The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1 by Julian Hawthorne

J >> Julian Hawthorne >> The History of the United States from 1492 to 1910, Volume 1

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At length the English government, weakened by the opposition, and by the
badness of their cause, agreed to abolish all duties except that on tea,
which was now bought cheaper in Boston than in London; and to withdraw two
at least of the regiments. But Boston was contending for a principle, not
for a few hundred pounds, and refused to accept the tea as a compromise.
Much more conducive to good feeling was the recall of Governor Bernard,
just as he was making himself comfortable for a long tenure of office
under the protection of British soldiers. This man's character is as
contemptible as any in colonial history. It was not merely or chiefly that
he was an abject miser and a foe to liberty. He was a convicted liar, a
spy, and a double-dealer; and his cowardice made him despised even by the
British. He scrupled not to swindle the British government, by conniving
at smuggling, while assuring them of his zeal in putting it down. While
smiling in men's faces, he was covertly laying plots for their
destruction. His last thought, after receiving the crushing news of his
recall, was to try to beguile the assembly into voting him his salary for
the coming year. The attempt failed, and he retreated in disgrace, with
joy-bells ringing in his ears. His only consolation was that he left
Hutchinson in his place, as ill-disposed toward liberty and honor as
himself, and his superior in intelligence. His recall had been due to the
desire of London merchants, who believed that his presence was destructive
of their commercial interests. The ministers for whom he had incurred so
much ignominy would do nothing for him; for the dishonorable are always
ready to sacrifice their instruments.

Hutchinson immediately began the system of secret conspiracy against the
lives and liberties of the chief citizens of Boston which marked his
administration; flattering them in their presence, while writing letters
of false accusations to the English ministry, which he begged them never
to disclose. But his cowardice was equal to Bernard's; so that when the
people detected an informer, and tarred and feathered him, he dared not
order the English regiments to interfere, and no one else was qualified to
give the word. But the hatred between the soldiers and the citizens was
inflamed. A British officer told his men, if they were "touched" by a
citizen, to "run him through the body." Many young men went armed with
oaken cudgels.

Two sons of Hutchinson, worthy of their sire, were guilty of felony in
breaking a lock to get at a consignment of tea, which had been locked up
by the committee of merchants. The merchants called Hutchinson to account;
he promised to deposit the price of what tea had been sold and to return
the rest. Dalrymple, the commander, issued twelve rounds of ammunition,
with which the soldiers ostentatiously paraded the streets. But inasmuch
as no one but the governor was authorized to bid them fire, and the
citizens knew Hutchinson's timidity too well to imagine that he would do
such a thing, this only led to taunts and revilings; and such epithets as
"lobster-backs" and "damned rebels" were freely bandied between the
military and the young men. The officers made common cause with their men,
and the custom house people fomented the bitterness. A vague plan seems to
have been formed to provoke the citizens into attacking the military, who
were then to fire, and plead self-defense.

On Friday, March 2, 1770, some soldiers came to blows with men employed
on a rope-walk. The affair was talked over in the barracks, and nothing
was done to restrain the desire of the soldiers for revenge, or to keep
them off the streets at night. On the 5th, squads of them were forging
about, armed with bludgeons, bayonets and cutlasses, boasting of their
"valor," challenging the people they met, and even striking them. Their
officers openly encouraged them. Their regiments were the Fourteenth and
the Twenty-ninth, notorious for their dissoluteness and disorderliness.
The night was cold, and a few inches of snow fell. Other groups of
soldiers came out, with their flintlocks in their hands: a boy was struck
on the head; several times the guns were leveled, and the threat was made
to fire. One youth was knocked down with a cutlass. Knots of angry young
men began to range hither and thither with staves:--"Where are they?
--Cowards!--Fire if you dare!--Lobster-scoundrels!" The soldiers, on the
other hand, were giving way to fury, striking persons in the doors of
their houses, calling out that they would kill everybody, and shouting
"Fire--fire!" as if it were a watchword. But as yet no irrevocable act had
been done.

