper, and colors, retaining only that on tea. Their action was that of well-meaning, narrow, and weak men. They should either then and there have enforced their policy at the point of the bayonet, or they should have fully and frankly given way on every point. To save their pride, maintain their doctrines, and please the king, they retained one paltry tax, yielding perhaps three hundred pounds a year, but which carried the vital principle with it as surely and clearly as revenue involving millions. The course of the ministry had slowly brought the conflict to the point at which complete victory on one side or the other was alone possible. The colonies were fully alive to the situation, and saw that while one tax remained nothing had been gained. The non-importation agreements spread everywhere, and were strongly enforced, and all society was drawn into a refusal to use tea. Conflicts with the revenue officers in Rhode Island and elsewhere grew more and more frequent, and the relations of the people with the soldiery in New York and Boston more and more strained. In New York there were violent affrays between the soldiers and the people over the erection of the liberty-pole, and there was fighting in the streets. These outbreaks heightened the feeling in Boston, where the soldiers were taunted and insulted, and where recurring fights between populace and red-coats showed that a crisis was at hand. On the 3d of March there was an ugly brawl, and on the evening of the 5th there was another fray, and trouble with the sentry. Before quiet was restored there was renewed fighting, and a crowd gathered round the sentry in King Street. Alarmed and angry, the man called out the guard; the mob rapidly increased; insults were followed by missiles; one soldier discharged his gun; there was a scattering fire from the troops, and three of the citizens were killed and two mortally wounded. Blood had been shed, and it looked as if civil war had begun. The regiments were turned out, the people poured into the streets; it was a mere chance that the American Revolution was not then to open. But Hutchinson appeared in the balcony of the State-House, promised an investigation, and besought peace. The people dispersed, and war was for the moment averted; but nothing could efface the memory of this affray. Regular troops had fired upon the citizens, human life had been sacrificed, and the exaggerated title of the "Boston Massacre" showed the importance attached to this event, which served for years to keep alive and develop resistance to England.

The morning after the massacre the select-men waited on Hutchinson and urged the removal of the troops. At eleven the town meeting came together, and chose a committee, with Samuel Adams at its head, to wait upon the governor and demand the withdrawal of the troops. Hutchinson wished to delay and postpone. He offered to have the Twenty-Ninth Regiment, which had fired on the people, removed to the Castle, and the other put under proper restraint. The committee went back through thronged streets, and made its report, which was pronounced unsatisfactory, and a new committee, again headed by Adams, went back to the governor. The interview which followed in the council-chamber, as the daylight slowly faded, was one of the great dramatic scenes of the American Revolution. In that moment Samuel Adams was pre-eminent, and all the greatness and force of his mind and character concentrated to raise him up as the great tribune of the people. The incarnation of right and justice, the true champion of the people, he stood before the fit representative of a weak, vacillating, proud, and stupid ministry, and made the representative quail before him. "If you can remove one, you can remove both," he said to Hutchinson; "there are three thousand people in yonder town meeting; the country is rising; night is falling; and we must have an answer." Hutchinson hesitated a moment, trembled, and gave way. Before a week elapsed, all the troops were withdrawn; and meantime they had watched the funerals of their victims, seen their companions arrested for murder, beheld a town meeting called to hurry their departure, and had been kept under strict guard by the militia of the town they went forth to garrison. Staying and going were alike full of humiliation and defeat. It was a great triumph; and as the news of the events at Boston spread, a strong sense of relief filled the colonies.
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The Gaspee affair


