Henry Howell Williams as a Quartermaster?

In his 1858 History of East Boston, William H. Sumner wrote, “I think [Henry Howell Williams] was a quartermaster-sergeant in the army” during the siege.

To research that book, Sumner relied on Williams family sources. He wrote favorably of Williams and included the portrait of the man shown here. So that impression probably came from descendants.

In fact, the Continental Congress didn’t establish the rank of quartermaster sergeant until July 1776.

As for the possibility that Williams helped in supplying the Continental Army around Boston less formally, I’ve found no contemporaneous documentation for that. Unless, of course, we count how the Massachusetts government commandeered his livestock for the public benefit.

Adm. Samuel Graves did claim that the destroyed property on Noddle’s Island belonged to “a notorious Rebel then in Arms.” But there’s no evidence for Williams joining the Massachusetts or Continental army. We shouldn’t rely on Graves’s self-justifying account for what was happening on the other side of the siege lines.

Sumner linked Williams’s alleged work for the army to how he obtained some property from the Continental authorities after the siege:

In partial compensation for this destruction of private property was the gift of the barracks at Cambridge, after the army quitted it, by General [George] Washington, to Mr. Williams. . . . The barracks were removed to the Island, and part of them used for a house, which Mr. Williams erected over the old cellar, to be used as tenements for his workmen, and for barns and sheds for the sheep and cattle, at the westerly slope of Camp hill.

Again, I’d like to see contemporaneous evidence for such a gift. Gen. Washington was careful to work with the Continental Congress and local governments in managing public assets, so such a grant should have left a paper trail. The documents I’ve found suggest another story.

[The search function for Founders Online has slowed down considerably in the past month. On 19 May the U.S. government issued an acknowledgment of “periodic degraded performance owing to extreme spikes in traffic caused by excessive website crawling, associated with content scooping from AI platforms and other indexers.” This slowdown coincided with the D.O.G.E. takeover of federal government computer networks. Given that new agency’s faith in A.I. programs, that could be related to the “scooping.”]

TOMORROW: The barracks on Noddle’s Island.

“Belonging to Mr. Henry Howell Williams”

Henry Howell Williams lost more property in the Battle of Chelsea Creek than anyone else but the Royal Navy.

Williams held the lease for Noddle’s Island. He had a big house there—big enough to show up on maps of the harbor. He’d invested in agricultural outbuildings, horses, sheep, cattle, hogs, and hay.

Williams probably took his family off the island in April, soon after the war began. On 1 May, Adm. Samuel Graves granted him a pass to go to and from his home, with the stipulation that he not remove anything. Williams later reported that his house still contained a clock bought in Britain, mahogany furniture, family pictures, and other genteel possessions.

Late that month, provincial troops went onto Hog Island and Noddle’s to grab animals, keeping them away from the British. In the fighting that followed, they set fire to the hay and most buildings on Noddle’s Island. In early June the provincials returned to grab the remaining livestock and burn the last structure.

Williams’s farm was reduced to charred ruins on an empty, singed landscape. As I wrote back here, Williams was protective of his interests, placing regular advertisements to warn off trespassers and hunters. He came from a wealthy Roxbury family. He had connections to men in the Patriot leadership.

However, Williams had also signed the farewell to Gov. Thomas Hutchinson. He sold his livestock and forage to the British military, possibly even after the war began. That no doubt affected his standing with the provincial authorities.

On 31 May, Gen. Artemas Ward’s general orders stated:

That the stock, which was taken from Noddle’s Island, belonging to Mr. Henry Howell Williams, be delivered to his father, Col. Joseph Williams, of Roxbury, for the use of the said Henry H. Williams.

But evidently few or no animals were driven all the way around the siege lines to Roxbury and returned to the Williams family. After all, there was a war on. The provincial army also needed food and horses.

TOMORROW: The first petition.

“The Diana was soon after burnt by the rebels”

Having covered the maritime seizures that took place between Fairhaven and Martha’s Vineyard (14 May 1775) and the exchange of fire over Grape Island off Hingham (21 May), I’ve come back to the skirmishing over Hog Island and Noddle’s Island that’s become known as the Battle of Chelsea Creek.

And just in time for its Sestercentennial! (Well, the Sestercentennial of the second day of the action.)

Here’s a description of that fight from the British perspective, not contemporaneous but within living memory, published in 1804 by former engineer Robert Beatson in Naval and Military Memoirs of Great Britain:

The insurgent Americans, with astonishing perseverance, pursued their avowed design of cutting off every possible supply from the friends of Government, and of destroying what they could not carry away.

On the 27th of May, they burnt a great deal of hay on Hog island; and a few hours after, they landed on Noddles island, with the intention of also burning the hay which had been purchased for the army, and of adding to the conflagration, by laying in ashes a storehouse that had been hired when his Majesty’s ship the Glasgow was on shore, and in which the Admiral [Samuel Graves] had deposited two large cargoes of lumber, until an opportunity should offer of sending them to Halifax.

The storehouse also contained many other articles, which it was of great consequence to preserve, from the impossibility of having them replaced at this juncture. There were likewise on this island six hundred sheep, several milch cows, and a number of horses, mostly private property.

The Admiral, eager to prevent the depredations of the Americans, when he observed that they were landed upon the island, immediately ordered the Diana schooner (newly arrived) to sail between it and the main; and to get up as high as possible to intercept them: and as assistance from the army required time, he directed a party of marines to be landed.

The Diana entered the river between three and four in the afternoon at low water, and proceeded to Hog island, with some interruption from the rebels on all sides. Their numbers on Hog and Noddles islands were computed at seven hundred men. Parties of each occasionally attacked the Diana. They were, however, all obliged to quit Noddles island, without doing the intended mischief.

This being effected; Lieutenant [Thomas] Graves [shown above, later in his career], whom the Admiral had ordered not to remain in the river upon the turn of the tide, began to move off: but being retarded by a calm which unluckily took place, the boats of the squadron were ordered to assist the Diana by towing her along.

The slow progress which she made gave time for the enemy to assemble; and by the close of the evening the whole country was alarmed, and the rebel General [Israel] Putnam had brought two thousand men with field-pieces from Cambridge, with which he lined the shore and greatly annoyed her.

The marines from the squadron were landed on the island, with two three pounders from the Cerberus; and General [Thomas] Gage, the moment it was in his power, sent two pieces of artillery: but it was impossible, though in sight of the fleet, to give the schooner any effectual assistance.

The calm continued; it grew almost dark; the fire of the rebels increased; between eleven and twelve at night, she unfortunately got aground upon the ferry-ways at Winnisimmest, and the tide ebbing fast, rendered every effort to move her ineffectual.

About three in the morning she fell over, and her crew were obliged to abandon her, and go on board the Britannia armed floop, which had been sent to their assistance. The Diana was soon after burnt by the rebels.