Soon after nine o'clock, however, the alarm bell at the top of King
Street was rung hurriedly. Many persons thought it was for fire; and as
Boston had been nearly destroyed by a great fire ten years before, a large
crowd rapidly poured out into the streets. But the frosty air carried no
scent of smoke, and as the bell soon stopped its clangor, a number
returned to their homes; but the younger and more hot-headed smelled
mischief, if not smoke, and drew from various directions toward the
barracks. A party of them came down King Street toward the custom house.
They were halted by the gruff "Who goes there?" of the sentry, and his
bayonet at their breasts.

There were words of defiance: a sudden scuffle: and out of the barrack
gate came pouring the guard, with guns in their hands. Almost in the same
moment a great multitude of citizens came surging in from all sides, and
thronged in front of the custom house, where the fight seemed to be going
on. Those behind pushed against those in front, and all became wedged in a
mass, trying to see what was going forward, swaying this way and that,
uttering broken shouts, threatening, warning, asking, replying; and hot at
heart with that fierce craving to measure strength against strength which
is the characteristic of the Anglo-Saxon when his blood is up. The
soldiers were wholly in the wrong: they had no right to be where they
were; they had no right to wantonly annoy and provoke citizens in their
own town; their presence in the colony, for the purpose of constraining a
peaceful population, was a crime; but consciousness of this fact did not
lessen their animosity. As for the Boston people, they felt, as they faced
the emissaries of their oppressors on that wintry night, the accumulated
exasperation of generations of injustice, and perhaps a stern thrill of
joy that now, at last, the final, unforgivable outrage was to be
perpetrated.

The great majority of citizens had not even sticks in their hands; none
of them carried guns or cutlasses. Some snowballs were thrown at the
soldiers, who faced the crowd with savage faces, and leveled bayonets.
Then there was a fresh crowding and uproar, for Captain Preston and a
squad of eight men had issued from the guard house and were forcing their
way to their comrades with the point of the cold steel. Their red coats
and black shakos and the glint of the moonlight on their weapons made them
conspicuous in the struggling mass, and the sinister intent which was
manifest in their look and bearing sent a strange thrill through the
multitude.

A tall man in a black cloak, who five years later was a general of
artillery in the American army, laid his hand on Preston's shoulder
forcibly. "For God's sake, sir, get back to your barracks; if you fire,
you must die for it!" exclaimed he, in a deep voice. Preston stared at
him, hardly seeming to see him, and quivering with agitation. "Stand aside
--I know what I'm about," he replied huskily. As the soldiers reached the
sentinel's post and faced about in a semicircle, the crowd fell back, and
there were voices calling "Home--home!" The soldiers began to load,
pouring the powder and ball into the muzzles of their guns, and ramming
the charge home sharply with their ramrods. At this, a dozen men, with
cudgels, advanced upon the soldiers, cheering, and passed in front of
them, striking the barrels of their muskets with their sticks. "Cowardly
rascals!--drop your guns, and we're ready for you," said some between
their gritted teeth. "Fire, lobsters!--you daren't fire!" cried others.
"Down with 'em! drive the cowards to their barracks!" shouted some. "Are
your men loaded?" demanded a citizen, stepping up to Preston; and when the
latter nodded--"Will they fire upon the inhabitants?"--"Not without my
orders," the captain seemed to say. "Come on, you rascals--fire if you
dare--you daren't fire!" yelled the fiercer spirits, now beside themselves
with passion; and one struck a soldier's piece. He leveled it and fired,
at the same moment that Preston waved his sword and gave the word. A man
fell at the shot: the people gave back; the other soldiers fired
deliberately and viciously, not in a volley, but one after another, taking
aim. Some of them started forward to use the bayonet. It is said that a
figure was seen to come out on the balcony of the custom house, his face
concealed by a veil hanging down over it, and fire into the retreating
throng. The open space in front of the soldiers was overhung with smoke,
which slowly dissolved away, and revealed eleven New Englanders stretched
along the trodden snow of their native town. Some tried to rise; others
lay still. Blood flowed from their wounds, smoking in the icy air, and
tinging the white snow red. The deed had been done.