An act of violence committed by the colonists of Rhode Island, though less memorable in respect of its intrinsic importance than the insurrection of the Regulators in North Carolina, excited more general attention from its significance as an indication of the height to which the general current of American sentiment was rising. The commander of the Gaspee, an armed British schooner stationed at Providence, had exerted much activity in supporting the trade laws and punishing the increasing contraband traffic of the Americans, and had provoked additional resentment by firing at the Providence packets in order to compel them to salute his flag by lowering theirs as they passed his vessel, and by chasing them even into the docks in case of refusal. The master of a packet conveying passengers to Providence (June 9, 1772), which was fired at and chased by the Gaspee for neglecting to pay the requisite tribute of respect, took advantage of the state of the tide (it being almost high water) to stand in so closely to the shore that the Gaspee in the pursuit might be exposed to run aground. The artifice succeeded; the Gaspee presently stuck fast, and the packet proceeded in triumph to Providence, where a strong sensation was excited by the tidings of the occurrence, and a project was hastily formed to improve the blow and destroy the obnoxious vessel. Brown, an eminent merchant, and Whipple, a ship-master, took the lead in this bold adventure, and easily collected a sufficient band of armed and resolute men, with whom they embarked in whale-boats to attack the British ship of war. At two o'clock the next morning they boarded the Gaspee so suddenly and in such numbers that her crew were instantly overpowered, without hurt to any one except her commanding officer, who was wounded. The captors, having despatched a part of their number to convey him, together with his private effects and his crew, ashore, set fire to the Gaspee and destroyed her, with all her stores The issue of this daring act of war against the naval force of the king was as remarkable as the enterprise itself. [A large reward was offered for information, and commissioners appointed to try the offenders.] But no trial took place. Nobody came forward to claim the proffered reward;. . and in the commencement of the following year the commissioners reported to the British ministry their inability, notwithstanding the most diligent inquisition, to procure evidence or information against a single individual.
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The Enforcement of the Tea Act...The Boston Tea Party


The British government, having rashly determined to enforce the Tea-duty Act, of which the most considerable effect hitherto was a vast importation of smuggled tea into America by the French, the Dutch, the Danes, and the Swedes, attempted to compass by policy what constraint and authority had proved insufficient to accomplish. The measures of the Americans had already occasioned such diminution of exports from Britain that the warehouses of the English East India Company contained above seventeen millions of pounds of tea, for which it was difficult to procure a market. The unwillingness of the Company to lose their commercial profits, and of the ministry to forego the expected revenue from the sale of tea in America, induced a compromise for their mutual advantage. A high duty was imposed hitherto on the exportation of tea from England; but the East India Company were now authorized by act of Parliament to export their tea free of duty to all places whatever (may, 1773). By this contrivance it was expected that tea, though loaded with an exceptionable tax on its importation into America, would yet readily obtain purchasers among the Americans; as the vendors, relieved of the British export duty, could afford to sell it to them even cheaper than before it was made a source of American revenue.

The crisis now drew near when the Americans were to decide whether they would submit to be taxed by the British Parliament, or practically support their own principles and brave the most perilous consequences of their inflexibility. One common sentiment was awakened throughout the whole continent by the tidings of the ministerial device, which was universally reprobated as an attempt, at once injurious and insulting, to bribe the Americans to surrender their rights and bend their own necks to the yoke of arbitrary power. A violent ferment arose; the corresponding committees and political clubs exerted their utmost activity to rouse and unite the people; and it was generally declared that, as every citizen owed to his country the duty at least of refraining from being accessory to her subjugation, every man who countenanced the present measure of the British government should be deemed an enemy of America. .

The East India Company, confident of finding a market for their tea, reduced as it was now in price, freighted several ships to America with this commodity, and appointed consignees to receive and dispose of it. Some cargoes were sent to New York, some to Philadelphia, some to Charleston, the metropolis of South Carolina, and some to Boston. The inhabitants of New York and Philadelphia prevailed with the consignees to disclaim their functions, and forced the ships to return with their cargoes to London. The inhabitants of Charleston unladed the tea, and deposited it in public cellars, where it was locked up from use and finally perished. At Boston, the consignees, who were the near kinsmen of Governor Hutchinson, at first refused to renounce their appointments (November 5); and the vessels containing the tea lay for some time in the harbor, watched by a strong guard of the citizens, who, from a numerous town meeting, dispatched peremptory commands to the ship-masters not to land their obnoxious cargoes. . [The consignees] proposed then to the people that the tea should be landed, and preserved in some public store or magazine; but this compromise was indignantly rejected. At length the popular rage broke through every restraint of order and decency. From the symptoms of its dangerous fervor the consignees fled in dismay to the Castle; while an assemblage of men, dressed and painted like Mohawk Indians, boarded the vessels and threw the tea into the ocean (December 16).