The battle was renewed by Lieutenant [John] Graves in the Britannia, and lasted about eleven hours from first to last, in which there were two men killed, and several wounded; the commander, officers, and crew of the Diana schooner were tried by a Court-martial for the loss of the vessel, and most honourably acquitted.

Lt. Thomas Graves of was a nephew of Adm. Samuel Graves, as was Lt. John Graves of the Somerset’s tender Britannia. Other sources say both Graves brothers suffered serious burns when the provincials set the Diana on fire.

This account is based mostly on Adm. Graves’s report to the Admiralty on 7 June. He said almost nothing about this event in his later narrative of the start of the war, most likely because it didn’t reflect very well on the navy in general and his family in particular.

The courts martial that Beatson mentioned were held in Boston, under Adm. Graves’s eye. In their 2013 New England Quarterly article on this fight, Craig J. Brown, Victor T. Mastone, and Christopher V. Maio reported that all the British mariners testifying at Lt. Graves’s trial said the Diana hadn’t gone far upstream, but the archeological record suggests otherwise. In sum, that inquiry might have been a whitewash. Both Graves brothers eventually became admirals.

Of the shoreline fights between Crown and provincials in May 1775, this was the first in which either commander reported any of his own men killed. The two Royal Navy seamen who died were named George Williams and William Crocker. The Rev. John Troutbeck, assistant rector at King’s Chapel, “performed divine Service” at their funeral on board H.M.S. Somerset.

“Surely the most ridiculous expedition that ever was plan’d”

After the exchange of fire over Grape Island on 21 May 1775, both sides of the war claimed to have damaged the other and gotten the best of the day.

Four days after the fighting, the New-England Chronicle stated:

Whether any of the Enemy were wounded, is uncertain, though it is reported three of them were. It is thought that they did not carry off more than one or two tons of hay.

As for the gunfire from the departing Royal Navy vessels, that was “without effect.”

The next day’s Connecticut Gazette was even more positive:

the People…wounded 3 of the Enemy, and drove them off. They had got a Ton and Half of Hay on Board.

And the 3 June Pennsylvania Ledger said:

the regulars returned to Boston, with the loss of eight men killed and several wounded, as the provincials were informed by a gentleman that left Boston the next day.

In contrast, Lt. John Barker of His Majesty’s 4th Regiment wrote in his diary that ”a few of the Rebels were killed, without any loss on our side,” and he estimated the amount of hay removed as up to “7 or 8 Tons.”

Militaries always have a better sense of their own losses and usually exaggerate the enemy’s. If we follow that guideline and accept only what each army said about its own force, then the day ended without any casualties on either side.

The Crown forces had taken away a few tons of needed hay, but the Patriots burned far more—even Barker guessed his comrades had left “about 70” tons behind.

The provincials also burned Elisha Leavitt’s barn on the island. Local tradition held that he treated his neighbors to rum during the day to avert similar violence against his property on shore.

As usual, Lt. Barker saw a lot to complain about:

It was surely the most ridiculous expedition that ever was plan’d, for there were not a tenth part boats enough even if there had been Men enough, and the Sloop which carried the Party mounted 12 guns, but they were taken out to make room, whereas if one of two had been left it would have effectually kept off the Rebels

That might have been echoed in the 26 May Connecticut Gazette: “We hear Gen. [Thomas] Gage blamed the Admiral [Samuel Graves] for sending Vessels that were so small, on this Enterprize.” We should ask how the printers could reliably know such a thing. On the other hand, it may be significant that Graves skipped over this action in his self-serving report narrative of the war.

The reaction on the provincial side was very different. In a follow-up letter to her husband, Abigail Adams had nothing but praise for the locals who took part in the fight, particularly their own relatives:

I may say with truth all Weymouth Braintree Hingham who were able to bear Arms, and hundreds from other Towns within 20 30 and 40 miles of Weymouth.

Our good Friend the Doctor [Cotton Tufts] is in a very misirable state of Health, has the jaundice to a [very gr]eat degree, is a mere Skelliton and hardly able to [ride fro]m his own house to my fathers. Danger you [know] sometimes makes timid men bold. He stood that day very well, and generously attended with drink, Bisquit, flints &c. 5 hundred men without taking any pay. He has since been chosen one of the committee of Correspondence for that Town, and has done much Service by establishing a regular method of alarm from Town to Town.

Both your Brothers were there—your younger Brother [Elihu Adams] with his company who gaind honour by their good order that Day. He was one of the first to venture aboard a Schooner to land upon the Island.

That reflects the general mood on the two sides at this time. The British military was having inter-service quarrels over logistics while the provincials were celebrating solidarity. Even though neither side had accomplished a great deal, or suffered a serious loss.

“Observing the Rebels landed on Noddles Island”

On 14 May 1775 the Massachusetts Provincial Congress’s committee of safety, aware that the British military was buying or confiscating sheep and cattle pastured on the Boston harbor islands, passed this resolution:

as the opinion of this committee, that all the live stock be taken from Noddle’s island, Hog island, Snake island, and from that part of Chelsea near the sea coast, and be driven back; and that the execution of this business be committed to the committees of correspondence and selectmen of the towns of Medford, Malden, Chelsea and Lynn, and that they be supplied with such a number of men as they shall need, from the regiment now at Medford.

That strong opinion apparently didn’t have the effect the committee wanted. It was, after all, recommending that other people undertake a difficult task that wouldn’t normally fall within their responsibilities.

So ten days later the committee resolved:

That it be recommended to Congress, immediately, to take such order respecting the removal of the sheep and hay from Noddle’s Island as they may judge proper, together with the stock on the adjacent islands.

The next day, 25 May, Gen. Thomas Gage wrote to Adm. Samuel Graves (shown above):

I have this moment received Information that the Rebels [intend] this Night to destroy, and carry off all the Stock & on Noddles Island, for no reason but because the owners having sold them for the Kings Use: I therefore give you this Intelligence that you may please to order the guard boats to be particularly Attentive and to take such Other Measures as you may think Necessary for this night.

According to Lt. John Barker, some British troops went onto Noddle’s Island that day “to bring off some hay.” But that was about it.

On the morning of 27 May, about 600 provincial soldiers under Col. John Nixon and Col. John Stark moved from Chelsea onto Hog Island. They began to round up livestock, most likely owned by Oliver Wendell, and set fire to hay and other crops.

In the afternoon, part of that provincial force crossed to Noddle’s Island, burning some structures. The smoke from the fires alerted British commanders. Capt. John Robinson of H.M.S. Preston sent an alert to Adm. Graves, who later wrote:

Upon observing the Rebels landed on Noddles Island, I ordered the Diana to sail immediately between it and the Main[land], and get up as high as possible to prevent their Escape, and I also directed a party of Marines to be landed for the same purpose.

That started the second significant fight of the siege of Boston, which local historians later named the Battle of Chelsea Creek. Rather than recounting the two-day action blow by blow, I recommend Craig J. Brown, Victor T. Mastone, and Christopher V. Maio’s article in the New England Quarterly from 2013 and HUB History’s recent podcast.