A sullen muttering of horror, swelling by degrees into a roar of rage,
burst from hundreds of throats as that spectacle was seen; and in a
moment, as it seemed, the town drums had beat to arms, the bells were
clanging, and all Boston was pressing tumultuously into King Street. The
Twenty-ninth regiment was hurriedly marshaled under arms; it appeared at
first as if the populace, thousands strong, and not without weapons, would
rush upon them and tear them in pieces. But by this time the saner and
stronger men had reached the scene, and set themselves resolutely to
withhold the people. "You shall have justice," they told them, "but let it
be by due course of law." And there was Hutchinson, promising everything
in his dismay, hurrying between the soldiers and the crowd, his feet
making blood-stained marks in the snow as he went. To no man more than to
him was due the guilt of that night's work.

Prompt and clean measures were taken: a town-meeting was held, and the
immediate withdrawal of all troops from Boston was required. The wretched
Hutchinson tried to temporize: he denied that he had power to move the
soldiers; then he consented to send one regiment away, letting the other
remain; the people would accept no compromise; Dalrymple said that he
would do as the governor directed. Samuel Adams and Hutchinson finally
faced each other in Faneuil Hall. "If you have power to remove one
regiment, you have power to remove both," said Adams, in a low but
distinct voice, pointing his finger at the other. "Here are three thousand
people: they are becoming very impatient: the country is in general
motion: night is approaching: an immediate answer is expected: it is at
your peril if you refuse." And describing the scene afterward, Adams said,
"at the appearance of the determined citizens, peremptorily demanding
redress of grievances, I saw his knees tremble and his face grow pale: and
I enjoyed the sight!" Truly, it was a subject for a great artist to
immortalize. The troops must go: and they went, choking with humiliation.

The news of this affair in England shocked the more reasonable people,
and led to criticism of the ministers; but Lord North, supported by the
king, would not consent to remove the tax on tea. He made it "a test of
authority," and a punishment for "American insolence." It was an expensive
punishment for England; the cost of keeping an army in the colonies, and
other incidental expenses, footed up about half a million dollars, against
a revenue from duties of four hundred dollars only. Americans got their
tea from the Dutch by smuggling and by corrupt connivance of the English
customs officers; and the loss of the English East India Company was
estimated at two and a half million dollars at least. There was great
uneasiness at this absurd showing; and Burke declared that "the idea of a
military establishment in America is all wrong." Lord Chatham, reading the
letters from Boston patriots, and resolutions of assemblies, remarked,
"These worthy New Englanders ever feel as Old Englanders ought to feel."
The colonists, however, zealous as they were for their liberties, were
ready to meet half way any effort toward conciliation on England's part.
The agreement to accept no British imports was but slackly kept, in spite
of protests from South Carolina and elsewhere. The people were wearied of
strife and would have welcomed any honorable means of peace. In this
juncture, two things only kept alive the spirit of independence; neither
would have sufficed apart from the other. The first was the pig-headedness
of the English government, with the king at the head of it, and men like
Thurlow, an irreconcilable foe to America, assisting; together with the
conspiracy against the colonies of the royal governors and officials, who
sent home false and exaggerated reports, all aiming to show that martial
law was the only thing that could insure order--or, in other words, secure
them their salaries and perquisites. These persons, by continually
irritating the raw place, prevented the colonists from forgetting their
injuries. In South Carolina, Governor Tryon, a bloody-minded Irishman,
went further; he took the field against the "Regulators"--a body of
citizens who had organized to counteract the lawlessness of the internal
conduct of the colony--and after a skirmish took a number of them
prisoners and hanged them out of hand; most of the rest, to save their
lives, took to the woods and, journeying westward, came upon the lovely
vales of Tennessee, which was thus settled. Daniel Boone had already made
himself at home in Kentucky. In Virginia, where the people were disposed
to loyalty, the agitation to do away with slavery, both on practical and
moral grounds, was harshly opposed by England, and the other colonies,
sympathizing with her action, were snubbed along with her. In short, the
pompous and hide-bound Hillsborough followed everywhere the policy of
alienation, under the impression that he was maintaining English dignity.