It was remarked with some surprise that during the whole of this transaction the civil and military force of government, including the garrison of Castle William and several ships of war in the harbor, remained completely inactive. The governor, indeed, issued a proclamation forbidding the people to assemble in factious meetings. But the council, when their protection was implored by the consignees, refused to interfere at all in the matter; and though, after the outrage was committed, they condemned its perpetration and invoked legal vengeance upon all who had been engaged in it, the futility of this demonstration was obvious to every eye. To procure legal proof that would implicate even a single individual was notoriously impossible.
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The First Continental Congress


On the day when the operation of the Boston Port Bill was appointed to commence (June 1, 1774) all the commercial business of the capital of Massachusetts was concluded at noon, and the harbor of this flourishing town was closed, till the gathering storm of the Revolution was to reopen it. At Williamsburg, in Virginia, the day was devoutly consecrated to the religious exercises recommended by the Assembly. At Philadelphia it was solemnized by a great majority of the population with every testimonial of public grief; all the inhabitants, except the Quakers, shut up their houses; and after divine service a deep and ominous stillness reigned in the city. In other parts of America it was also observed as a day of mourning; and the sentiments thus widely awakened were kept alive and exasperated by the distress to which the inhabitants of Boston were reduced by the continued operation of the Port Bill, and by the fortitude with which they endured it. The rents of the landholders in and around Boston now ceased or were greatly diminished; all the wealth vested in warehouses and wharves was rendered unproductive; from the merchants was wrested the commerce they had reared, and the means alike of providing for their families and paying their debts; the artificers employed in the numerous crafts nourished by an extensive commerce shared the general hardship; and a great majority of that class of the community who earned daily bread by their daily labor were deprived of the means of support. But, animated still by that enduring and dauntless spirit of freedom which had been the parent principle of the New England communities, the inhabitants of Boston sustained the presence of this calamity with inflexible fortitude. Their virtue was cheered by the sympathy, and their sufferings were mitigated by the generosity, of the sister colonies. In all the American States contributions were made for their relief. Corporate bodies, town meetings, and provincial conventions, from all quarters, transmitted to them letters and addresses, applauding their conduct, and exhorting them to perseverance.

The royal garrison of Boston was now augmented, and its fortifications strengthened and increased, thus adding to the irritation of the people. At the suggestion of the Massachusetts Assembly, a Congress of the provinces was called. This Congress, embracing members from all the colonies except Georgia, met at Philadelphia on September 5, 1774. Of the debates of this body, which continued in session eight weeks, no authentic report exists, but it published a Declaration of the Rights of America, with many other acts in which a determined spirit of resistance to tyranny was indicated. Before dissolving, it was decreed to meet again on May 10, 1775, if no redress of American grievances was granted. A cargo of tea about this time entered the harbor of Annapolis, Maryland, but the ship-master became so alarmed by the popular excitement that he asked the advice of an able lawyer, Charles Carroll of Carrollton, as to what he should do. Carroll advised him to burn the vessel and cargo. This advice was taken. "The sails were set, the colors displayed, and the vessel burned amidst the acclamations of the multitude."
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The Battle of Lexington and Concord


When on the night of the 18th of April, 1775, Paul Revere rode beneath the bright moonlight through Lexington to Concord, with Dawes and Prescott for comrades, he was carrying the signal for the independence of a nation. He had seen across the Charles River the two lights from the church-steeple in Boston which were to show that a British force was going out to seize the patriotic supplies at Concord; he had warned Hancock and Adams at Rev. Jonas Clark's parsonage in Lexington, and had rejected Sergeant Monroe's caution against unnecessary noise, with the rejoinder, "You'll have noise enough here before long: the regulars are coming out." As he galloped on his way the regulars were advancing with steady step behind him, soon warned of their own danger by alarm-bells and signal-guns. When Revere was captured by some British officers who happened to be near Concord, Colonel Smith, the commander of the expedition, had already halted, ordered Pitcairn forward, and sent back prudently for reinforcements. It was a night of terror to all the neighboring Middlesex towns, for no one knew what excesses the angry British troops might commit on their return march..

Before 5 A.M. on April 19, 1775, the British troops had reached Lexington Green, where thirty-eight men, under Captain Parker, stood up before six hundred or eight hundred to be shot at, their captain saying, "Don't fire unless you are fired on; but if they want a war, let it begin here." It began there; they were fired upon; they fired rather ineffectually in return, while seven were killed and nine wounded. The rest, after retreating, reformed and pursued the British towards Concord, capturing seven stragglers,--the first prisoners taken in the war.