On Saturday, 24 May, Chelsea will commemorate the Sestercentennial of the Battle of Chelsea Creek. There will be military drills, artillery demonstrations, and other events at Port Park. The Governor Bellingham Cary House Museum will have an open house. There’s also a boat tour, but that’s sold out (and the Battle of Chelsea Creek wasn’t really a good event for sailing vessels, anyway).

On that same day, East Boston will commemorate the Sestercentennial of the Battle of Chelsea Creek at Condor Street Urban Wild with two battle reenactments at 11:00 A.M. and 3:00 P.M., a boat tour, a walking tour, military music, games, crafts, and the usual activities of modern public festivals.

After the anniversary passes, I’ll discuss a couple of the outcomes of that fighting.

“Permission to pass to & repass from Noddle’s Island”

As discussed yesterday, Henry Howell Williams’s oversaw what was probably the biggest farming operation in Boston harbor in 1775. He was renting Noddle’s Island to raise sheep, cattle, and horses and to grow forage and vegetables.

According to Mellen Chamberlain’s Documentary History of Chelsea, Williams’s “most profitable business had been supplying the King’s troops rendezvoused at Boston, in time of war, and merchant vessels, in time of peace, with fresh provisions from his fields and stock yards.”

That tie to the royal establishment and imperial trade was probably why Williams had signed a complimentary address to Gov. Thomas Hutchinson on his departure for London in June 1774, which quickly became a litmus test for Loyalism.

On the other hand, Williams also had strong ties to the other side of the political divide. He was the son of Roxbury farmer Joseph Williams, and I found hints that that family helped to smuggle cannon out of army-occupied Boston in 1774–75. Williams’s sisters married into Patriot families like the Mays, Heaths, and Daweses. His brother Samuel had moved out to Warwick but then came back east as a Provincial Congress delegate and militia captain.

On 21 April, Williams was in Boston and ran into William Burbeck, who held the Massachusetts government post of storekeeper at Castle William. A year later Burbeck described their interaction:

after some Conoversation with him setting forth my Concern how I should git out of town, Expecting every minute that I should be sent for; to go Down to that Castle—

he told me that he would Carry me over to Noddles Island if I would Resque it that he would Do the same for ye good of his Country; And am Sure that if we had been taken Crossing of water must have been confind. to this Day, or otherway more severly punished. . . . And that the Very next morning after; A party of men & Boat was sent after me And Serchd. my house & Shop to find me—

that after we got to ye Island Mr. Williams ordered one of his men to Carry me over to Chelsea by which means I am now in Cambridge—And that a few Days after I got into Cambridge sent to Mr. Williams Desiring him to Send my millitary Books & plans as also all my instruments which ye Army stood in great Need of. And Could not Do without.

Days after arriving behind provincial lines, Burbeck became the second-in-command of the Massachusetts artillery regiment.

However much Williams wanted to support the Patriot cause, the British military still controlled Boston harbor. So he also made a deal with the royal authorities. On 1 May, Capt. Robert Donkin, one of Gen. Thomas Gage’s aides, issued Williams a pass, shown above courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

Head Qrs. Boston 1st. May 1775

The Bearer, Mr. Williams, has the Commander in Chief’s permission to pass to & repass from Noddle’s Island to this place as often as he has occasion; he having given security to carry no people from hence, or bring any thing off the Island without leave from His Excelly or the Admiral—

Rt. Donkin
Aide Camp

NB. his own Servants row him.

Adm. Samuel Graves approved this pass as well. After all, the Royal Navy had at least one storehouse on Noddle’s Island, including a cooper’s shop.

“The Only Method to secure peace in the Town”?

At the end of his 23 Apr 1775 letter to George Rogers, and in a second, undated letter preserved in the same archive, Lt. John Bourmaster, R.N., turned from reporting stories he’d heard from army officers back to a topic he was experiencing first-hand: what it was like inside besieged Boston.

Bourmaster wrote:

The number of the Country People who fired on our Troops might be about 5 Thousand ranged along from Concord to Charlstown but not less than 20 Thousand were that day under Arms and on the March to join the Others. their loss we find to be nearly on a footing with our own

This count of militiamen who had turned out was reasonably accurate. However, the Crown had lost about three times as many men killed, wounded, or missing as the provincials.

three Days have now pass’d without communication with the Country; three more will reduce this Town to a most unpleasent situation; for there dependence for provision was from day to day on supply from the Country that ceasing you may conceive the consequences.

preparations are now making on both sides the Neck for attacking and defending the Hampshire and Connecticut Militia have join’d so that Rebel Army are now numerous. Collins is well and stationed between Charls Town and the end of this Town to assist in the defence. The General [Thomas Gage] and Earl Percy shall have the perusal of your Letter.

John Collins and Bourmaster had both been lieutenants on HMS Valiant years earlier. Collins had become commander of HMS Nautilus, which arrived in Boston harbor in early April.

Under the date of 20 April, Adm. Samuel Graves wrote in his Narrative:

The Captain of the Nautilus off the Magazine point, was directed to arm a flat bottomed Boat, and with the assistance of Boats from other Ships to take care that Guard should be rowed every night as high up the [Charles] River as possible.

In his later letter, Bourmaster discussed Gage’s quandary of how to deal with Boston’s civilian population. Was it safer to let them leave or to keep them in town to forestall a provincial attack, knowing most were hostile to the occupying army and had militia training?

Propositions have been made on the part of the General to the Select Men for disarming the Inhabitants but this I find they are unwilling to comply with; so that if we begin at the Lines we shall have it on both sides of our Ears they being at least 3000 strong in Town, with Arms in their possession; a pretty pass we are come to, Ah poor Old England how my heart feels for her present dishonourable situation—

Ultimately Gage and the selectmen reached a deal: once Bostonians had stored their firearms in Faneuil Hall, they could leave. Later Gage curtailed the departures, prompting complaints. Later still, Gen. George Washington grew suspicious of people leaving the town, worrying they were meant to spread smallpox or collect information.

Bourmaster shared his own idea for how to deal with this set of zealous civilians:

The following I have proposed as the Only Method to secure peace in the Town there are Churches and meetings sufficient to contain all those before mentiond, they with the Select Men, and Preachers, should be put in their at daylight in the Morning, their doors well secured, a strong guard round each, with Bagonets fixt; and then would I begine the Attack on Roxbury and Open a way again for us besieged Britons, but this is only a little presumption in an Old Valiant who becaus he has seen great things don expects to see such days again.

That plan was never implemented, of course.

Again, the surviving text of Bourmaster’s letters, as copied for the Marquess of Rockingham, was published in the William & Mary Quarterly in 1953.

“Landed them on a point of Marsh or Mudland”

Lt. John Bourmaster of the Royal Navy, introduced yesterday, played a crucial role in Gen. Thomas Gage’s expedition to Concord on 18–19 Apr 1775.

