tives, constables, and other officers made a part, sent him an answer that their assembly was warranted by law. He saw that the answer was in Hancock's handwriting; and he treasured up the autograph, to be produced one day when Hancock should be put on trial. "It is hard," said Trumbull, now governor of Connecticut, "to break connections with our mother country; but, when she strives to enslave us, the strictest union must be dissolved." "The accomplishment of some notable prophecies is at hand." 1770. Feb. The liberty pole raised by the people of New York in the Park stood safely for nearly three years. The soldery, in February, resolved to cut it down, and after three repulses succeeded. The people, assembling in the fields to the number of three thousand, and without planning retaliation, expressed abhorrence of the soldiers, as enemies to the constitution and to the peace of the city. The soldiers replied by an insulting placard; and, on two successive days, engaged in an affray with the citizens, in which the latter had the advantage. The newspapers loudly celebrated the victory; and the Sons of Liberty, purchasing a piece of land near the junction of Broadway and the high road to Boston, erected a pole, strongly guarded by iron bands and bars, and inscribed "Liberty and Property." At the same time, Macdougall, son of a Presbyterian of the Scottish isle of Ila, having publicly censured the act of the assembly in voting supplies to the troops, was indicted for a libel; and, refusing to give bail, this "first Son of Liberty in bonds for the glorious cause was visited by such throngs in his prison that he was obliged to appoint hours for their reception. The men of Boston emulously applauded the spirit of the "Yorkers." Hatred of the parliament's taxes spread into every social circle. One week three hundred wives of Boston, the next a hundred and ten more, with one hundred and twenty-six of the young and unmarried of their sex, renounced the use of tea till the revenue acts should be repealed. How could the troops interfere? Everybody knew that it was against the law for them to fire without the authority of a civil magistrate; and the more they paraded with their muskets and twelve rounds of ball, the more they were despised, as men who desired to terrify and had no power to harm. Hutchinson, too, was taunted with wishing to destroy town-meetings, through which he himself had risen; and the press, calling to mind his days of shopkeeping, jeered him for his old frauds, as a notorious smuggler. Theophilus Lillie, who had begun to sell contrary to the agreement, found a post planted before his door, with a hand pointed towards his house in derision. Richardson, an informer, asked a countryman to break the post down by driving the wheel of his cart against it. A crowd of boys chased Richardson to his own house and threw stones. Provoked but not endangered, he fired among them, and killed one of eleven years old, the son of a poor German. At his funeral, five hundred children walked in front of the bier; six of his school-fellows held the pall; and men of all ranks moved in procession from Liberty Tree to the townhouse, and thence to the "burying-place." Soldiers and officers looked on with wounded pride. Dalrymple was impatient to be set to work in Boston, or to be ordered elsewhere. The common soldiers of the twenty-ninth regiment were notoriously bad fellows, licentious and overbearing. "I never will miss an opportunity of firing upon the inhabitants," said one of them, Kilroi by name. It was a common feeling in the regiment. On the other hand, a year and a half's training had perfected the people in their part. It was no breach of the law for them to express contempt for the soldiery; they were ready enough to confront them, but they were taught never to do it, except to repel an attack. If any of the soldiers broke the law, which they often did, complaints were made to the local magistrates, who were ready to afford redress. On the other hand, the officers screened their men from legal punishment, and sometimes even rescued them from the constables. 1770. On Friday the second day of March, a soldier of March. the twenty-ninth asked to be employed at Gray's ropewalk, and was repulsed in the coarsest words. He then defied the rope-makers to a boxing match; and, one of them accepting his challenge, he was beaten off. Returning with several of his companions, they too were driven away. A larger number came down to renew the fight with clubs and cutlasses, and in their turn encountered defeat. By this time, Gray and others interposed, and for that day prevented further disturbance. At the barracks, the soldiers inflamed each other's passions, as if the honor of the regiment were tarnished. On Saturday, they prepared bludgeons; and, being resolved to brave the citizens on Monday night, they forewarned their particular acquaintances not to be abroad. Without duly restraining his men, Carr, the lieutenant-colonel of the twenty-ninth, made complaint to the lieutenant-governor of the insult they had received. The council, deliberating on Monday, seemed of opinion that the town would never be safe from quarrels between the people and the soldiers, as long as soldiers should be quartered among them. In the present case, the owner of the ropewalk gave satisfaction by dismissing the workman complained of. The officers should, on their part, have kept their men within the barracks after nightfall; instead of it, they left them to roam the streets. Hutchinson should have insisted on measures of precaution; but he too much wished the favor of all who had influence at Westminster. 