Then followed the fight at Concord, where four hundred and fifty Americans, instead of thirty-eight, were rallied to meet the British. The fighting took place between two detachments at the North Bridge, where

"once the embattled farmers stood, And fired the shot heard round the world."

There the American, captain, Isaac Davis, was killed at the first shot, --he who had said, when his company was placed at the head of the little column, "I haven't a man that is afraid to go." He fell, and Major Buttrick gave the order, "Fire! for God's sake, fire!" in return. The British detachment retreated in disorder, but their main body was too strong to be attacked, so they disabled a few cannon, destroyed some barrels of flour, cut down the liberty-pole, set fire to the court-house, and then began their return march. It ended in a flight; they were exposed to a constant guerilla fire; minute-men flocked behind every tree and house; and only the foresight of Colonel Smith in sending for reinforcements had averted a surrender. At 2 P. M., near Lexington, Percy with his troops met the returning fugitives, and formed a hollow square, into which they ran and threw themselves on the ground exhausted. Then Percy in turn fell back. Militia still came pouring in from Dorchester, Milton, Dedham, as well as the nearer towns. A company from Danvers marched sixteen miles in four hours. The Americans lost ninety-three in killed, wounded, and missing that day; the British, two hundred and seventy-three. But the important result was that every American colony now recognized that war had begun.
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The day of the meeting of the Second Continental Congress.


On May 10, the Continental Congress convened, and on the same day Ethan Allen took possession of the strong fortress of Ticonderoga. It was the first act of positive aggression by the patriotic party, for at both Lexington and Concord they were acting on the defensive. The expedition was planned in Connecticut and reinforced in western Massachusetts, but the main reliance was to be placed on Ethan Allen and his "Green Mountain Boys," whose daring and energy were already well known. Benedict Arnold, who had been commissioned in Massachusetts for the same purpose, arrived only in time to join the expedition as a volunteer. On May 10, 1775, eighty-three men crossed the lake with Allen. When they had landed, he warned them that it was a dangerous enterprise, and called for volunteers. Every man volunteered. The rest took but a few moments. They entered with a war-whoop the open wicket-gate, pressing by the sentinel, and when the half-clad commander appeared and asked their authority, Allen answered with the words that have become historic, "In the name of the great Jehovah and the Continental Congress."

The Congress was only to meet that day, but it appeared already to be exercising a sort of antenatal authority, and a fortress which had cost eight million pounds sterling and many lives was placed in its hands by a mere stroke of boldness. Crown Point gave itself up with equal ease to Seth Warner, and another dramatic surprise was given to the new-born nation.
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The history of the Battle of Bunker Hill

Israel Putnam, who had won honors in the French and Indian War, and Captain Hubbard, were at work on their farms in adjoining fields, when a man on horseback, with a drum, stopped to tell them of the fight. Hubbard, a man of method, at once walked home, put things in order, filled his knapsack, and started for the camp; but fiery old Putnam simply unyoked his team from the plough, sent his son home to tell his mother what had happened, mounted his horse, and dashed away for Boston, which he reached in twenty-four hours, though it was nearly one hundred miles distant.

The militia were gathering with surprising rapidity. Within a few days an army of twenty thousand men was encamped around Boston, extending from Dorchester to the Mystic River, and completely enclosing the British troops within the city. Generals Ward and Putnam were made commanders of the army, Ward having the chief command. In all haste they constructed lines of entrenchment sufficiently strong to encourage their undisciplined forces. During this interval, Gage, who had made no effort to face the provincials, was reinforced by troops under Generals Howe, Clinton, and Burgoyne, and had now an army of from ten to twelve thousand trained soldiers. Thus strengthened, he prepared to act with more energy, and issued a proclamation declaring those in arms rebels and traitors, and offering pardon to all who would go quietly home, with the exception of the arch-rebels Samuel Adams and John Hancock. The story of the stirring events which immediately followed we extract from Cutter's "Life of Israel Putnam."]

THE American commanders, having ascertained that the British intended to take possession of the heights of Charlestown, as a vantage-ground from which to dislodge them from some of their entrenchments, and thus make a way into the country, resolved, by a sudden and secret movement, to defeat the project, by advancing to that position a portion of the left wing of their own camp.

Putnam, who had already carefully examined the ground, was strenuously in favor of this movement, and had urged it again and again in council, with all the arguments at his command. In common with Prescott, and other veterans, who understood the character of the American soldiery and knew the immense advantage to the order and discipline of the army which would be derived from active and hazardous service, he had repeatedly proposed to lead a party which should invite an engagement with the enemy..