Bourmaster’s commander, Adm. Samuel Graves, wrote in his self-serving Narrative report about the navy’s role in that operation:

The Boats of the Squadron, by desire of the General were ordered to assemble along side the Boyne by 8 o’Clock in the Evening, and their Officers were instructed to follow Lieut. Bourmasters Direction. These Boats were to take in the Troops and land them in the Night at Phipps Farm; which being done they marched up the Country.

Bourmaster’s own account appears in his 23 Apr 1775 letter to George Rogers, secretary to Adm. Augustus Keppel. J. E. Tyler published the text of that letter in the William and Mary Quarterly in 1953, and I pointed out the connections to Bourmaster yesterday.

The lieutenant offered details about the first leg of the redcoats’ journey—across the Charles River:

On the 18th Instant between 11 and 12 0 Clock at Night I conducted all the Boats of the Fleet (as well Men a War as Transports) to the back part of Boston where I received the Granadiers and light Infantry amounting to 850 Officers and Men and Landed them on a point of Marsh or Mudland which is overflowed with the last quarter flood;

this Service I presume to say was performed with secrecy and quietness having Oars muffled and every necessary precaution taken, but the watchful Inhabitants whose houses are intermixed with the Soldiers Barracks heard the Troops Arms and from thence concluded that somthing was going on tho they could not conceive how or where directed

in consequence of this conception a light was shown at the top of a Church Stiple directing those in the Country to be on their guard.

The intention of this Expedition was to distroy some Guns and provision which were collected near Concord a Town 20 miles from where the Troops were landed, Colonel [Francis] Smith a Gallant Old Officer commanded this detachment and performd the above service.

Bourmaster’s contemporaries wrote of him as not having wealth or genteel education when he joined the navy. That’s reflected in his writing, which has non-standard spellings (“Men a War,” “Stiple”) and punctuation. To be sure, we’ve got a copy of the original, if not a copy of the copy.

Bourmaster’s account confirms the struggle between the British military and the Boston Patriots over control of information. Just as the lieutenant’s sailors rowed with “Oars muffled,” so did the two men conveying Paul Revere across the same river a little downstream. British officers recognized how the lights from the Christ Church steeple signaled the countryside. They didn’t know the man cued to ride by that signal would play little or no part in raising the alarm.

It’s not clear if Bourmaster knew the objective of the regulars’ march on 18 April or heard about it later, but this is yet another British source saying that goal was the “Guns and provision” in Concord and not Patriot leaders in Lexington.

TOMORROW: Who was to blame.

Two Lieutenants and the Battle of Bunker Hill

Lt. John Ragg of the Royal Navy’s marines entered our scene back here, in an anecdote from the Shaw family of Boston about how he got into an affair of honor with twenty-year-old Samuel Shaw.

I suspect that conflict happened before the war began, while Ragg, Maj. John Pitcairn, and perhaps other officers were boarding with the Shaw family in the North End.

It definitely happened before the Battle of Bunker Hill because Pitcairn died of his wounds that day, and the anecdote credited him with mediating the dispute.

By the date of that battle, Lt. Ragg had gotten into another argument, this time with one of his fellow British officers.

Lt. John Clarke was a veteran marine, having “served thirty six years with great credit” according to Adm. Samuel Graves. That said, Clarke had become a second lieutenant only in 1757 and a first lieutenant in 1771 (with a brief retirement on half-pay in between). He was assigned to H.M.S. Falcon.

According to British military documents that Allan French quoted in an article for the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, on the evening of 19 April (i.e., the day the war began) Clarke got drunk.

Lt. Clarke was arrested “for being very much in Liquor and unfit for Duty on the Morning of the 20th of last April, for breaking his Arrest, and for grossly abusing and challenging Lieutenant John Ragg of the Marines to fight.”

On 7 June, Graves wrote, Clarke was “tried and dismissed for being in Liquor upon duty on the 19th of April last.” The admiral ordered the former lieutenant back to England.

Then, on 17 June, came the big battle in Charlestown. Lt. Ragg’s grenadier company was in the thick of the fight. Gen. Thomas Gage’s report included this casualty list from the first battalion of marines:

1st battalion marines. — Major Pitcairn, wounded, since dead; Capt. Ellis, Lieut. Shea, Lieut. Finnie, killed; Capt. Averne, Capt. Chudleigh, Capt. Johnson, Lieut. Ragg, wounded; 2 sergeants, 15 rank and file, killed; 2 sergeants, 55 rank and file, wounded.

While Lt. Ragg recovered from his wound, former lieutenant Clarke traveled back to London on H.M.S. Cerberus, which also carried Gage’s report.

Not being in the Battle of Bunker Hill, or even in the British military at the time, didn’t stop Clarke from publishing An Authentic and Impartial Narrative of the Battle when he arrived back in London. That short book, credited to “John Clarke, First Lieutenant of Marines,” was one of the first descriptions of the battle to reach print and went through a second edition in London before the end of the year.

Many historians have tried to rely on Clarke’s Narrative, which offered details not found elsewhere, like Gen. William Howe’s speech to his soldiers and a description of Dr. Joseph Warren’s death. But ultimately most authors realized that Clarke was just piecing stuff together and making it up. French concluded, “it seems likely that it was written to relieve the tedium of his voyage to London, from such material as he could gather from his own observations and from the talk of the ship’s company.”

Despite his dispute with Ragg, Clarke described the first battalion of marines “behaving remarkably well, and gaining immortal honour, though with considerable loss, as will appear by the number of the officers killed and wounded.”

TOMORROW: Lt. Ragg, back in the fight.

“His Majesty’s Ship under my Command ran on the Rocks”

On 11 Dec 1774, Capt. William Maltby of H.M.S. Glasgow wrote from off Cohasset to his commander, Adm. Samuel Graves, with some bad news:

His Majesty’s Ship under my Command ran on the Rocks at this Place Yesterday Morning at 5 O’Clock.

She is now at an Anchor in a very narrow Place environ’d with Rocks and about half her Length from some of them, her Rudder is lost and she has received very considerable damage, if timely Assistance arrives, I hope She will be saved, She now makes as much Water as all the Pumps can free, I am taking every Method for her Preservation, but want Craft for Her Guns &ca.

as there is a little more Water than She draws at Low Water, but it would be very dangerous to throw her Guns Overboard here as She would strike on them at Low Water; for other particulars I refer You to the Bearer who seems to be a very communicative and civil Person.

The man Maltby entrusted with that message was Ebenezer Dickinson. He evidently did his job since the next afternoon Maltby could file this report:

Sir, I have your favor by Mr Dickinson, Lieutenant [Alexander] Greme is arrived in the Sloop; Lieutenant [Joseph] Nunn in the Halifax; Mr [William] Lechmere by Land; You may be assured I shall lose no time or Opportunity in doing everything in my power for the Preservation of the Ship,

an able Carpenter with two or three of that Profession would be of great Service in constructing a Rudder of this Plan.

