Looking for Trouble, Even on the Sabbath

Among the men who brawled at John Gray’s ropewalk on 2 Mar 1770 were a young ropemaker named Samuel Gray (no known relation) and Pvts. William Warren and Mathew Kilroy of the 29th Regiment.

The next day, there were more fights in Boston. Some redcoats from the 29th, including Pvt. John Carroll, went back into Gray’s ropewalk and challenged the men working there, along with sailor James Bailey. Then there was another brawl, with one private reportedly badly injured.

Town watch captain Benjamin Burdick also had a run-in with soldiers on Saturday:

A young man that boarded with me, and was at the Rope-Walks, told me several of them had a spite at him, and that he believed he was in danger. I had seen two soldiers about my house, I saw one of them hearkening at the window, I saw him again near the house, and asked him what he was after;

he said he was pumping ship:

(“Pumping ship” was slang for urinating. This may have been a reference to William Green’s rude joke the day before about cleaning an outhouse. Then again, the soldier might have been urinating.)

Was it not you, says I, that was hearkening at my window last night?

what if it was, he said, I told him to march off, and he damned me, and I beat him till he had enough of it, and he then went off.

That incident made Burdick, and even more so his wife, decide that he should carry a Highland broadsword when he went out on duty.

Sunday was a day of rest in Boston, of course. Yet more military men visited Gray’s ropewalks then, 250 years ago today. But this delegation was at a higher level, as owner John Gray testified:

At Sabbath noon I was surprised at hearing that Col. [Maurice] Carr [of the 29th] and his officers had entered my rope-walk, opened the windows, doors, &c, giving out that they were searching for a dead sergeant of their regiment; this put me upon immediately waiting upon Col. [William] Dalrymple [of the 14th, senior army officer in Boston, pictured above after retirement], to whom I related what I understood had passed at the rope-walk days before.

He replied it was much the same as he had heard from his people; but says he, “your man was the aggressor in affronting one of my people, by asking him if he wanted to work, and then telling him to clean his little-house.”

For this expression I dismissed my journeyman on the Monday morning following; and further said, I would do all in my power to prevent my people’s giving them any affront in future.

He then assured me, he had and should do everything in his power to keep his soldiers in order, and prevent their any more entering my inclosure.

Presently after, Col. Carr came in, and asked Col. Dalrymple what they should do, for they were daily losing their men; that three of his grenadiers passing quietly by the rope-walks were greatly abused, and one of them so much beat that he would die.

He then said he had been searching for a sergeant who had been murdered; upon which, I said, Yes, Colonel, I hear you have been searching for him in my rope-walks; and asked him, whether that sergeant had been in the affray there on the Friday; he replied, no: for he was seen on the Saturday. I then asked him, how he could think of looking for him in my walks; and that had he applied to me, I would have waited on him, and opened every apartment I had for his satisfaction.

These gentlemen in the military and in business were trying to keep the peace, but also sought to protect the interests of their operations.

The 12 March Boston Gazette added detail, perhaps even reliable, to the story of the missing sergeant:

Divers stories were propagated among the soldiery that served to agitate their spirits; particularly on the Sabbath that one Chambers, a sergeant, represented as a sober man, had been missing the preceding day and must therefore have been murdered by the townsmen. An officer of distinction so far credited this report that he entered Mr. Gray’s rope-walk that Sabbath; and when required of by that gentleman as soon as he could meet him, the occasion of his so doing, the officer replied that it was to look if the sergeant said to be murdered had not been hid there.

This sober sergeant was found on the Monday unhurt in a house of pleasure.

On the day of rest there were no more brawls, but rumors flew among the townspeople that soldiers were plotting revenge on Monday. Oddly enough, rumors spread among the soldiers that townspeople were plotting revenge on Monday.

