“The Villain that murdered Colo: Parsons Brother is here”

Back here I described the family of the Rev. Jonathan Parsons of Newburyport, including his fourth son, Thomas Parsons, who disappeared in 1772.

The third son, Samuel Holden Parsons, became an attorney in Lyme, Connecticut. He prospered, getting elected to the colonial assembly, and then moved to New London. At the start of the Revolutionary War Parsons raised a regiment and marched north.

Parsons served through the siege of Boston and in the spring of 1776 led his troops south through Connecticut to defend New York.

Soon after Continental officers detained Basile Boudrot (alias Dugan) on suspicion of murdering Thomas Parsons and his crew, someone sent the news to Col. Parsons.

The next trace of Boudrot that we have is therefore Gen. Philip Schuyler’s 12 June letter from Albany to Gen. George Washington:

The Villain that murdered Colo: Parsons Brother is here. The Colo: desired Me to send him to New York I wait Your Excellency’s Directions.

Washington replied on 24 June:

As Colonel Parsons has requested you to send the Person who is supposed to have murdered his Brother, I have no objection to your doing it, if you judge it necessary. He, from what I have been told, designs to apply to Congress, for instituting some Mode of Trial for the Offence.

Schuyler (shown here) proceeded on that course. On 11 July, John Holt’s New-York Journal reported:

Last Sunday [7 July] one Bazel Bonderot, a native of Nova-Scotia, was brought to this city from Canada, charged with being a principal in the murder of Captain Thomas Parsons, and eight other persons, in Nova-Scotia, in February 1772.

Soon after this murder was perpetrated, he fled his country, and has been wandering from place to place ever since, till last April, when he was providentially detected by Captain Hector McNeil, properly secured, and sent forward to receive the just reward of his crimes.

He was yesterday sent on from this city to Newbury Port, the place where Captain Parsons last lived, for examination and trial.

That article was reprinted in several newspapers, and eventually in the 19 July Essex Journal of Newburyport.

That same issue of the Essex Journal reported:

This Morning, between 6 and 7 o’clock, departed this life after a long tedious illness, the Rev. JONATHAN PARSONS, in the 71st year of his age, and in the 31st of his MINISTRY in the PRESBYTERIAN Church, in this Town—His remains to be interred on Tuesday next, at three o’clock in the afternoon.

It’s not clear whether the minister heard about the capture of his son’s alleged killer before he died.

TOMORROW: Deliberations in the Congress.

“Appointed to the command of the Schooner Isabella”

In the April 1776 letter from Capt. Hector McNeill to Col. Benedict Arnold (shown here) that I quoted yesterday is the line, “My William Farris is Saild for you I hope you will be kind to him.”

William Farris was twenty-three years old that year, having been born in Belfast in 1753. He came to Newburyport at the age of twelve. Then he went to sea.

In an 1832 pension application, quoted in John J. Currier’s History of Newburyport, Mass.: 1764-1905, Farris described what he did at the start of the war:

he was at Quebec as first officer of the Ship Mary Ann, belonging to Boston, in the summer of the year 1775, and there made arrangements with Captain Hector McNiel, and was under further engagement with him for a voyage and as first Officer of a vessel, in the Merchants service with him, and while thus engaged, and before the lading of the vessel, information was received of an expedition undertaken by General Arnold, in the service of the United States, who was then on his way through the woods.

To the best of his remembrance, General Arnold appeared with his Army in the month of November of that year [14 Nov 1775], and immediately thereupon a proclamation was issued by Lieutenant Governor Crambries [Hector Theophilus Cramahé] requiring every Individual in the City to take arms in its defence, or depart therefrom within three days, and declaring all who did not thus manifest their allegiance Rebels and Spies.

Your petitioner did not hesitate to make his election, but immediately procured a passport, leaving all his effects behind him, excepting only such few articles as were necessary for a change, and those contained in a single handkerchief, left the City, and proceeded to join the standard of his country, under General Arnold, who was then at about thirteen miles distance; he was favorably received by the General, and was immediately stationed by him at a place called Point aux Trembles, and there given in charge the care of several vessels, which had been captured from the British, and placed in a small creek at that place; from these vessels various articles which were considered useful and necessary for the American Army were selected and sent down from thence by land.

At this place he was stationed during the whole of the following Winter, having with him an officer from General Arnold’s Army, and a few soldiers, for the protection of this property. On the breaking up of the ice in the spring following, he was sent across the river to direct some Canadians, who were employed for that purpose, in making a number of sweeps, or large bars, for the use of gondolas, which were to be employed in transporting heavy cannon, and as soon as the Ice was sufficiently cleared away he was appointed to the command of the Schooner Isabella, one of the prises which had been captured from the British, mounting four carriage guns, and with this vessel was ordered for Montreal, as a transport, with supplies for the American army.

On arriving at said Montreal, it was found that General Arnold had been superceded in the command at Quebec [by Gen. David Wooster], and that information had been received of the arrival of a British fleet, upon which General Arnold immediately ordered all the materials which were considered useful and proper for the American Army to be selected, and these were laden and put on board the said Schooner, which was then under the command of your petitioner, and General Arnold, Colonel [Aaron] Burr, and several other officers of the American Army took passage in said Schooner with him and went down to the River Sorcel, where reinforcements for the Army were arriving, and at that place said Schooner was hauled in near the banks, and the General and all his officers continued on board several days, having no convenient place on shore for their accommodation.

When it became necessary to leave the said Schooner, there appearing no further use for her, or for the services of your petitioner at that place, he procured a passport from Colonel Burr, with which about the middle of June, 1776, he proceeded for the United States, with a view of entering the Navy, having been employed in the service of the United States, having the charge of said prises, and in the command of said Schooner, the full term of seven months.

I quote that at length because it offers a picture of the environment in which Capt. McNeill spotted the man he identified as Basile Boudrot.

In addition, Farris offers a link between McNeill, his mentor in Québec, and Newburyport, the port that Thomas Parsons had sailed from on his last voyage.

TOMORROW: Transporting the prisoner.

“He Now Passes by the Name of Dugan”

On 29 Aug 1775, Capt. Hector McNeill arrived in Québec on board another captain’s ship from Dominica. He brought false news of a battle at Roxbury where “most of the light horse were killed.”

Having been born in Ireland and raised in Boston, McNeill was then living in Québec with his daughters while carrying on trade with New England. His son Hector, Jr., based in Marblehead, had enrolled in Col. John Glover’s regiment.

A few months later, Col. Benedict Arnold and Gen. Richard Montgomery arrived at the walls of Québec with Continental troops. Lt. Gov. Hector Theophilus Cramahé ordered all able-bodied men to help defend the city or leave. The captain made his way to Arnold and started to carry supplies for the Continentals.