I purpose to get the Ship in safety to Night if possible, until I can get. her in a Condition to come to Boston; If the 40 Men are completed to a 100. it will vastly contribute to forward the Ship as her Men are much fatigued already; I must refer You to Lt Lechmere for particulars of which he has heard and seen

In a postscript the captain added: “the reason I mention the Men after what You have said in your Letter, the Officers are of Opinion that the King’s Men are more to be depended on than Others.”

Graves’s letter doesn’t appear to have survived, but I’m guessing Maltby wanted men already in the Royal Navy to help with the salvage effort, not trusting locals, even if they were experienced sailors. In late December, there was already an open split between rural Massachusetts and the Crown.

Graves was especially displeased about this accident since H.M.S. Glasgow had just been refurbished in Halifax. It was, he wrote, “a clean Ship, compleatly stored and victualled.” And it had nearly reached Boston. As Capt. John Barker of the army wrote in his diary, the Glasgow ran aground “within two or three Leagues of the Light House.” But that proximity also meant the navy was able to hurry resources out to Maltby. The frigate was refloated, moved into Boston, and slowly repaired by early March.

At the time of the accident, the Admiralty office had sent orders for Capt. Maltby to report to Spithead because he had “served three years successively.” He was in line for a new command. However, the grounding spelled the end of Capt. Maltby’s naval career.

On 10 Jan 1775 the merchant John Rowe wrote in his diary:

Capt. Maltby of the Glasgow Man of Warr was try’d this day by a Court Martial on board the Somerset & suspended.

The Glasgow’s gunner was court-martialed at the same time. Presumably Maltby sailed home to Britain shortly afterward, but I can’t trace him.

Adm. Graves reassigned the Glasgow to Capt. Tyringham Howe. During the Battle of Bunker Hill, the frigate fired shot across Charlestown Neck to discourage more provincials from going onto the peninsula.

Meanwhile, Lt. William Finnie, whom Maltby had wounded in a duel on Noddle’s Island back in 1773, was serving with the Marines’ 61st Company, also listed as grenadiers. He was among the many Marine officers killed in the Bunker Hill battle.

(The map shown above, viewable at Boston Rare Maps, was published in 1774. It includes at the bottom right “Konohasset Harbour” and the “Konohasset rocks.”)

“The vote of the town complying with his excellency’s proposal”

On Sunday, 23 Apr 1775, Boston’s emergency town meeting considered whether to accept Gen. Thomas Gage’s condition for letting people leave the besieged town: all Bostonians had to turn their firearms over to the selectmen to be stored in a central place.

Massachusetts’s militia law required most men to own and train with firelocks. Provincials were proud of that self-defense system. Indeed, they were now relying on it to resolve their dispute with Crown authorities.

Furthermore, Gen. Gage’s demand that men lock up their guns may have come as a surprise; that issue doesn’t appear on the records of the town meeting the day before.

Nonetheless, Bostonians wanted to get out of the town, to be away from the expected battles and food shortages.

As soon as the town’s committee put their understanding of the agreement with the governor in writing, the men at the town meeting acted on it:

Whereupon, Voted,
That the town accept of his excellency’s proposal, and will lodge their arms with the select men accordingly.

Voted, That the same committee be desired to wait upon his excellency the governor with the vote of the town complying with his excellency’s proposal, and the committee are desired to request of his excellency that the removal may be by land and water, as may be most convenient for the inhabitants.

The men at that meeting wanted out. Unlike the previous day’s vote on a promise not to attack the redcoats, this vote wasn’t recorded as unanimous. But it came quickly, and there’s no indication of any counterproposals.

The record published in the 26 June Boston Gazette doesn’t indicate how long the committee’s further consultation with Gage took, instead continuing:

The Committee appointed to wait upon his Excellency, report; that they accordingly waited upon him, and read the vote of the town, which was accepted by his Excellency; and at the same time his Excellency agreed that the inhabitants might remove from the town by land and water with their effects, within the limits prescribed by the Port Act:

Parliament had outlawed most sea voyages from Boston to ports outside of Massachusetts, and Gage felt he had to maintain that law.

…and also informed the committee he would desire the Admiral [Samuel Graves] to lend his boats to facilitate the removal of the effects of the inhabitants, and would allow carriages to pass and repass for that purpose: Likewise would take care, that the poor that may remain in Town should not suffer for want of provision after their own stock is expended, and desire that a letter might be wrote to Doctor [Joseph] Warren, chairman of the committee of the [Massachusetts Provincial] Congress, that those persons in the country who may incline to remove into Boston, with their effects, may have liberty so to do without molestation.

The town unanimously accepted of the foregoing report, and desired the inhabitants would deliver their arms to the Selectmen as soon as may be.

The townsfolk then voted to adjourn their meeting until “Tuesday morning the 25th of April, ten o’clock in the Forenoon.” And most of the men went home to find their guns.

TOMORROW: Implementing the agreement.

“Admiral Graves foresaw a great likelihood…”

The Road to Concord describes the Boston militia artillery company’s theft of their own cannon in September 1774, and how Gen. Thomas Gage reacted to that.

Robert Beatson’s Naval and Military Memoirs of Great Britain, from 1727 to 1783, published in 1804, includes a passage describing how Gage’s counterpart in the Royal Navy, Adm. Samuel Graves, reacted to events in and around Boston that month.

This recounting of events was very characteristic of Graves’s own reports home:

The rebellious designs of the people became every day more evident, and a mob attempted to remove some pieces of cannon during the night from Boston; and actually carried some from Charlestown [on 7 September], which place may be regarded as a suburb of that town. The disaffected gave out at the same time, that their intention was to fortify a camp in the country; and soon after, the boats of the Lively and Preston seized a flat-boat belonging to the Americans [on 20 September], with six very good guns, six pounders, which they were carrying up Charlestown river, and were supposed to be destined for the same service.

From the disposition of the people, Admiral Graves foresaw a great likelihood, that there would soon be a want of artificers to work for Government, although Boston abounded with shipwrights, sailmakers, caulkers, &c. He therefore wrote, in the most pressing terms, to Captain [James] Ayscough of his Majesty’s sloop the Swan, then at New York, but under orders to return to Boston, to procure such work-people as might be necessary to keep the ships under his command in proper repair, lest those at Boston should refuse their assistance. This precaution eventually proved of great service; for after the skirmish at Lexington, none of the Americans durst work for the King, either in the navy or army departments, but at the hazard of their lives.

In sum:

• The Bostonians were a criminal mob deteremined on rebellion.
• By implication, Gen. Gage and the army couldn’t handle that problem.
• In contrast, Adm. Graves was far-sighted and realistic, and more people should have listened to him. 

As I said, characteristic.