But all this would not have sufficed to keep the colonies on their course
toward independence, had it not been for the ceaseless vigilance and
foresight of Samuel Adams in Boston, Benjamin Franklin in London, and the
small but eminent band of patriots whom they worked with. Adams,
profoundly meditating on the signs of the times and the qualities of human
nature, perceived that England would continue to oppress, and that the
longer the colonies abstained from open resistance, the more difficult
would the inevitable revolt become. He did not hesitate, therefore, to
speak in ever plainer and bolder terms as the peril augmented. Reason was
on his side, and his command of logic and of terse and telling language
enabled him to set his cause in the most effective light. By drawing a
distinction between the king and his ministers, he opened the way to
arraign the latter for their "wickedness" in sending an "impudent mandate"
to one assembly to rescind the lawful resolution of another. The too eager
Hutchinson fell into the trap, and pointed out that it was the king,
rather than the ministry, who must be charged with impudence. But this was
not to disprove the impudence; it was simply to make the king instead of
the ministry obnoxious to the charge, and to enlighten the people as to
who their real enemy was. "The king," said Adams, "has placed us in a
position where we must either pay no tax at all, or pay it in accordance
with his good pleasure"--against the charter and the constitution. "The
liberties of our country," he went on, "are worth defending at all
hazards. Every step has been taken but one: and the last appeal requires
prudence, fortitude and unanimity. America must herself, under God, work
out her own salvation." He set resolutely to work to put into execution
his plan of a committee of correspondence, to elicit and stimulate the
patriotic views of the various colonies. "The people must instruct their
representatives to send a remonstrance to the king, and assure him, unless
their liberties are immediately restored whole and entire, they will form
an independent commonwealth, and offer a free trade to all nations."--"It
is more than time," Adams wrote to Warren, "to be rid of both tyrants and
tyranny." He prepared a statement of rights, among which was the right to
change allegiance in case oppression became intolerable, and to rescue and
preserve their liberties sword in hand. A detailed statement of grievances
was also drawn up, to be submitted to the king; its specifications were no
doubt familiar to Jefferson, when he wrote the "Declaration" four years
later. This document was circulated throughout the colony, and was
indorsed with unexpected enthusiasm by scores of towns; many of them, with
rustic bluntness, telling their thoughts in language even stronger than
that of their model. The fishermen of Marblehead (of whom history says not
much, but whatever is said, is memorable) affirmed that they were
"incensed at the unconstitutional, unrighteous proceedings of the
ministers, detested the name of Hillsborough, and were ready to unite for
the recovery of their violated rights." In Plymouth, "ninety to one were
for fighting Great Britain." The village of Pembroke, inhabited by
descendants of the Pilgrims, said that the oppressions which existed must
and would issue in the total dissolution of the union between the mother
country and the colonies. "Death is more eligible than slavery," said
Marlborough; and Lenox refused to "crouch, Issachar-like between the two
burdens of poverty and slavery." There was no doubt about the sentiment of
the country; and the hands of Adams and his colleagues were immensely
strengthened by the revelation.

In the spring of 1773 the next step was taken by Virginia. Young Dabney
Carr rose in the assembly and moved a system of correspondence between all
the colonies similar to that which had been established in Massachusetts.
In other words, the intercommunication of councils in all the colonies was
organized, and when these councils should meet, the Continental Congress
would exist. The response was earnest and cordial from Georgia to Maine.
Things were rapidly shaping themselves for the end. If anything more were
needed to consolidate England's offspring against her, it was not wanting.
Hutchinson, the veteran plotter and self-seeker, who never did a generous
or magnanimous act, who stabbed men in the back, and who valued money more
than country or honor, was exposed to the contempt of all men both in
America and England, and was forced to resign his governorship in disgrace
and to fly to England, where he died a few years later. Franklin was the
immediate means of his downfall. A member of Parliament had remarked to
him in conversation that the alleged grievances of which the colonists
complained had not been inflicted by any English initiative, but were the
result of solicitation from the most respectable of the colonists
themselves, who had affirmed these measures to be essential to the welfare
of the country. Franklin lifted his eyebrows; upon which his interlocutor
produced a number of Hutchinson's secret letters to Hillsborough. They
proved a conspiracy, on the part of Hutchinson, Oliver and others, to
crush American liberty and introduce military rule: they were treasonable
in the worst sense. Franklin remarked, after reading them, that his
resentment against England's arbitrary conduct was much abated; since it
was now evident that the oppression had been suggested and urged by
Americans whom England must have supposed represented the better class of
the colonists. He sent the letters to Boston; and "as to the writers," he
wrote, "when I find them bartering away the liberties of their native
country for posts, negotiating for salaries and pensions extorted from the
people, and, conscious of the odium these might be attended with, calling
for troops to protect and secure them in the enjoyment of them;--when I
see them exciting jealousies in the crown, and provoking it to wrath
against so great a part of its most faithful subjects; creating enmities
between the different countries of which the empire consists; occasioning
a great expense to the old country for suppressing or preventing imaginary
rebellions in the new, and to the new country for the payment of needless
gratifications to useless officers and enemies--I cannot but doubt their
sincerity even in the political principles they profess, and deem them
mere time-servers, seeking their own private emoluments through any
quantity of public mischief; betrayers of the interest not of their native
country only, but of the government they pretend to serve, and of the
whole English empire."