COMING UP: Another glimpse of Sergeant Chambers. But first…

“Boston Surrounded with aboute 14 Ships”

On 30 Sept 1768, Deacon John Tudor wrote in his diary that the Royal Navy’s transport ships were now approaching Boston’s wharves:

At 3 O’Clock P. M. the Lanceston of 40 Guns, the Mermaid of 28, Glasgow of 20, Keven [Beaver, wrote John Rowe] of 14, Senegal 14, Bonnetta 10, several armed schooners, which with the Romney of 50 Guns (which had been hear most of the Summer) & the other Ships of War before in the Harbour, Capt. [James] Smith in the Mermaid Comadore, all came up to town bringing with them the 14th Regiment Col. [William] Dalrymple & 29th Regt. Col. [Maurice] Care.

So that now we See Boston Surrounded with aboute 14 Ships, or Vessells of war. The greatest perade perhaps ever seen in the Harbour of Boston.

Boston’s selectmen had been expecting those troops as far back as 10 September. After that, they met on the 11th, 12th, 13th (twice), 14th (twice), and 15th (twice). Most of those meetings produced no official decisions, the exceptions being typical small tasks such as admitting a person to the poorhouse or setting the price of rye bread.

On the 18th, the selectmen went to the Council Chamber in the Town House and received official word that four regiments were on their way, two from Halifax and two later from Ireland. Those thousands of soldiers would need a place to stay, the Council relayed. Three days later, the selectmen returned to the Council and said the only place for the soldiers was in Castle William.

The selectmen met again on the afternoon of the 21st, the 23rd, 26th, 28th, 29th, and 30th (twice). Again, most of those meetings officially resulted in nothing. The record of the afternoon meeting on the 30th even says: “A number of His Majestys Justices were present, but nothing transacted, matter of minuting.”

(On 26 September a cloth dyer named Thomas Mewse alerted the selectmen that he had come to Boston from Norwich, England, with his son. Mewse would go into “the Weaving Business” with William Molineux, a partnership that broke down in mutual recriminations, lawsuits, and newspaper essays. I wrote a long chapter about how that dispute connects to Molineux’s sudden death in October 1774 for The Road to Concord, and then I cut it for length. But it was nice to see Mewse make his entrance.)

The reason for the selectmen’s frequent meetings, and the magistrates’ presence on the 30th, is that Gov. Francis Bernard was trying to make the Manufactory building near the Common available as barracks. He told Col. Dalrymple that the Manufactory “is a building belonging to the Province and at present not leased or appropriated to any Person or Purpose.”

In fact, there were a few families in that large building weaving cloth or stockings or making buttons on a small scale. Moving them out would require a legal eviction, hence the justices of the peace—but most of those appointees stood with the selectmen in opposing the troops’ presence in town.

As much as Gov. Bernard wanted to turn the Manufactory over to the army, he didn’t want to take all the responsibility for doing so. He had spent almost two weeks trying to get his Council to agree with the idea. Those elected officials refused, also siding with the Boston selectmen.

In his letter to Col. Dalrymple, the governor wrote, “you have requested of me the Use of the building called the manufactory house.” So far as I know, Dalrymple had never been in Boston, but the governor wanted the request to come from the army.

On 30 September, Gov. Bernard finally bit the bullet and acted on his own authority—but he turned all the hard work over to Dalrymple:

as it is my Duty to preserve the Peace of the Town by all means in my Power, for which it is necessary to prevent an intermixture of the Soldiers and the People, as it must certainly give frequent occasions for the breaking the Peace, I do hereby assign & appoint the Manufactory house being a building appropriated to no use, & belonging to the Province; & I do authorise you to take possession of the same as & for a Barrack for the quartering the King’s Troops.

Until that building was available, the governor said, he had no objection to the regiments camping on Boston Common. As for straw for that camp, he would speak with the Council—the same uncooperative Council that didn’t want the troops in Boston in the first place.

TOMORROW: The landing.

(The picture above, courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical Society, is one version of Christian Remick’s painting of the fleet in Boston harbor as seen from Long Wharf.)