This passage also strongly suggests that Gage never informed the admiral about the disappearance of the militia field-pieces. Otherwise, the admiral would surely have mentioned that embarrassing fact in London, as another thing that was by no means his fault.

The Career of Captain Dundas

Once I saw that “Captain Dundas” had come up in the dispute between James Otis, Jr., and John Robinson, I had to figure out who that was and what role he played in the coming of the Revolution.

In September 1769, Otis called Dundas “a well known petty commander of an armed schooner,” meaning he was in the Royal Navy. (The Customs service had just lost its one and only armed schooner, the Liberty.)

Fortunately, the Royal Navy keeps good records, and websites like Three Decks make that information available as long as one keeps running searches. So here’s what I’ve put together.

Ralph Dundas was born on 12 Oct 1732, the eldest son of Ralph and Mary Dundas of Manour, Scotland. He was serving in the Royal Navy by 1748, when he was in his mid-teens, and passed the exam to be a lieutenant in October 1757.

Lt. Dundas received his first command in 1764: H.M.S. St. Lawrence (also spelled St. Laurence). In British Warships in the Age of Sail 1714-1792 Rif Winfield writes that this schooner was “purchased on stocks at Boston [or Marblehead?],” though J. J. Colledge and Ben Warlow’s Ships of the Royal Navy says the Royal Navy bought it in Halifax, Nova Scotia.

It carried thirty men, six three-pounder cannon, and twelve swivel guns—by no means a fearsome warship but powerful enough for peacetime patrols, carrying messages, and supporting larger vessels as a “tender.” Among the crew was master’s mate John Whitehouse, who later sailed under Capt. James Cook.

On 28 July 1766, the Boston Evening-Post reported:

Friday last arrived a Schooner from Louisbourg, by whom we learn, that some time before he sail’d fro thence, his Majesty’s armed Schooner the St. Laurence, commanded by Lieut. Dundas, was struck by Lightning as she lay at Anchor there, which set Fire to the Powder Magazine in the Fore Part of the Vessel and blew her up, by which Accident three Men were instantly killed, and several others terribly wounded, two of whom died the next Day:

We hear that the Officers on board, being in the Cabin, escaped unhurt; and that the Bows of the Vessel being carried away by the Explosion, she sunk in a few Minutes after.

The Boston Post-Boy of the same date said the explosion happened “between two and three Weeks ago.” The Narrative of American Voyages and Travels of Captain William Owen, R.N. names the site of the wreck as Neganishe, now probably called Ingonish.

Commodore Samuel Hood then bought a merchant’s sloop called the Sally, renamed it St. Lawrence, and assigned it to Lt. Dundas.

In the spring of 1768, the St. Lawrence accompanied H.M.S. Romney from Halifax to Boston. On 23 May, the Boston Chronicle carried Lt. Dundas’s advertisement for four deserters. Keeping the sloop fully manned was a challenge. Within a month the town was upset about a “man pressed by Capt. Dundas, and carried down to Halifax.” Capt. John Corner of the Romney and Councilor Royall Tyler sat down to discuss that issue and others, according to the 27 June Boston Chronicle.

The Boston News-Letter and Post-Boy show that over the next several months the St. Lawrence sailed back and forth along the northeast coast: off to Halifax in August, back to Boston in November and then heading off to Halifax again, collecting military stores at Canso and Louisburg over the winter, then back to Halifax. The St. Lawrence returned to Boston again in August 1769.

That put Lt. Dundas in town for the busy fall of 1769. He probably wasn’t in the British Coffee-House when Robinson and Otis started hitting each other with their canes on 5 September. Otis hinted that he participated in the fight, but Robinson denied that. Otis also said rumor had it Dundas “swore last year that the whole Continent was in open Rebellion.” However, the lieutenant’s name doesn’t appear to have come up again in this or other political disputes, which suggests that Otis’s Whig allies didn’t think they could make a case against him, even to their own followers.

The next month brought the Neck Riot on 24 October, followed four days later by the attacks on printer John Mein and sailor George Gailer. In the next couple of weeks, Royal Navy captains helped to hide Mein from the crowd. On 11 November, provincial secretary Andrew Oliver reported to Gov. Francis Bernard that Mein “thinking it unsafe for him to continue in Tow has taken his passage for England with Capn. Dundass.” In fact, it looks like Mein sailed away on another ship, but Oliver’s letter indicates that Dundas left Boston early in the month.

In April 1770, the sailmaker Ashley Bowen wrote in his diary that Dundas’s schooner had come into Marblehead harbor. However, the diary’s annotations suggest he mistook that ship for the Magdalen under Lt. Henry Colins. That suggests how common it was for New Englanders to see Dundas’s schooner. The 16 July 1772 Massachusetts Spy stated that Dundas had sailed the St. Lawrence to the Bahamas, and the 17 June 1773 Boston News-Letter reported that it had come back from the Bahamas to Boston.

As of June 1774, the Royal Navy listed the St. Lawrence, with six guns and thirty men, at Boston. It was small part of the big fleet under Vice-Admiral Samuel Graves sent to enforce the Boston Port Bill. In November Lt. Dundas sailed for London; part of a letter he carried was forwarded to Lord North as useful intelligence in January 1775.

That was the last voyage of that St. Lawrence, at least as a naval schooner. In May 1775, immediately after the war began, Graves reported that he had bought and armed two schooners at Halifax and planned to call one the St. Lawrence. He assigned it to a new commander. Lt. Dundas’s ship was sold off in London the next year.

Ralph Dundas became commander of the new fourteen-gun sloop Bonetta in April 1779, then the new sixteen-gun sloop Calypso (shown above) in December 1782. He served in that post until 1787. Dundas died that year at age fifty-four, having spent about four decades in the Royal Navy. He was buried at St. Clement Danes in Middlesex County. He left no known wife or children.

Commander Dundas served during two wars, but his naval career was overshadowed by his little brother George (1756-1814), who rose to be a rear admiral—having presumably joined the navy with Ralph as inspiration. An intervening brother, David (1749-1826), became a doctor to George III and a baronet.

Refighting Bunker Hill with the Angry Staff Officer

This is the anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill. For an overview of the action this year, I’m pointing to the Angry Staff Officer’s article “Warfighter: Bunker Hill.”

It sets aside the mysteries, ambiguities, and evidence that historians focus on, and also applies modern military terms to the situation in 1775. Here’s a taste:

On the night of June 16, Col. [William] Prescott with chief engineer Richard Gridley and about 500 men crossed Charlestown Neck and occupied Breed’s Hill. Equipped with survivability equipment, they began construction of a fighting position on the height of the crest. During the night, ISR assets on the Royal Navy ships in the harbor spotted the movement and called for fire on the hill. Rounds began to impact, but the guns soon fell silent: Admiral Richard [sic—Samuel] Graves had been awoken by the firing and ordered the men to cease fire. Working all night, the Patriots dug a substantial fortification on Breed’s Hill with earthworks and firing platforms. When the sun rose, the British found that the height had been seized and fortified.