Though we usually tell the story of the American invasion of Canada with a climax and swift end in December 1775, the campaign went on for several more months, so McNeill had lots of work to do.

In the spring of 1776, the captain recognized a man aboard another ship, presumably also working for the Americans. On 25 April, McNeill at Pointe-aux-Trembles sent an urgent message to Col. Arnold, who was on the same island at Montréal:

This will be handed you by Major [Zachariah] Dubois, and is to Request the favour of you to Arrest, & Confine in Jail a certain acadian Whose proper Name is Basiell Boudrott, he Now Passes by the Name of Dugan and is the Mate of the Schooner Providence Commanded by Capt. Palmer,

I am bold to charge this fellow above named with the Murder of Capt. Thomas Parsons of Newbury Port, & his whole Crew at or near Cape St Mary’s in the Bay of Funda in the Month of March 177[2], I have been upon the look out for this chap ever Since & Now Providentially have found him, I am Sure he is the Principall of that gang of Villians who murderd Capt Parsons, & his crew, 9 in Number, & plundered first, afterwards burnt his Vessell—

I hope I need not urge you to Confine, & keep him close untill he can be Sent to New England, as Piracy, & Murder are Crimes which all good Men Should Endeavour to Prosecute & punish, I inclose you a Letter for the Owners of Capt Parsons his Vessell Which I beg you will read, Seal, & forward to the place of its distination—

My William Farris is Saild for you I hope you will be kind to him—as for your Capt Palmer—he has Sickened Me; of all Men to dispatch or manage affairs I Never Mett with worse hands then himself & his Lieut,—

I hear your wound is broke loose Which gives Me real Sorrow—you Must be Carefull of it or it may yet cost you dear

For heavens Sake do not Neglect to Secure the aforementioned Basiell Boudrot, for he is a Vile Murderer

May heavens preserve you in that Nest of Tory Scoundrels & grant you Wisdom & Fortitude to mannage them as they deserve

McNeill sent the same request to Gen. David Wooster. On 26 April, Wooster assured him: “I shall write Genl Arnold concerning the Acadien & also to arrest Palmer.”

TOMORROW: A culprit in custody?

“Cast away upon the Isle of Sable”

There are a lot of unanswered questions about the disappearance of Capt. Thomas Parsons, his ship, and his crew in early 1772.

As colonial newspapers show, shipwrecks happened all the time. The rocky shores of Nova Scotia were notorious for their dangers.

For example, on 16 Sept 1773, the Massachusetts Spy ran this report from John Callahan, just arrived from London:

Capt. Callahan, last Thursday se’nnight, went on shore at Cape Sable, where he saw the Wreck of a Snow, New-England built, Pink Stern, called the Kitty, loaded with Lumber, had all her Cargo on board, but her Sails, Rigging and Crew gone.

That might seem mysterious, even suspicious. But back on 10 May the Boston Post-Boy had reported:

A Fisherman, who arrived here last Week, informs, that the Snow Katy, Capt. Major, from this Port for Newfoundland, is cast away upon the Isle of Sable: The Vessel and Cargo is entirely lost; the Captain and Mate, with great Difficulty saved their Lives, and the Remainder of the Crew, (five in Number) perished.

In the case of Capt. Parsons’s schooner, within a year New Englanders suspected he’d met with foul play. What led them to that conclusion? Unfortunately, our sources don’t say.

Those sources do raise some geographic questions about this voyage. One is why, if Capt. Parsons was heading from Newburyport to the Caribbean, he’d ended up far north. Perhaps that was a way of catching trade winds. Perhaps a storm had pushed his ship off course. Perhaps people didn’t remember his destination accurately. Or perhaps Parsons’s ship was returning from the islands and overshot Cape Cod because of weather.

The March 1773 news item quoted here said a schooner had been lost “near Cape-Sable,” which is the southernmost corner of the Nova Scotia peninsula. In Newburyport people came to believe Parsons had met his fate at “St. Mary’s,” which must mean St. Mary Bay’s at the westernmost corner. Was that close enough to count as “near Cape-Sable” to a New Englander?

Yet another mystery: Near the mouth of St. Mary’s Bay sits the village of Comeauville, where Basile Boudrot was granted 300 acres in May 1772. That was three months after Capt. Parsons reportedly left Newburyport, and in that season Boudrot was supposedly busy digging up buried money. Yet somehow the people of New England came to believe that Basile Boudrot was responsible for the death of Capt. Parsons and his crew.

TOMORROW: Spotting the culprit?

[The picture above is Bonaventura Peeters’s “Shipwreck,” ca. 1652, courtesy of the Journal of Historians of Netherlandish Art.]

“The supposed Plunder of the Cargo and burning of the Vessel”

Alas, the first newspaper printed in Newburyport, Massachusetts, Henry-Walter Tinges’s Essex Journal and Merrimack Packet, wasn’t founded until the end of 1773.

That means we don’t have published accounts of ships coming and going from that port in 1772, or stories on topics of local interest.

It’s possible a historian digging into the local sources like Alexander Cain will uncover a contemporaneous source on what happened to Capt. Thomas Parsons in 1772. But for now the closest he’s found is the lore published by Joshua Coffin in A Sketch of the History of Newbury, Newburyport, and West Newbury, from 1635 to 1845:

February 10th [1772]. Captain Thomas Parsons sailed from Newburyport, in a schooner, for the West Indies; was wrecked at St. Mary’s, Nova Scotia. It was supposed that he, with all his crew, eight in number, were massacred by the inhabitants there, after plundering the vessel, and setting it on fire.

We don’t know the name of Parsons’s ship or of his crewmen. Coffin also offered no sources—no indication of how the news got back to Newburyport, or when. I suspect that for months people thought the schooner had been lost at sea. Then something—the sight of a burned wreck, a bit of loot, seamen’s gossip—made people suspect there had been foul play.

On 11 Mar 1773, more than a year after Capt. Parsons’s departure, the Boston News-Letter ran this item:

We are informed, that the Accounts sent from hence of the Loss of a Schooner, belonging to Newbury, near Cape-Sable, and the supposed Plunder of the Cargo and burning of the Vessel if not the Murder of the Crew, had been received by the Governor of Nova-Scotia, and that there would be the strictest Inquiry and Prosecution by the Authority of that Province.

That was reprinted in the following weeks in the Essex Gazette of Salem and in Connecticut newspapers. (Capt. Parsons had brothers and other relatives in Connecticut who might be interested.)

It’s not certain that news item referred to rumors about Capt. Parsons’s ship, but the details are similar, and I’ve found no other possible cases. That suggests the suspicions about what happened in Nova Scotia built up over time until someone demanded an investigation.