The measure was ably opposed by some of the best and bravest men in the council, and there were obstacles in the way of its accomplishment which would have appalled any other men than those who planned and achieved it. One of these was the want of powder. There were, at that time, only eleven barrels in the public depots, and sixty-seven barrels in all Massachusetts,-- scarcely enough, under the most prudent management, for one day's fighting. To this objection General Pomeroy answered that he was ready to lead his men to battle with but five cartridges apiece. They were all experienced marksmen, and would fire no random shots; and if every American killed his five, they would have but little occasion for more powder..

The bolder counsels prevailed, and orders were issued to Colonels Prescott and Bridge, and the regiment of Colonel Frye, to be prepared for an expedition with all their men who were fit for service, and with one day's provision. The same order was issued to one hundred and twenty men of General Putnam's regiment, under the command of the brave Captain Knowlton, and one company of artillery, with two field-pieces. Putnam, having the general superintendence of the expedition, and Colonel Gridley, the chief engineer, accompanied the troops..

The detachment drafted for this expedition, consisting of about one thousand men, under the immediate command of Colonel Prescott, were assembled on the common at Cambridge at an early hour on the evening of the 16th of June, where prayers were offered by Rev. President Langdon, of Harvard College. Immediately after dark they commenced their silent march through Cambridge and across the Neck, Colonel Prescott leading the way. He was attended only by two sergeants, carrying dark lanterns, open only in the rear.

Arrived at the base of Bunker Hill, they found the wagon laden with entrenching-tools, and then only were the men made acquainted with the nature and purpose of the expedition. A serious question now arose among the leaders.

It was perceived that entrenchments on Bunker Hill would be of minor importance unless the elevation known as Breed's Hill, nearer Boston, was seized and fortified. After a long consultation, Putnam's counsel was taken, to erect the main work on Breed's Hill, with a subsidiary one on Bunker Hill, as a protection to the rear, and as a rallying-point in case of defeat.

It was midnight before the first spade entered the ground. It was then within four days of the summer solstice. They had, consequently, but about for hours to work, before the dawning light would disclose their operations to the enemy and expose them to an immediate cannonading from the batteries in Boston and the ships in the harbor. But such was the spirit and resolution of the whole party, officers and men, that the work was effected in that brief space. Instructed and stimulated by Putnam and Prescott, who did not fear a spade or a pickaxe any more than a sword or a musket, and feeling that life and liberty alike depended on their success, they performed prodigies of labor during that notable night, --surpassed only by the prodigies of valor by which they signalized the following day. The works being in a state of promising forwardness, and every man cheerfully doing his whole duty, Putnam repaired to his camp at an early hour, to make all necessary preparations for the coming crisis.

The crisis came with the dawning light. When the British officers, aroused at peep of day by their startled sentinels, beheld their daring foes above them, overlooking their whole position with formidable entrenchments, which had sprung up as by enchantment in the night, they could scarcely credit the evidence of their own senses. It was instantly perceived that, if the Americans were not driven from their bold position at once, Boston would be no longer tenable by the British. A council of war was called, which directed an immediate assault.

Meanwhile, as preparations for the assault were going on, a brisk but unavailing fire was opened upon the Americans from the armed vessels and floating batteries, and from the battery on Copp's Hill.. General Putnam, on discovering the design of the enemy, returned immediately to Cambridge, and urgently advised that a reinforcement should be sent to Colonel Prescott's aid, and that his men should be supplied with suitable refreshment before the action should commence. His application for reinforcements was unsuccessful. General Ward was strongly impressed with the idea that the British would land on Lechemere's Point, or Inman's farm, in Cambridge, and make an assault upon the camp, and so cut off the rear of the party in Charlestown. He was the more convinced of this, as the scanty depots of ammunition and military stores on which the salvation of the American army depended were at Cambridge and Watertown, and in no way could the British gain so decided an advantage over them as by securing or destroying them. And this had been the direct object of all their active operations hitherto. It appears, also, that a formidable party of General Gage's council of war, among whom were Generals Clinton and Grant, were urgently in favor of making an attack at this place. Ward, therefore, thought it unsafe to weaken his own force, as that would not only invite an attack, but render it difficult to repel it. On the same grounds he resisted the earnest solicitation of Putnam's troops to follow their commander to the battle, assuring them that theirs was the post of danger, and, consequently, of honor..