1770. March. The evening of the fifth came on. The young moon was shining brightly in a cloudless winter sky, and its light was increased by a new-fallen snow. Parties of soldiers were driving about the streets, making a parade of valor, challenging resistance, and striking the inhabitants indiscriminately with sticks or sheathed cutlasses. A band, which poured out from Murray's barracks in Brattle Street, armed with clubs, cutlasses, and bayonets, provoked resistance, and a fray ensued. Ensign Maul, at the gate of the barrack-yard, cried to the soldiers: "Turn out, and I will stand by you; kill them; stick them; knock them down; run your bayonets through them." One soldier after another levelled a firelock, and threatened to “make a lane" through the crowd. Just before nine, as an officer 1770. crossed King Street, now State Street, a barber's lad cried after him: "There goes a mean fellow who hath not March. paid my master for dressing his hair;" on which, the sentinel stationed at the westerly end of the custom house, on the corner of King Street and Exchange Lane, left his post, and with his musket gave the boy a stroke on the head, that made him stagger and cry for pain. The street soon became clear, and nobody troubled the sentry, when a party of soldiers issued violently from the main guard, their arms glittering in the moonlight, and passed on, hallooing: "Where are they? where are they? Let them come." Presently twelve or fifteen more, uttering the same cries, rushed from the south into King Street, and so by way of Cornhill, towards Murray's barracks. "Pray, soldiers, spare my life," cried a boy of twelve, whom they met. “No, no, I'll kill you all," answered one of them, and knocked him down with his cutlass. They abused and insulted several persons at their doors and others in the street; "running about like madmen in a fury," crying, "Fire!" which seemed their watchword, and "Where are they? knock them down." Their outrageous behavior occasioned the ringing of the bell at the head of King Street. The citizens, whom the alarm set in motion, came out with canes and clubs; and, partly by the interference of well-disposed officers, partly by the courage of Crispus Attucks, a mulatto, and some others, the fray at the barracks was soon over. Of the citizens, the prudent shouted, "Home! home!" others, it was said, called out, "Huzza for the main guard! there is the nest; but the main guard was not molested the whole evening. A body of soldiers came up Royal Exchange Lane, crying, "Where are the cowards?" and, brandishing their arms, passed through King Street. From ten to twenty boys came after them, asking, "Where are they? where are they?" "There is the soldier who knocked me down," said the barber's boy; and they began pushing one another towards the sentinel. He loaded and primed his musket. "The lobster is going to fire," cried a boy. Waving his 1770. piece about, the sentinel pulled the trigger. "If you fire, you must die for it," said Henry Knox, who was passing by. "I don't care," replied the sentry; "if they touch me, I'll fire." "Fire!" shouted the boys, for they March. were persuaded he could not do it without leave from a civil officer; and a young fellow spoke out," We will knock him down for snapping;" while they whistled through their fingers and huzzaed. "Stand off!" said the sentry, and shouted aloud, "Turn out, main guard!" "They are killing the sentinel," reported a servant from the custom house, running to the main guard. "Turn out! why don't you turn out?" cried Preston, who was captain of the day, to the guard. "He appeared in a great flutter of spirits," and "spoke to them roughly." A party of six, two of whom, Kilroi and Montgomery, had been worsted at the ropewalk, formed with a corporal in front and Preston following. With bayonets fixed, they "rushed through the people" upon the trot, cursing them, and pushing them as they went along. They found about ten persons round the sentry, while about fifty or sixty came down with them. "For God's sake," said Knox, holding Preston by the coat, "take your men back again; if they fire, your life must answer for the consequences.' “I know what I am about," said he hastily, and much agitated. None pressed on them or provoked them, till they began loading, when a party of about twelve in number, with sticks in their hands, moved from the middle of the street where they had been standing, gave three cheers, and passed along the front of the soldiers, whose muskets some of them struck as they went by. "You are cowardly rascals," they said, "for bringing arms against naked men.' "Lay aside your guns, and we are ready for you." "Are the soldiers loaded?" inquired Palmes of Preston. "Yes," he answered, "with powder and ball." "Are they going to fire upon the inhabitants?" asked Theodore Bliss. "They cannot, without my orders," replied Preston; while "the town-born" called out, "Come on, you rascals, you bloody backs, you lobster scoundrels, fire, if you dare. We know you dare not." Just then Montgomery received a blow from a stick which had hit |