Unfortunately, I also haven’t found any follow-up stories. Because of national boundaries, I can’t search the Halifax Gazette. Government archives in Nova Scotia might hold information. In early 1773 the royal governor, Lord William Campbell, was busy chasing smugglers and securing a better berth for himself in South Carolina, but maybe he did start an inquiry. Or at least file the “Accounts” from Massachusetts.

It’s also conceivable that some archive in the Caribbean holds a clue. Did Capt. Parsons sail to an island successfully only to run into difficulty on the way back? If he was on some sort of smuggling voyage, what sort of records would he have left?

TOMORROW: Probing the mystery.

Parson Parsons and His Sons

Jonathan Parsons was born in West Springfield in 1705, the son of a church deacon. As an adolescent he “worked at a trade,” but a Yale tutor named Jonathan Edwards persuaded him to try college.

Parsons graduated at the late age of twenty-four. He then studied more theology under Edwards, who had become the minister at Northampton.

In 1731 Parsons took the pulpit himself in the town of Lyme, Connecticut. He married Phebe Griswold, from a prominent local family, and they started having children—thirteen in all, but six died in infancy.

The children who grew up were four sons, born every two years from 1733 to 1739 (Marshfield, Jonathan, Samuel Holden, and Thomas), and three daughters, born 1748 to 1755 (Phebe, Lucia, and Lydia).

At Lyme the Rev. Mr. Parsons also got caught up in the “New Light” revival inspired by his old mentor Edwards and further inspired by the Rev. George Whitefield, who came through town in 1740. Parsons was soon known for his energetic preaching and evangelical outreach.

In 1745 the minister’s fervor grew too much for his congregation, and they decided on a separation. Parsons moved his family to Newbury to preach to a small “New Light” congregation that set itself up as Presbyterian, independent of New England’s independent network.

That meeting grew, erecting what’s now called the Old South Presbyterian Church in Newburyport in 1756. Whitefield died during a visit to Parsons in 1770 and was buried in its crypt. The minister’s wife Phebe died later the same year. He married the widow Lydia Clarkson of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in 1771. 

Of the Parsons sons, Marshfield and Samuel Holden moved back to their birthplace of Lyme. Marshfield was a merchant and with his succession of four wives kept a tavern. Samuel Holden graduated from Yale and became a lawyer. Jonathan, Jr., and Thomas kept Newbury as their base and went to sea.

In particular, Thomas Parsons had a son by his first wife, Mary Gibson, and four daughters by his second wife, Sarah Sawyer. The New-Hampshire Gazette shows a captain named Thomas Parsons sailing out of Portsmouth harbor:

• on the Charming Sally to Guadaloupe in 1762.
• on the Success to Dominica and the West Indies in 1769.
• on the Three Friends to the West Indies and Guadaloupe in 1770.

In February 1772, according to secondary sources, Capt. Thomas Parsons took a schooner out of Newburyport for another voyage to the Caribbean. He never came home.

TOMORROW: Mystery off Cape Sable.

Basile Boudrot and “1004 pieces of money”

According to the Musée des Acadiens des Pubnicos website, Basile Boudrot was born in 1739 in Port Royal, which the British had renamed as Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, in 1713.

War broke out between the British and French Empires in the 1740s and again in the 1750s. At some point the Boudrot family moved to Cherbourg, France. Basile’s father was a mariner, and the young man worked as a fisherman “now and then.”

In 1764 Basile married Magdelene d’Entremont in Cherbourg. She, too, had roots on Nova Scotia, in Pubnico on the southeastern shore.

Four years later, the lieutenant governor of Nova Scotia, Michael Francklin, signed a charter creating the settlement of Clare in the easternmost corner of the peninsula. That area was set aside for French-speaking Acadians.

Three important things happened to Basile Boudrot in 1772. First, the Musée des Acadiens des Pubnicos tells this story:

It was in April when he left [France] with a letter from his sister[-in-law] Marguerite Landry for her brother-in-law in Pubnico, asking him to send her the money which had been hidden at the “Cabanaux.”

On his way to Acadia, Basile opened the letter and went right straight to the spot indicated where the money had been hidden and unearthed “1004 pieces of money.”

Then he went to Pubnico and told the d’Entremont bothers that their relatives in France were well provided for, having received money from “the town-hall and a quarter out of two vessels.” Thus, he was going to keep the money. It is obvious that he did not give them Marguerite’s letter.

He left Pubnico on May 7 and disappeared forever. In a letter, we read that some captains from Cherbourg had seen him several times “in America” without saying exactly where.

A few days after Basile had left, Benoni d’Entremont wrote to his sister-in-law Marguerite Landry and told her about the visit that he and his brothers had received from Basile Boudrot. Marguerite answered April 20, 1773, telling of the letter she had entrusted him with and of the lies he had told of her being well provided for, and these the whole story of Basile’s “prevarication” came to light.

Benoni d’Entremont (1745–1841) had spent his adolescence in Marblehead, Medfield, and finally Walpole, Massachusetts, having been expelled from Acadia with his family after the capture of Louisbourg. His father died in 1759 and was reportedly buried in Roxbury. After years as “French neutrals,” the rest of the family returned to Nova Scotia.

Back to Basile Boudrot. According to Isaiah W. Wilson’s A Geography and History of the County of Digby, Nova Scotia (1900), in May 1772 the government of Nova Scotia granted him 300 acres on St. Mary’s Bay within the Clare settlement. Today the village of Comeauville claims him as a founder.

I have questions about how those events fit together, assuming all the details are correct. Did Boudrot use the money he unearthed to buy that land? The timing would be tight if he left France in April and completed the real estate deal by the end of May. Or did he return to Nova Scotia to settle on a land grant and as a bonus stumble onto buried treasure?

Pubnico and Comeauville are more than fifty miles apart, but there weren’t a whole lot of people living on eastern Nova Scotia at that time. Did the D’Entremonts really never hear about Boudrot living in the same province?

As for the third event in 1772, that’s coming up later this week.

TOMORROW: Parson Parsons’s sons.

Museum of African American History Events on the Revolution

The Museum of African American History in Boston has opened a new exhibit called “Black Voices of the Revolution: Liberty, Emancipation, and the Struggle for Independence.”

The museum website says:

What do you do when a country cries out for liberty—but won’t offer it to you? In the shadowed alleys and crowded docks of Revolutionary-era Boston, Black men and women—enslaved and free—listened as white colonists thundered about freedom. They heard the speeches. They read the broadsides. But they knew: the liberty being shouted from the rooftops was not meant for them. Still, they stepped forward.