The cannonading from the British ships and floating batteries, though kept up incessantly during all the morning, effected nothing. The Americans kept on steadily at their works, suffering more from hunger and fatigue than from the fire or the fear of the enemy. Putnam was very anxious to avail himself of the time required for the British troops to prepare for engagement to throw up another redoubt, according to the original plan, and in obedience to orders, on Bunker Hill. He accordingly, with a handful of men, commenced an entrenchment on that summit, which, if it could have been completed so far as to afford a tolerable protection to his troops, would have enabled him to check the advance of the British and prevent them from occupying the redoubt on Breed's Hill. The two summits were within gunshot of each other, the former, which was nearly thirty feet higher, having complete command of the latter.

Little was done on this breastwork, the attack of the British making more urgent work for the men.

The veteran General Pomeroy, on hearing the distant roar of the artillery, borrowed a horse to carry him to the field. On approaching the Neck, which was swept by a tremendous firing form the British ships, he became alarmed, not for his own safety, but for that of the horse he had borrowed. He accordingly left his charger in charge of a sentinel, and coolly walked over, mounted the hill, and advanced to the rail fence. He was received with the highest exultation, and the name of Pomeroy rang through the line.

General Warren had previously made his way to the same point. Later, when it became evident that an assault would be made upon the works, General Ward sent reinforcements to Prescott.

The British van soon appeared in view. The Americans, eager to salute them, were with difficulty restrained from firing too soon. General Putnam rode along the line, giving strict orders that no one should fire till the enemy had arrived within eight rods, nor then, till the word of command should be given. "Powder is scarce," said he, "and must not be wasted. Do not fire at the enemy till you see the whites of their eyes; then fire low,--take aim at their waistbands,--aim at the handsome coats,--pick off the commanders." The same orders were given by Prescott, Pomeroy, Stark, and all the veteran officers.

The effect of these orders was tremendous. With a bold and confident front, assured of an easy victory over the raw, undisciplined troops of the Provinces, the British troops advanced to the fatal line, eight rods in advance of the defences, when a well-aimed volley from the deadly muskets within swept away the whole front rank, and laid many a gallant officer in the dust. Rank succeeded ran, and volley following volley mowed them down, till at length they were compelled to retreat..

Three times did the brave veterans of the British retreat before the deadly fire of the American militia, with the loss of whole ranks of men and the very elite of their officers; and three times, in the face of this almost certain death, they returned to the charge. They had expected an easy victory, and promised themselves that at the first approach of a regular army the raw, undisciplined Americans would fly like frightened sheep. They now found, not less to their cost than to their surprise, that they had men to deal with, and that courage, daring, and the highest heroism were less a matter of training than of principle. As colonel Abercrombie led up his men to the charge, he was saluted by a familiar stentorian voice from the redoubt, reminding him, probably, of a reproachful epithet he had applied to his enemies: "Colonel Abercrombie, are the Yankees cowards?"

Hitherto the British had neglected the only manoeuvre by which they could possibly defeat their enemy, so long as their ammunition should last. This was to charge with the bayonet. The Americans were wholly unprovided with bayonets, and therefore could not resist nor withstand a charge. But this the assailants did not know. They relied upon their fire, which was for the most part aimless and ineffectual, while every shot from the redoubt, the breastwork, and the rail fence, being reserved and deliberate, found its victim.

While these terrible scenes were enacting, several reinforcements arrived from Boston to the aid of the British, till their whole number amounted to not less than eight thousand. To add new horrors to the scene, vast columns of smoke were observed over Charlestown, and the village was seen to be on fire in several places.

The British had been annoyed by a fire from this place, and sent a detachment of men to burn it. While they were doing so, and seeking to gain the rear of the Americans under cover of the smoke, Putnam saw them, and opened on them with some cannon which had been deserted.

The pieces were well aimed, General Putnam dismounting and pointing them himself, and every ball took effect. One canister was so well directed that it made a complete lane through the columns of the enemy, and threw them into momentary confusion. With wonderful courage, however, they closed their ranks, and advanced again to the charge. The Americans, their cartridges being spent, resorted to their muskets, and, suffering their assailants to approach still nearer than before, poured in a volley with such deliberate aim that the front rank was swept wholly away, and officers and men fell in promiscuous heaps..