The letters were read in the assembly in secret session. But in the
meanwhile Hutchinson had been led into another mistake. He had denied, in
his speech to the legislature, that any line could be drawn between the
supreme authority of Parliament and the total independence of the
colonies. Either yield, then (he said), or convince me of error. The
terrible Adams asked nothing better. Accepting Hutchinson's alternative,
he answered, "If there be no such line between Parliament's supreme
authority and our total independence, then are we either vassals of
Parliament or independent. But since the parties to the compact cannot
have intended that one of them should be vassals, it follows that our
independence was intended. If, as you contend, two independent
legislatures cannot coexist in one and the same state, then have our
charters made us distinct states from England."--Thus had the governor
unwittingly pointed his opponent's spear, and, instead of driving him to
attack Parliament, been placed in the position of implicitly questioning
its authority himself.

But this was nothing compared with the revelation of his treacherous
letters. His first instinct, of course, was falsehood. "I never wrote any
letter tending to subvert the constitution," he asseverated. Being
confronted with his own sign-manual, "Their design," he cried, "is not to
subvert but to protect." But he knew he was ruined, and sent word to his
correspondents in England to burn the letters they held. The letters were
published, and distributed all over the colonies. Not a man or woman in
the country but knew Hutchinson for the dastardly traitor he was. A
petition to remove him and Oliver was sent to the king, but he hastened to
submit his resignation, with a whining entreaty that he be not "left
destitute, to be insulted and triumphed over." And bringing false charges
against Franklin, he begged to receive the latter's office of deputy
postmaster-general.

Before this matter could be settled, affairs in Boston had come to a
crisis. The East India Company had large consignments of tea ready for
shipment to the principal towns along the American coast. The latter
warned them of loss, but Lord North said "The king means to try this
question with America." It was seen that the connection between England
and her colonies could be continued only on a basis of equal liberties,
and "Resist all shipments of tea!" was the word. New York and Philadelphia
settled the matter by commanding all consignees to resign, which they did;
but this was not to be the solution in Boston. When, on November 28th, the
"Dartmouth," Captain Rotch, arrived with one hundred and fourteen cases of
tea, the representatives of the people ordered him not to enter till
Tuesday, the 30th. Four weeks before a meeting at Liberty Tree had been
summoned, and the consignees directed to attend and resign. The meeting
was held, but Clarke and the other consignees had refused to recognize its
authority. They now temporized, and were granted a day to consider;
meanwhile a guard was kept on the ship. The next day the consignees
proposed to suspend action until they could write to the exporters for
advice; but this was seen to be a subterfuge and was indignantly refused.
Rotch agreed to take the tea back; but the custom house refused him a
clearance. For if the ship remained in port, with her cargo undischarged,
twenty days, the authorities could seize and land it by law. If then the
people were to prevail, they must do so within that time. It seemed as if
they must be defeated; for if the consignees would not resign, and the
ship could not get a clearance, nothing but a direct violation of the law
could prevent the tea from being landed. To make assurance surer, two
frigates kept guard at the mouth of the harbor, and the guns of the Castle
were loaded. The governor and the officers were already chuckling over
their anticipated victory.

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