Interact with AI-driven, holographic images of primary sources, and the men and women who represented the African American community in Massachusetts during the period from the 1620s to 1800. Ask questions of the interactive using a voice activated program or by simply typing your queries on a touchscreen.

Those personages include Lucy Terry Prince, Phillis Wheatley Peters, Chloe Spear, and more.

On Tuesday, 17 February, the museum will host an event called “Digging Deeper into Black Voices of the Revolution.” Chief Curator and Director of Collections Angela Tate and Prof. Nedra Lee will discuss the process of assembling that exhibit. That free event is due to run from 5 to 7 P.M. at the museum on 46 Joy Street. Register to attend here.

On Wednesday, 18 February, the Massachusetts Historical Society will host a panel discussion on the topic “Whose Independence: Black Experiences During the American Revolution.” The panelists will be:

• Dr. Noelle Trent, Museum of African American History | Boston & Nantucket
• Dr. Benjamin Remillard, Providence College
• Dr. Chernoh Sesay Jr., DePaul University
• Dr. Kyera Singleton, Royall House and Slave Quarters

The panel description says:

As cries for liberty and clashes with the British broke out in the American colonies, enslaved and free Black people fought for independence on the battlefield, in courtrooms, and their communities. In petitions and writings, they argued that there were contradictions in a fight for freedom that didn’t include a full abolishment of slavery. Following the promise of freedom advertised, many enslaved men enlisted as soldiers. Many joined the Patriot cause while others volunteered with British forces. Throughout the war and in the years following, free Black leaders built the African Lodge and African Meeting House and established spaces for religion and education in their communities.

That event will run 6 to 7 P.M. Register to attend in person or online starting at this page.

Back at the Museum of African American History, on Thursday, 26 February, it will host the first U.S. showing of “In Search of Phillis Wheatley Peters,” Leslie Askew’s thirty-five-minute documentary about the poet, her work, new discoveries about her life after marriage, and her cultural legacy. That event is scheduled from 6 to 8 P.M. It is free, with donations welcome. Reserve a space here.

Shown above is the first-class stamp featuring Phillis Wheatley, just issued by the U.S. Postal Service.

A Super Bowl Toss-up

Through Craig Bruce Smith I learned that the coin to be tossed at the start of this year’s Super Bowl has a Revolutionary pedigree.

It’s a replica of the Libertas Americana medal that Benjamin Franklin commissioned in 1782 after learning of the French and Continental victory at Yorktown.

That medal has the date 1776 on one side, but the 1777 and 1781 dates of Saratoga and Yorktown are on the other. It’s not quite a Sestercentennial artifact, in sum.

The Super Bowl could have chosen a replica of Washington Before Boston medal, commemorating an event that occurred 250 years ago next month.

That, too, has a 1776 date on it, albeit in Roman numerals. The Continental Congress voted in 1776 to commission that medal, though the project didn’t get done until 1789.

Of course, choosing a coin this year that celebrates the recovery of Boston, based on a medal held by the Boston Public Library, might seem biased toward the New England Patriots.

Knox Trail Commemorations on 8–9 Feb.

Two hundred fifty years ago, the fifty-eight artillery pieces that Col. Henry Knox had convoyed from Fort Ticonderoga were in Framingham, being mounted on carriages and prepared for use.

The Sestercentennial celebrations of that event continue.

Sunday, 8 February, 2 to 4 P.M.
Knox Trail 250th Commemorative Program
Framingham History Center, Village Hall on the Common

This free, family-friendly event is part of a four-community commemoration presented by Revolution250. The program is scheduled to begin at 2 P.M. with a winter procession across the Framingham Centre Common, featuring cannons mounted on draft-animal-pulled sleds, a fife and drum unit, and colonial reenactors portraying a welcoming party.

The event will continue inside with a commemorative program highlighting Framingham’s role and the shared history of nearby Knox Trail communities. Peter Salem will be portrayed alongside a display of the original muster roll that records his service. Another highlighted artifact will be one of only twelve known handwritten fife tune books from the era. The MA250-sponsored “Stitching Revolution in Massachusetts” quilt will be unveiled.

Because of frigid temperatures and snow, most of the program will take place indoors. Parking will be available at Plymouth Church (87 Edgell Road) and First Parish (24 Vernon Street). For more details, see this webpage.

Monday, 9 February, 7 to 8:30 P.M.
The Noble Train Arrives: Knox, Washington and the End of the Siege
Aeronaut Brewing Company, Somerville

As sponsored by the Somerville Museum, Dan Breen concludes his two-part saga by recounting how the cannon from Ticonderoga were hauled over the Berkshires, across the Connecticut River and finally to Dorchester Heights, where they would help to cue Gen. William Howe to abandon Boston. Learn more and reserve tickets through this page.

In addition, a video of my talk in Cambridge at the end of last month on “A Fine Train of Artillery” and how the siege ended is now online here.

“I fired two guns & my Master Mr. Manwarring fired one”

Another document related to the Boston Massacre in the collections of the Boston Public Library is catalogued as “Examination and answers of a servant of Edward Manwaring.”

Though his name doesn’t appear in the manuscript, that servant was Charles Bourgate, the “French boy.”

The handwriting identifies this document as having been made by Samuel Winthrop (1716–1779, shown here), long-time clerk of the Massachusetts superior court.

So far as I can tell, this text has never been published. It doesn’t contain information not found elsewhere—in fact, given that Charles Bourgate was lying, it doesn’t contain actual information at all. But here it is.

Q. was you at the Custom house in Boston on the Eveng. of the 5th. of March last
A. I was there

Q. at what time did you go there
A. I do not know at what hour I went there; it might be half an hour or an hour after Sunset

Q. how long did you stay there
A. after I got into the Custom house I staid there not quite half an hour

Q. Did you leave the Custom house before the firing was over
A. the guns were all discharged before he [sic] left the house

Q. was you at the Custom house at the time the bells rung for fire
A. I went there while the bells were ringing & staid there while the bells rang, when I came out of the house the bells had done ringing—

Q. do you know of any guns being fired out of the Custom house at that time
A. I fired two guns & my Master Mr. Manwarring fired one—

Q. Where were you when Mr. Manwarring fired
A. I was below. I had come from the Chamber down stairs I did not see him fire, I saw him direct the gun out of Window

Q. how came you to give those guns
A. my Master & the tall man ordered me

Q. What Chamber was those guns fired out of
A. Right over the Sentry box

Q. Whether when you went home you found Mr. Hudson & his Wife at home
A. I found them at home in the same Room where I left them when I went away—

There’s no date on this document, but I think it comes from the week after the Massacre. That was when Bourgate first told his story to legal authorities, but before John Munro came forward to provide an alibi for Edward Manwaring. Bourgate subsequently changed his story to accuse Munro as well, and a grand jury indicted both men and a couple more.