During the morning hours, more men arrived on the neck and began improving the fighting positions. An earthen trench was constructed down the left side of the redoubt. Just behind it, the New Hampshire and Connecticut troops constructed additional defenses extending to the left using log fences and stone walls to erect a position that ran down the slope towards the Mystic River. Between the fence and the trench, pioneers dug three v-shaped trenches to tie in the trench and the fence. This still left the extreme left vulnerable to flanking parties moving along the coast, so Col. [John] Stark led a detachment down the bluff to the river and emplaced a series of rock walls in depth. He then placed detachments of marksmen behind each wall, with strict fire control measures. He drove a stake forty yards in front of this position, with instructions for his men to aim at the enemy’s feet; this compensated for the natural rise of the musket and would place their fire center mass.

Arrayed across the dominant heights, the Patriot forces overlooked the key terrain where the British would have conduct an amphibious landing. Between this beach and the heights lay a series of swamps and rail fences that served as natural obstacles that would disrupt British movement and maneuver.

Secondary fighting positions were constructed on Bunker Hill to the rear of Breed’s Hill to serve as a fallback position for Patriot forces should they be forced to retrograde.

Fires

With their navy, the British brought significant fires dominance to the battlefield. Naval gunfire began again in the early morning hours of June 17 to suppress the Patriot lines. Over 100 guns were brought to bear on the enemy lines. This sustained fire was also meant to disrupt Patriot movement, but the natural lay of the land allowed Patriots to maneuver their forces in relative safety. In the afternoon, the British landed 12 pound and 6 pound batteries on the beach to provide additional suppressive fire.

The Patriots had four guns in position between the Connecticut and Massachusetts troops, but their gunners abandoned the field prior to the battle and so negated the majority of effects of the guns.

Sustainment

The British were forced to move all supplies via boat across the river, slowing their rate of supply and reinforcement significantly. The 6 pounder battery commander neglected to conduct a precombat inspection prior to deployment and found to their chagrin that their caissons were filled with 12 pound shot rather than 6 pound shot. This denied General [William] Howe his mobile fire support that he was counting on for close in fires.

On the Patriot side, they were already dangerously short of gunpowder. Each soldier had only about 30-40 rounds of ammunition. Lack of an overall field commander meant that there was no one individual tasked with overseeing logistics from the assembly area to the forward line of troops. This oversight would play an outsized role in the coming fight.

Now that we’ve reviewed the big picture, I’ll get into the smaller stories and questions.

London’s Response to the Marshfield Loyalists

In February 1775 Gen. Thomas Gage received the thanks of the town of Marshfield, or at least of the Loyalist majority at that February town meeting, for stationing British soldiers in that town.

The royal governor responded as protocol demanded: he sent back a public letter of gratitude, praising the citizens’ initiative “at a Time when Treason and Rebellion is making such hasty Strides to overturn our most excellent Constitution, and spread Ruin and Destruction through the Province.” Likewise, Adm. Samuel Graves thanked the town for its loyalty.

Back in January, Gage had reported to his superiors in London how he had sent troops to Marshfield and expected good results. He might even have started to turn the political tide, regaining some control over Massachusetts outside of Boston.

Marshfield came up as Parliament debated further steps to pacify New England. Former governor Thomas Hutchinson (shown above) visited the House of Lords on the afternoon of 16 March. In his diary he recorded that one of the colonies’ strongest supporters, Lord Camden

upbraided the Ministry with being pleased with every appearance of concession from the Americans: a little town of Marshfield had desired soldiers from Gage; he thought it was an inland town, and that 100 men had marched 40 miles into the country without being destroyed: but, alas! it appears by the map to be a town upon the sea coast, to which the men were sent by water—a town which had six of Mr Hutchinson’s Justices in it.

Upon mentioning my name, most of the Bishops, and many Lords who sat with their backs to me, turned about and looked in my face. It happened that I never made a Justice in that town whilst I was in the Government.

Two days later, Hutchinson complained to Jonathan Sewall in unusually emotional terms about Lord Camden’s remark:

I am a little angry wth him for asserting that the departure of the little town of Marshfield from the confederacy was owing to Mr Hutchinson’s having made six Justices there, wch. brought the eyes of the Lords upon me, who, I doubt not, believed him, though it happens unluckily for him that I never made a Justice in that town. Our American patr[iots] hardly exceed him in boldly asserting, to say the least, what he knows not to be true (you may transpose not if you will) to support his cause.

Ld Suffolk spake very well. Ld Mansf. was silent, but looked with sovereign contempt upon his adversary. Attending two or three debates in the H. of L. has lessened the high opinion I had formed of the dignity of it when I was in England before.

On 30 March, Parliament passed the New England Restraining Act, designed to apply economic pressure to the whole region in the same way the Boston Port Bill was squeezing Boston. That law limited both trade and fishing out of New England ports. However, it made a couple of exceptions, such as:

XI. Provided also, and be it enacted by the authority aforesaid, That nothing in this Act contained respecting the Fisheries carried on by his Majesty’s subjects in North America, shall extend, or be construed to extend, to any Ship or Vessel being the property of any of the inhabitants of the Townships of Marshfield and Scituate, in the Province of Massachusetts Bay, employed in or carrying on the Mackerel, Shad, and Alewife Fisheries only, if the Master or other person having the charge of any such Ship or Vessel as aforesaid, shall produce a Certificate, under the hand and seal of the Governour or Commander-in-Chief of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, setting forth that such Ship or Vessel, (expressing her name and the name of her Master, and describing her built and burthen) is the whole and entire property of his Majesty’s subjects of the said Townships of Marshfield and Scituate, and was the property of one or more of them, on or before the twenty-fifth day of March, in the year one thousand seven hundred and seventy-five, which Certificate or Certificates such Governour or Commander-in-Chief is hereby authorized and required to grant.

Thus, Parliament viewed Marshfield and its neighbor to the north—the one part of Massachusetts that appeared to have welcomed the king’s troops—as not part of the rebellion.

TOMORROW: Was Marshfield a “Tory town”?

Marshfield Town Meeting “penetrated with the highest sense of gratitude”

In February 1775 Marshfield’s Loyalist community was feeling emboldened by the presence of a hundred British regulars, and perhaps upset by the complaints from neighboring towns about those troops.

At that time, local historian Lysander Salmon Richards later wrote, Marshfield had only three selectmen: Dr. Isaac Winslow, Abijah White, and Ephraim Little. And they were all in the Loyalist camp.

Thus, those men could call an official town meeting on the terms they chose. Which started with applying to Gen. Thomas Gage for permission to hold such a meeting. The Massachusetts Government Act had forbidden towns from meeting more than once a year without the royal governor’s approval, which was a big strike at local self-government and thus a big grievance for the Patriot side.

