“Unable to be at the expense of removing themselves”

On Monday, 1 May 1775 the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, having declared that Loyalists could move into Boston, turned to the bigger question of how to handle families who wanted to move out of the besieged town.

The previous day, the congress had named five members to a committee to consider that issue. After seeing that group’s report in the morning, the body added four more delegates to revise the plan.

In the afternoon, having meanwhile codified the language for commissioning officers in the new army, the congress approved the enlarged committee’s amended report:

IN PROVINCIAL CONGRESS, Watertown, May 1, 1775.

Whereas, the inhabitants of the town of Boston have been detained by general Gage, but at length, by agreement, are permitted to remove, with their effects, into the country, and as it has been represented to this Congress that about five thousand of said inhabitants are indigent, and unable to be at the expense of removing themselves:

Therefore, Resolved, That it be, and it is hereby recommended to all the good people of this colony, and especially to the selectmen, and committee of correspondence most convenient to Boston, that they aid and assist such poor inhabitants of said town (with teams, waggons, &c.,) as shall procure a certificate from the committee of donations, that they are unable to remove themselves;

and it is further recommended to the selectmen of the several towns specified in the schedule annexed, to provide for said inhabitants in the best and most prudent way and manner, until this, or some future congress, shall take further order thereon, and that the said selectmen receive, support and employ their proportion of said inhabitants assigned them in said schedule, and no other; and render their accounts to this, or some future congress, or house of representatives, for allowance, which reasonable accounts shall be paid out of the public treasury:

and it is further recommended, to the committee of donations, to apply said donations for the removal of said inhabitants, and for their support whilst removing; and in case that is insufficient, it is further recommended to said committee of donations, that they make up said deficiency, and lay their accounts before the Congress for allowance, which reasonable expense shall be paid out of the public treasury of the colony:

and it is further Resolved, that the inhabitants of Boston thus removed shall not, in future, be considered as the poor of said town into which they remove; and it is to be understood, that if the number of the poor who shall be removed in consequence hereof, should surpass, or fall short of the number herein calculated, the distribution of them shall be increased or diminished, in proportion according to this regulation: …

There followed a list of towns in Suffolk, Middlesex, Plymouth, Bristol, Berkshire, Hampshire, and Worcester Counties with the number of refugees each was thought capable of supporting, from 4 in Leverett to 129 in Rehoboth.

Essex and Barnstable Counties had no allotment, nor did any seacoast towns elsewhere. Likewise, the towns along or close to the siege lines weren’t on the list, though the congress did ask them to supply teams and wagons for moving people. Presumably the authorities thought those communities were already stretched thin supporting the military and maintaining their coastal defenses.

The Maine counties and the islands were also left off, probably because those would be too hard for refugees to get to.

In all, the congress found space, at least theoretically, for 4,903 poor war refugees. That was nearly a third of Boston’s prewar population.

Other families came out by their own means and went to places left off the congress’s list. I discussed Abigail Adams’s July struggle to host George Trott’s family on her farm in Braintree back here. In this article Katie Turner Getty reports that Concord eventually housed “as many as 130 Bostonians” though its initial allotment of poor refugees was 66.

COMING UP: The agreement breaks down.