The indictment of Capt. Thomas Preston and the soldiers, also in the Boston Public Library, was written and signed by the Massachusetts attorney general, Jonathan Sewall. He then retired from the case. The indictment of Manwaring, Munro, and other men connected to the Customs service appears in Samuel Winthrop’s handwriting, based on Charles Bourgate’s testimony.

“Causes of the breaking out of this ill Humor”

Among the items in the Boston Public Library’s manuscripts department is a 21 Apr 1770 letter from Charles Lloyd (1735–1773) to George Grenville, former prime minister of Britain (shown here).

Lloyd was working at the Treasury office by 1761. His elder brother had tutored Grenville’s sons before becoming dean of Norwich, and through him Charles secured the job of secretary to the new prime minister in 1763.

After the Marquess of Rockingham took over government, Lloyd lost some patronage appointments but continued working at the Treasury. As of 1770, he was writing from the “Salt Office”; that department collected the salt tax, operating somewhat independently.

Lloyd also continued serving Grenville, who remained in Parliament, as a source on London news and a pamphleteer. According to the Dictionary of National Biography, Lord North even suspected that Lloyd wrote the radical Junius letters, a theory most later scholars called “absurd.”

This particular letter passed on news from Boston, which is probably why it ended up on this side of the Atlantic. It began:

Salt Office Saturday
21st April 1770.

Dear Sir

Nothing has occurred since youn left Town that I thought worth troubling you with till this morning when Mr. Robertson [John Robinson] (one of the Commrs. of the Customs in America) arrived in Town with an account that he left the whole Town of Boston in the utmost Confusion.

The immediate Causes of the breaking out of this ill Humor arose from some petty Quarrel between a Townsman & a Soldier. Each had their respective Partizans from words they came to Blows some were killed by the Soldiers & many wounded—

The next Day, a more General Engagement took place between the Civil & military when the Commander in Chief [acting governor Thomas Hutchinson] to prevent further Effusion of Blood order’d the Troops to retire into the Castle, & the Commrs. of the Customs are lodged there likewise—

The Townsmen were guilty of several outrages before the military Fired.

Lloyd then went on to write more about a lottery. He added a brief postscript of political gossip.

We can barely recognize the Boston Massacre in Lloyd’s description. The “petty Quarrel” was probably the ropewalk brawl. Robinson or Lloyd put less significance on the people killed than on Lt. Gov. Hutchinson agreeing to the town’s demand to move the troops—“a more General Engagement…between the Civil & military.” That was how some conservative elements in London first learned about the Massacre. 

Rhymes with Memes

The corporal arrested after the Boston Massacre is recorded in Massachusetts legal papers as William Wemms.

The soldiers’ trial was therefore designated as Rex v. Wemms et al., with the corporal always listed first as a matter of rank. (Ironically, he was most likely the one man who didn’t fire his gun that night.)

We know from the case of Edward Montgomery that those legal records can err. Both the army’s muster rolls and Boston town records establish that that private’s first name was Edward, but his indictment and conviction came under the name of Hugh Montgomery.

In Cpl. Wemms’s case, the army muster rolls consistently spell his name as Wemys, a name which these days is more often rendered as Wemyss.

It wasn’t till this year that I got curious about how that name was pronounced.

Turns out it’s a Gaelic name pronounced “Weems,” like the parson.

So now I have to retrain my brain and mouth around how to say Rex v. Wemms.

Flagging a Call for Presentations at the 2026 HistoryFest in Westfield

In the summer and fall of 1774, New England towns competed to put up Liberty Poles, the taller the better.

On 28 July, Ephraim Potter and Edward Lawrence brought such a flagpole into Deerfield, though they didn’t have time to set it up that day. Young Dr. Elihu Ashley estimated that it was “about fifty feet.”

Dr. Ashley got a good look at that pole because that evening he sawed through it with the help of some friends.

The next day, Ashley wrote in his diary, the talk of the town was “nothing but Liberty, and ye Poles being Sawd.” Soon “ye Liberty Pole was set up and also a Tory Pole as they in their infinite wisdom are pleased to call it.” I wonder if together those poles measured fifty feet.

On 30 July, an anonymous public letter was posted in town. It declared Potter, Lawrence, and their comrades to be “a pack of ignorant villains.” Also, whoever wielded the saw was “some Malicious Person, Inimical to his Country”—though that was meant ironically, since it’s now thought the anonymous letter came from Dr. Ashley. It went on:

Where are things going, that so sensible people as you know the Town of Deerfield are, should suffer these Rascals to carry matters on so. I cannot help feeling, and very sensibly, when I think what the Consequences of these things will be & have no reason to think but that they will issue in blood…

Today Deerfield’s Liberty Pole is commemorated in a stone marker and in a flagpole in Historic Deerfield, as I photographed it above last year. (It was flying a version of the Taunton flag.)

That’s just one Revolutionary story from the Connecticut River valley, also called the Pioneer Valley.

On 11 April, the Pioneer Valley History Network and the Westfield State University History & Philosophy Department will host their 2026 HistoryFest in Westfield. Like History Camp Boston, this is a chance for local chroniclers and researchers to share their work with other people curious about history.

The organizers say:

Our Homespun History Conference thrives on the stories, ideas, and passions of people who care deeply about the history of the Pioneer Valley, Massachusetts, and the many ways history connects to museums, historical societies, and community life today. Whether your focus is local history, material culture, public history practice, education, preservation, or an untold story waiting to be shared, we invite you to submit a proposal to present.

That process starts with their invitation to propose a session through this form.

The organizers say they aren’t necessarily looking for formal “experts” but for:

• Fascinating stories and fresh perspectives
• Practical or thought-provoking workshop topics
• Case studies, community projects, or works-in-progress

For people with questions, they have scheduled some brief Zoom information sessions at different times of the day on 3, 13, and 19 February. For more details, click on the proposal link above.

Getting Warmer on the Origin of a Warming Pan

At Historic New England, Erica Lome, curator of collections, shared a behind-the-scenes essay about a warming pan with a Revolutionary heritage of sorts:

Tucked away in the parlor at Historic New England’s Cogswell’s Grant in Essex, Massachusetts, is a warming pan with a turned wooden handle and a brass container pierced with holes and engraved with scrolling vines and flowerheads. Also referred to as bed warmers, warming pans were a common household tool in colonial and post-revolutionary America, filled with embers and placed under the sheets of a bed to warm it before use.

This particular warming pan had more than just decorative motifs adorning its metallic surface. Engraved on its lid are the words:

From the Townspeople / Patriot and Friend of Gen. Washington / Bell Tavern, Danvers, Massachusetts / Francis Symonds Esq. Innkeeper and Poet.