According to Boston businessman Harbottle Dorr, Marshfield was the first town to approach the governor under the new law. Most towns were either claiming to meet by adjournment from a previous session or just gathering without official sanction.

Marshfield’s meeting took place on 20 February. The attendees chose Dr. Winslow to moderate. The records of that meeting say:

A vote was put to know the mind of the Town, whether they will adhere to, and abide by the Resolves and Recommendations of the Continental and Provincial Congresses, or any illegal assemblies whatsoever? and it passed in the negative.

Secondly, The vote was put to know the mind of the Town, whether they will return their thanks to General Gage, and Admiral [Samuel] Graves, for their ready and kind interposition, assistance, and protection from further insults and abuses with which we are continually threatened? and it passed in the affirmative.

Thirdly, They voted that a Committee be chosen to draw up and send the same to General Gage, and Admiral Graves, said Committee consisting of 23 persons.

Dr. Winslow chaired that large committee and probably drafted the addresses in the home he had recently inherited. (That home is shown above; now the 1699 Winslow House, I’m speaking there this evening.) Marshfield’s address to Gen. Gage matches the neighboring towns’ complaint in its high-flying rhetoric:

We, the Inhabitants of Marshfield, in legal Town Meeting assembled, this 20th day of February, 1775, beg leave to return your Excellency our most grateful acknowledgments for your seasonable assistance and protection, in sending a detachment of his Majesty’s Troops to secure and defend the loyal people of this Town, from the threats and violence of an infatuated and misguided people. We assure your Excellency (whatever may have been surmised to the contrary) that there were sufficient ground and reasons for making application; and we are fully convinced that this movement has preserved and promoted, not only the peace and tranquillity of this Town in particular, but of the County in general; owing, in great degree, to the prudence, firmness, and good conduct of Captain [Nisbet] Balfour, who, with pleasure as well as justice we say it, has done every thing in his power to obtain those laudable ends and purposes.

Thankfully we acknowledge our obligations to our Sovereign, for his great goodness and wisdom, in placing at the head of affairs, in this Province, in this day of difficulty, confusion, and discord, a gentleman of your Excellency’s well known humanity, moderation, capacity and intrepidity, and shall constantly implore the Supreme Governour of the universe to assist and direct you in the faithful discharge of the various functions of your exalted station, with fidelity to your King, with honour to yourself, and with happiness to the people committed to your charge.

With pleasure we embrace this opportunity of expressing our detestation and abhorrence of all assemblies and combinations of men (by whatever specious name they may call themselves) who have or shall rebelliously attempt to alter or oppose the wise Constitution and Government of Great Britain.

Furthermore, we beg leave to inform your Excellency, that in the most critical and dangerous times, we have always manifested and preserved our loyalty to the King, and obedience to his laws; carefully avoided all constitutional covenants and engagements whatsoever, that might warp us from our duty to our God, our King, and country; and as we are determined to persevere in the same course, we flatter ourselves that our endeavours and exertions will meet with our most gracious Sovereign’s approbation, as well as your Excellency’s, and that under his and your gentle and humane government and kind protection, we may peaceably and quietly sit under our own vines and fig-trees, and have none to molest or make us afraid.

(Fans of Hamilton will recall how George Washington also liked to quote Micah 4:4.)

The address to Adm. Graves was shorter but similar in tone:

We, the Inhabitants of Marshfield, in Town Meeting legally assembled, the 20th of February, A.D. 1775, penetrated with the highest sense of gratitude, present our sincere and hearty thanks to you sir, for your ready compliance with a request of a number of our inhabitants, in ordering an armed Vessel to protect and defend us from the lawless insults and abuses with which we were threatened by numbers of seditious and evil-minded people, for no other reason (that we can conceive) but our loyalty to the best of Kings, and firm adherence to the laws of Government. With hearts replete with gratitude, we contemplate the paternal care and goodness of our most gracious Sovereign, in the appointment of a gentlemen to command his Navy in America, at this critical juncture, whose duty, inclination, and abilities, so happily coincide to answer the good purposes of his department.

Permit us to acquaint your Honour, that we have always endeavoured to comport ourselves, and regulate our conduct agreeable to the laws of England and this country; that we have not been guilty of any riots or illegal assemblies, or adopted or subscribed any unconstitutional resolves, covenants, or combinations whatsoever, but have constantly and uniformly borne, our testimony against such measures and proceedings; that it is our serious intention and firm resolution to respect the English Constitution; and demean ourselves like true, loyal and obedient subjects, by doing which we apprehend we shall entitle ourselves to the continued protection of our most gracious King, your Honour, and every friend to peace and good Government.

Dr. Winslow and his Loyalist colleagues weren’t the only men at that meeting, however. Marshfield’s longtime town clerk, Nehemiah Thomas, also attended to keep the official record. And he surely didn’t like what was going on.

TOMORROW: The Patriot party objects.

John Graves Simcoe in Boston

John Graves Simcoe, the British army officer whose evil twin is a character in the Turn television series, arrived in Boston as a lieutenant soon after the Battle of Bunker Hill. Characteristically, he came with a bright idea.

Simcoe described that idea in his postwar memoir (writing modestly of himself in the third person):

His intimate connection with that most upright and zealous officer the late Admiral [Samuel] Graves, who commanded at Boston in the year 1775, and some services which he was pleased to entrust him with, brought him acquainted with many of the American loyalists: from them he soon learned the practicability of raising troops in the country whenever it should be opened to the King’s forces; and the propriety of such a measure appeared to be self-evident.

He therefore importuned Admiral Graves to ask of General [Thomas] Gage that he might enlist such negroes as were in Boston, and with them put himself under the direction of Sir James Wallace, who was then actively engaged at Rhode island, and to whom that colony had opposed negroes; adding to the Admiral, who seemed surprised at his request, “that he entertained no doubt he should soon exchange them for whites:” Gen. Gage, on the Admiral’s application, informed him that the negroes were not sufficiently numerous to be serviceable, and that he had other employment for those who were in Boston.

Simcoe came from a naval family and, as his middle name evidenced, he was godson to Adm. Graves. The young lieutenant expected that gentleman to be his mentor and sponsor in the British military hierarchy in North America. Simcoe probably didn’t realize that Gage and Graves were already feuding, and any ideas that the admiral sent to the general were probably dead on arrival.

Since Simcoe recalled a response from Gage, that conversation must have taken place before the general sailed for England on 11 Oct 1775. That was weeks before Lord Dunmore, governor of Virginia, issued his proclamation promising freedom to slaves who joined his royal forces in that colony.

However, Lt. Simcoe wasn’t the first to raise that idea. American Whigs had been warning (without much evidence) that the royal authorities might instigate a slave uprising for years. As it turned out, both sides in the war freed and armed the slaves of adherents of the other side while maintaining slavery for masters on their own side.

The only thing Simcoe seems to have accomplished in Boston was buying a captaincy and thus advancing one rank in the army before the New York campaign.