In the midst of this thunder of artillery and rattling of musketry, the sulphurous smoke rolling up in heavy volumes, and the balls whistling by on every side, Captain Foster, of Colonel Mansfield's regiment, arrived with a supply of powder from the American camp. It was brought in casks in wagons, and distributed loose to the soldiers, as they were able to take it; some receiving it in their horns, some in their pockets, and some in their hats, or whatever else they had that would hold it.

More than a thousand of the best of the British troops had now fallen before the murderous fire of an enemy whom they affected to despise as peasants and rebels. Among these was a large number of their bravest and most accomplished officers.. Meanwhile, the Americans, protected by their entrenchments, had suffered but little loss. But now the crisis was to come. Their ammunition was exhausted, and there was no alternative but to retreat. General Howe had learned, by a terrible experience, that it was vain to think of frightening the "undisciplined rebels" from their defences by the mere smell of gunpowder. With the advice of the accomplished and chivalrous General Clinton, who had just come to his aid, he commanded the works to be scaled and the enemy driven out at the point of the bayonet. He led the charge in person, as he had done before. General Clinton joined General Pigot, with a view to turn the right flank of the enemy. The artillery were ordered to advance to the same time, turn the left of the breastwork, and rake the line. This was the most vulnerable point in the American defences, and had hitherto been wholly overlooked.

Every possible preparation was made to meet this charge, but the powder of the Americans was exhausted.

They had sent in vain to the camp for a further supply. The magazine there was reduced to less than two barrels. The few who had a charge remaining reserved their last fire till the artillery, now advancing to turn the flank of their breastwork, had approached within the prescribed distance. Then every shot took effect. The gallant Howe, who had escaped unhurt hitherto, received one of the last of the American balls in his foot.

The fire of the Americans gradually diminished, and then ceased. Instantly their muskets were clubbed, and the stones of their defences were seized and hurled at the advancing foe. This only served to betray their weakness, and infused a new energy into their assailants. No longer exposed to that destructive fire which had so fearfully thinned their ranks, they now marched forward, scaled the redoubt, and began the work of retribution. The artillery, advancing at the same instant to the open space on the north, between the breastwork and the rail fence, enfiladed the line, and sent their balls through the open gate-way, or sally-port, directly into the redoubt, under cover of which the troops at the breastwork were compelled to retire.

The heroic but diminutive Pigot was the first to scale the works. He was instantly followed by his men, now confident of an easy victory. Troops succeeded troops over the parapet, till that little arena, where the first great effort of American prowess was put forth, was filled with combatants, prepared to contest its possession.

To contend, without a bayonet in his company, against such a superior force, would have been worse than madness. Prescott saw this, and reluctantly ordered a retreat. He and Warren were the last to leave the redoubt. The latter seemed to disdain to fly, even when nothing else remained to him. With sullen reluctance he followed his countrymen to the port, which he had scarcely passed when a ball from the enemy arrested him. Major Small [of the British army], as a personal friend,.. endeavored to save him. But Warren would neither yield nor fly. He fell between the retreat and the pursuit, having won the respect of his enemies and the everlasting gratitude of his countrymen, and leaving his name as one of the watchwords of liberty throughout the world..

The retreating Americans were now between the two wings of the British army, so that they could not fire without endangering the lives of each other. A brave and orderly retreat was effected.. Putnam, though the balls fell around him like hail, was wholly insensible of danger. Coming to one of the deserted field-pieces, he dismounted, took his stand by its side, and seemed resolved to brave the foe alone. One sergeant alone dared to stand by him in this perilous position. He was soon shot down, and the general himself retired only when the British bayonets were close upon him and he was in imminent danger of being made a prisoner..

The Americans had retreated about twenty rods, before the enemy had time to rally. They were then suddenly exposed to a destructive fire, which proved more fatal to them than all the previous contest. Some of the best and bravest men were left on this part of the field, and several officers, whose behavior that day had given promise of the highest military distinction. The retreat was maintained in good order, over the Neck, to Prospect and Winter Hills, where they took up their position for the night, throwing up hasty entrenchments, which were soon strengthened and fortified, so as to present to the enemy another line of defence, equally formidable with that they had just purchased at the expense of so much blood.
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