On the pan’s sides, inside the incised outline of a bell:

I’ll toll you / if you have need / and feed you well / and bid you speed.

On the other side:

Francis Symonds / makes and sells / the best of chocolate / also shells.

John Warner Barber’s Historical Collections (1839) recorded that those verses hung on signs outside the Bell Tavern. In 1841 the Boston Cultivator stated that innkeeper Symonds’s “poetic genius caused [those lines] to be inscribed”; as Lome notes, he was known for adding bits of rhyme to his advertisements. (The Cultivator changed “also shells” to “and shells,” which scans better if you put three syllables into “chocolate.”)

The essay continues:

By its history, as recorded by Nina Fletcher Little, the warming pan was presented to Symonds around 1785: “After the war’s close, the citizens of Danvers evidently wished to present Symonds with a token of their esteem and decided on a warming pan as a practical gift.” The engraved inscription inside the bell matched the Bell Tavern’s signpost. The additional inscription praised Symonds as a patriot, friend of George Washington, and a poet, truly a prominent citizen and worthy of appreciation.

When researching this object for [the upcoming exhibit] Myth and Memory, one major detail of Symonds’s life challenged its story: Francis Symonds died on September 22, 1775. According to the Essex Gazette:

“On the 22nd Instant died at Danvers and on the 24th was very decently interred, Mr. Francis Symonds, Innholder, in the 5th Year of his Age. He was very just in his Dealings, and compassionate to the Poor as far as lay in his Power. In his last Sickness, especially towards the Close of Life, his Calmness and Resignation were very remarkable. He has left a sorrowful Widow and 6 Children, for whom we wish that the fame Compassion that he has shown to others may be shown to them.” . . .

Francis Symonds mustered for two days with Colonel [Timothy] Pickering’s regiment during the Battle of Lexington and Concord, and again on April 24, 1775, serving for a little over three months, until August 1, 1775. He was at home when he died of illness.

So, what about the warming pan? It seems very unlikely that the town of Danvers presented it to him on his deathbed, nor to his family immediately after, given the ongoing Siege of Boston. What is its true history?

Lome doesn’t offer a definite conclusion, but I like her hypothesis that the words were inscribed during a commemoration of the Revolution, such as Danvers’s dedication of a memorial obelisk near the Bell Tavern in 1835. Or later, when warming pans themselves were becoming relics of a quaint past. 

Lunch with Maj. Thomas Musgrave, 6 Feb.

In last week’s talk about the end of the siege of Boston, I recounted the story of the British army raid on the Dorchester peninsula.

For action details I drew on Francis E. Blake’s 1899 article for the New England Historical and Genealogical Register, reprinted with additional realty information as a short book titled Dorchester Neck (Now South Boston): The Raid of British Troops, February 13, 1776.

In fact, most of that action happened in the early morning hours of 14 February. I quoted reactions to the raid in this posting from 2008.

Yet my favorite detail about the event is that Maj. Thomas Musgrave, who led a squad of elite troops across the ice from Boston Neck, was considered the best skater in the British force, as quoted here in 2010.

It was therefore intriguing to learn that the American Revolution Insitute will feature Maj. Musgrave in an online presentation on Friday, 6 February.

Here’s the event description:

Join the Institute’s museum collections and operations manager, Paul Newman, for a discussion of a 1780s manuscript account of the American Revolution by Lt. Col. (later made a General and Baronet) Thomas Musgrave, a British officer who served extensively throughout the war.

At the battle of Germantown, he commanded the British 40th Regiment of Foot that famously defended the Chew House against attacking American forces. Subsequently, he was restationed in the West Indies in 1778, before returning to New York as the last British commandant of the city.

Following the war, Musgrave authored a manuscript, housed in our library collections, that offers extensive details of his service throughout the Revolution.

The presentation will emphasize “the 40th Regiment of Foot at the Battle of Germantown.” But maybe there will some seasonal information about Maj. Musgrave on ice.

Knox Trail Commemorations on 31 Jan.–1 Feb.

This weekend brings another set of commemorations of Col. Henry Knox’s artillery train, including a couple of events displaced by last weekend’s snow.

Saturday and Sunday, 31 January–1 February, 10 A.M. to 4 P.M.
Knox Train of Artillery
Old Sturbridge Village

In partnership with Fort Ticonderoga, this unique event explores the Noble Train as it went through central Massachusetts. For regular museum admission, join staff from the village and Fort Ti and reenactors from Knox’s Regiment of Artillery to learn about the 300-mile journey. Examine reproduction artillery tools and ammunition. Explore the historic village and interact with costumed historians as they demonstrate daily life after the Revolution. Highlights include:

• See oxen in action hauling cannons. 
• Watch Knox’s Regiment of Artillery demonstrate cannon firing. 
• Learn about American artillery of the Revolution compared to the Massachusetts Artillery of the 1830s. 
• Try using an artillery engine, lifting reproduction cannon from Fort Ticonderoga. 
• Handle reproduction cannon ammunition and explore their types and use. 
• See cabinetmakers building a log sled. 
• Learn about using draft animals and their importance to 19th-century farmers. 
• See blacksmiths forging cannon carriage hardware. 
• Hear stories from a recreated patriot who marched on the Knox Trail from Pittsfield to Cambridge in 1976. 

For more details, including the schedule of events on each day, see the Old Sturbridge Village webpage.

Saturday, 31 January, 1 to 4 P.M.
250th Anniversary of Henry Knox & the Noble Train of Artillery
185 Salisbury Street, Worcester

Join Revolution 250, Boston Celebrations, the AC Marriott Hotel Worcester, and citizens of the towns of Brookfield, Leicester, Spencer, Worcester, Shrewsbury, and Northborough for a commemoration of the epic 1776 adventure of Henry Knox and his “Noble Train or Artillery” trekking across Massachusetts on their way to Boston. A procession will step off from Elm Park about 1 P.M. and end at City Hall. An indoor commemorative program will begin at 2 P.M.

Sunday, 1 February, 1:30 to 3 P.M.
“Were so lucky as to get the Cannon out of the River”: Henry Knox and His Noble Train of Artillery
Westford Museum

Alexander Cain will discuss Knox’s journey and its impact on the Continental Army’s firepower and the American cause. At Fort Ticonderoga, the colonel selected 58 artillery pieces, including immense 12-, 18-, and 24-pounders. Once they were ready, some of that artillery was positioned on Dorchester Heights, forcing the British evacuation of Boston. Cain explores Knox’s mission transformed the Continental Army’s firepower while embodying the ingenuity and determination that defined the American cause. Learn more about this presentation.

Sunday, 1 Febuary, 4 to 6 P.M.
Henry Knox: Presentation and Cannon Firing
Martha Mary Chapel, Wayside Inn, Sudbury

Local writer Steven Glovsky explores the improbabilities and inconsistencies of Henry Knox’s story, leading up to his undertaking the transport of urgently needed cannon in the winter of 1775–76. The presentation will be followed by cannon fire from Crane’s Third Artillery. For more information.

For those wanting to-the-date exactitude, as of 250 years ago, the fifty-eight cannon and mortars were parked in Framingham, being equipped for use. Col. Knox had taken command of the artillery regiment on the siege lines, issuing his first regimental orders.

America’s History Conference in Glen Allen, Virginia, 27–29 Mar.

America’s History, L.L.C., will hold its thirteenth Annual Conference of the American Revolution in Glen Allen, Virginia, on 27–29 March.

Here’s the lineup of speakers:

• Richard “Rick” Bell on “The American Revolution and the Fate of the World”
• Todd W. Braisted on “‘You must expect to hear me talked of as a monster of cruelty’: Colonel Francis Lord Rawdon and the Revolutionary War”
• Denver Brunsman on “Prisoners, Press Gangs, and the Battle for Sailors in the Revolutionary War”
• Iris de Rode on “Something New to Think About: The Dutch in the American Revolution”
• William “Larry” Kidder on “Defending Fort Stanwix: New York’s Frontier During the Revolutionary War”
• Stephen L. Kling (the Lorna Hainesworth Sponsored Speaker) on “An Underappreciated Victory: Bernardo de Gálvez’s Mississippi River Campaign Against the British in 1779”
• Mark Edward Lender on “War Without Mercy: Liberty or Death in the American Revolution”
• Charles P. Neimeyer on “Revolutionary Riverine Warfare: The War for Independence on America’s Rivers and Lakes”
• Gordon Blaine Steffey on “‘Trust Not Professions’: Feuding Founders and Diplomatic Disorder in the Arthur Lee–Silas Deane Affair”
• Andrew Waters on “Backcountry War: The Rise of Francis Marion, Banastre Tarleton and Thomas Sumter”

In addition to the conference, attendees can sign up for a bus tour on Friday, 27 March, visiting Ferry Farm, Gunston Hall, and Historic St. John’s Church to learn about “More Virginia Founding Fathers: Essentially Important for Independence” from Edward G. Lengel and site staff.

For more information and registration, visit this page.

“All occupations resemble one another in some way…”

Back on 17 January, the New York Times columnist Jamelle Bouie drew a historical parallel in an essay for his newsletter:

Not since the British occupation of Boston on the eve of the Revolutionary War has an American city experienced anything like the blockade of Minneapolis and its surrounding areas by the federal government. . . .

All occupations resemble one another in some way, and it is striking to read descriptions and accounts of the occupation of Boston in light of events in Minnesota. “Having to stomach a standing army in their midst, observe the redcoats daily, pass by troops stationed on Boston Neck who occupied a guardhouse on land illegally taken it was said from the town, and having to receive challenges by sentries on the streets, their own streets, affronted a people accustomed to personal liberty, fired their tempers, and gnawed away at their honor,” writes the historian Robert Middlekauff in “The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution, 1763 to 1789.”

“Harrison Gray, a prominent merchant and a member of the council, told soldiers who challenged him one evening that he was not obligated to respond,” writes Richard Archer of the same period in “As if an Enemy’s Country: The British Occupation of Boston and the Origins of Revolution.” “They retaliated by thrusting their bayonets toward his chest and detained him for half an hour.”

Harrison Gray (shown above) was the province’s treasurer, a future Loyalist. Yet he had the same complaint as resistance leader Samuel Adams, who as “Vindex” complained in 1768:

when these gentlemens attendants [i.e., soldiers] take upon them to call upon every one, who passes by, to know Who comes there as the phrase is, I take it to be in the highest degree impertinent, unless they can shew a legal authority for so doing.

There is something in it, which looks as if the town was altogether under the government & controul of the military power: And as long as the inhabitants are fully perswaded that this is not the case at present, and moreover hope and believe that it never will, it has a natural tendency to irritate the minds of all who have a just sense of honor, and think they have the privilege of walking the streets without being controul’d.

The British army’s occupation of Boston ended in the Massacre. Bouie drew a parallel between that event and federal agent Jonathan Ross’s killing of Renée Good. When his essay appeared, two still-unidentified agents had not yet killed Alex Pretti.

Though there are similarities, I’ve been wary about analogizing the Massacre to this month’s events in Minneapolis. For instance, the eight soldiers in King Street were much more vulnerable than the heavily armed and armored federal agents shoving people around. And those soldiers weren’t grabbing people off the street just because they didn’t look white.

Nonetheless, it’s hard not to be reminded of the past. Bouie concluded, “I think the administration is more likely to break…and learn, as the British did in Boston, that Americans are quite jealous of their liberties.”

“This rule narrows the concept of patriotism and patriotic education…”

Back in September, the U.S. Secretary of Education, former wrestling entertainment magnate Linda McMahon, announced that “Patriotic Education” would be a “supplemental priority” in the department’s grants.

The department’s press release defined that as “a civic education that teaches American history, values, and geography with an unbiased approach.”

However, the Federal Register’s proposed rule for this initiative, which carries more legal weight, offered a different definition of “Patriotic education”:

a presentation of the history of America grounded in an accurate, honest, unifying, inspiring, and ennobling characterization of the American founding and foundational principles; a clear examination of how the United States has admirably grown closer to its noble principles throughout its history; and the concept that commitment to America’s aspirations is beneficial and justified.

Words like “ennobling,” “admirably,” and “beneficial and justified” are obviously value judgments, contradicting the press release’s claim to seek “an unbiased approach.”

I believe the U.S. of A.’s founding principles are indeed inspiring and ennobling, and I wish the country had done and would do a better job of following those principles. It certainly hasn’t done so “throughout its history,” implying there have been no reverses. Not everyone shares my idea of those principles, furthermore.

The federal government invites citizens to comment on proposed rules. Many historical organizations spoke out about this one and urged their members to do so. I’ll quote the American Historical Association’s talking points because I think they’re sensible and well put.

Students deserve an honest and full account of US history. This funding priority promises to support the teaching of “accurate and honest” content. We consider this goal profoundly important, and this is why we are concerned about efforts to scrub historical content from federal websites, remove factual signage at historic sites, and attack curatorial decisions at Smithsonian museums, alleging that this history is insufficiently celebratory in its depiction of the United States. . . .

We do not need to think alike in order to find common purpose; the founders of the United States found common purpose amid multiple conflicts and divisions. The proposed Department of Education priority states that “a shared understanding of our political, economic, intellectual, and cultural history—including our national symbols and heroes” is a prerequisite for informed patriotism. The founding generation of the United States did not have a shared understanding of their history, their symbols, or their heroes; nor have subsequent generations. US patriotism is diverse and multifaceted and it is capacious enough to include even those who are critical and skeptical about patriotism.

The Department of Education’s rule asserts that there can only be one interpretation of an event, an assertion that runs contrary to the practice of history and the importance of allowing people to engage in civil deliberations. Disagreement also is a strength of our political system and not a flaw. The US Constitution’s First Amendment recognizes this when embracing freedom of assembly, petition, press, religion, and speech. . . .

This rule narrows the concept of patriotism and patriotic education, with a disproportionate focus on the Founding Era, a period when most Americans could not vote, when many were enslaved, and before the US Constitution explicitly embraced “equal protection.” American history does not stop in 1800, and it should be presented in a way that allows students to explore multiple periods, consider various perspectives, and draw their own informed conclusions. . . .

The commemoration of the 250th anniversary of American independence must provide opportunities for all Americans to learn from our shared history, one that includes recognition of the complex challenges, aspirations, and struggles across this history to enact a more perfect union.

The comment period has passed, though this federal website says citizens are still posting their responses. In fact, it looks like most comments have arrived this month. I don’t know when the department might issue a rule and apply it to educational grants.

Historical Signage Removed at Independence National Park

Back in September, I shared news reports of the Trump White House complaining about signs at the Presidential House site in Independence National Historical Park.

That mansion, now gone, was the home of Presidents George Washington and John Adams in the 1790s. During Washington’s time, it was a site of enslavement—and of self-liberation.

Two of the Washington’s staff, Oney Judge and Hercules Posey, escaped from bondage at that house and made their way to free lives in New Hampshire and New York, respectively. (Boston 1775 readers might recall this blog played a tiny part in documenting Posey’s presence in New York.)

In erecting brick walls to show the outline of the mansion, the National Park Service also developed detailed signage to interpret the history of that site for visitors. That’s standard N.P.S. procedure, with the material going through many reviews for accuracy.

Last week, the Philadelphia Inquirer reported that N.P.S. workers had acted under orders to remove all those signs. All that remains now is a list of the people documented as enslaved in President Washington’s household, etched in cement. (And I have no idea how long that list will remain visible.)

I first read complaints about commemorating slavery at Independence N.H.P. over twenty years ago on the Revlist discussion group. I pointed out that this was also a story of people gaining their liberty and independence, so what park could be more fitting?

The objector was unwilling to recognize that freedom for black Americans was more significant than comfort for white Americans. That same attitude is evident in the current trumpery from the White House.

This President’s respect for historical fact is evident in his June 2024 comment on Washington owning slaves: “Actually I think he probably didn’t.” Likewise his 4 July 2019 statement about how the Continental “Army manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over the airports,…”

After years of complaints that any community’s removal or alteration of a statue or monument was tantamount to erasing history, this administration is literally erasing history from a public site. But only a particular sort of history. 

“How should patriotic Americans think about political violence”?

On 15 January, Prof. Johann Neem shared an essay titled “The Problem of Violence in Authoritarian America.” Here’s a sample:

No American should be shot so easily or blithely. In a country where, as Tom Paine put it, the law is king, we are entitled to due process. Instead, we have become victims of state violence encouraged by the Trump regime’s policies, statements, and values. Trump has permitted federal agents to use illegal amounts of force; ICE agents now regularly assault Americans on the streets, in their cars, and in their homes. . . .

As Trump expands his rule, we must ask ourselves unsettling—and unsettled—questions about the role of violence: How should patriotic Americans think about political violence, and what might we learn from our Revolutionary political tradition?

At first glance, the answers to these questions are easy: violence in a constitutional democratic republic is never permitted. Democracies require citizens to embrace disagreement and accept the outcome of free, fair elections.

But we are no longer living in a free state. Under Trump, the Constitution is no longer active. The rule of law has ended. Donald Trump has deployed lies, violence, and lawlessness to amass power. As I have written before, Trump’s violation of his oath of office means that he is no longer the constitutional president of the United States. We Americans are now subjects of an arbitrary regime ruled by a tyrant. Under Trump, the federal government has become the enemy of the American people. We are subject to force, not law. . . .

In our current context, conversations about violence are complicated because our political tradition recognizes the legitimacy of violence against tyrants but denies the legitimacy of violence by tyrants. Two and a half centuries ago, when the colonists found themselves in a similar situation, the leaders of the patriot cause had to explain why they had embraced violent resistance against their own government. They did so in Continental Congress’s 1775 “Declaration…[on] the Causes and Necessity of Taking Up Arms.”

The situation was fraught. America’s resistance leaders in Congress had hoped to resolve differences between the colonists and England peacefully through meetings, petitions, and boycotts. Yet as Americans faced an increasingly hostile British government, patience was running out and the people got ahead of the opposition’s leaders. In April 1775, patriotic Minutemen at Lexington and Concord showed up to prevent British soldiers, then occupying Boston, from seizing arms in the Massachusetts countryside. Soon after, Ethan Allen’s Green Mountain Boys and colonial militiamen stormed Fort Ticonderoga.

Similarly, today, we see incidents in which protestors are getting increasingly unwilling to stay out of ICE’s way as Trump’s agents cross line after line that protects Americans from arbitrary force, arrest, and imprisonment, as the Cato Institute recently concluded. Most protestors are peaceful and obeying the law—but deciding what counts as lawful becomes harder when federal agents act violently and unlawfully. . . .

As our patriotic forebears 250 years ago understood, we too have a responsibility to our children and future generations who deserve to live in a free country. Violence is always a last resort. But at some point, some people in some city may be pushed to cross a line that most of us never want to cross. Just as [the] Continental Congress struggled with how to respond, so will we. The answer of what to do next is not easy or simple. The question we must all start asking ourselves, then, is how we will respond if that time comes, hoping and acting all along to prevent it from arriving.

Over a week later, as I type this, we see multiple videos of how I.C.E. agents approached, shoved, tackled, beat, maced, and finally shot observer Alex Pretti several times, killing him on the street. Along with the shooting of Renée Good, that made I.C.E. agents responsible for 66% of all homicides in Minneapolis so far this year.

The day before those agents killed Pretti, tens of thousands of local citizens braved harsh winter weather to march peacefully against federal oppression (shown in the photo at top). As Neem says, it’s hard to see Americans remaining committed to such peaceful protest if the forces of trumpery try to maintain their tyranny.