In response to the complaints of Bernard and the commissioners, the ministry had resolved on the despatch of a military force. June 8, 1768, Gage was commanded to send troops to Boston; the admiralty was directed to station several armed vessels in the harbor; and orders were given that Castle William should be occupied by the king's troops.
Before this, the Romney, a fifty-gun ship, had been anchored in the harbor. The captain began to impress American seamen into his service, and one of the impressed men was rescued by the people. On the same day, June 10, John Hancock's sloop Liberty arrived in Boston laden with wines from Madeira. Attempting to inspect the cargo, the collector was seized by the crew and locked on board while contraband goods were landed and a false entry made at the custom-house. After his release, the vessel was seized for the fraudulent entry, and, to prevent a rescue, moored under the guns of the Romney.
These events led to a riot in which the houses of the controller and an inspector of customs were damaged, and a boat belonging to the former was burned on the common. The custom-house officers fled to the Romney, and the next day, informing Bernard that the "honor of the crown would be hazarded by their return to Boston," they withdrew to Castle William. On the 14th the town-meeting presented an address to Bernard, alleging that "menaces have been thrown out, fit only for barbarians"; and declaring that to "contend with the parent state" is "the most shocking and dreadful extremity; but tamely to relinquish the only security we and our posterity retain of the enjoyment of our lives and properties, without one struggle, is so humiliating and base, that we cannot support the reflection. We apprehend, sir, that it is at your option, in your power, and we would hope in your inclination, to prevent this distressed and justly incensed people from effecting too much, and from the shame and reproach of attempting too little." Furthermore, they asked the governor to order the removal of the Romney from the harbor. Bernard gave a conciliatory answer, but declined to send away the man-of-war as being a matter beyond his authority.
There were no other signs of the rise of a dangerous spirit. Already in March a cargo of wine was landed in the night and boldly carted through the streets of Boston, "under a guard of thirty or forty stout fellows, armed with bludgeons; and, though it was notorious to the greatest part of the town, no officer of the customs thought fit to attempt a seizure; nor," adds Hutchinson, "is it probable that he could have succeeded, if he had attempted it." Elsewhere, similar events were taking place. At Providence, a custom-house officer was tarred and feathered. In Newport, a citizen was killed in a quarrel with the midshipmen of a war vessel, and later, a revenue cutter was burned at the dock.
Worse things were about to follow. The Townshend Acts and the unwise methods of enforcing obedience were only beginning to bear their evil fruit. The news of the riot in Boston incensed the ministry. A memorial of the commissioners declared that "there had been a long concerted and extensive plan of resistance to the authority of Great Britain; that the people of Boston had hastened to acts of violence sooner than was intended; that nothing but the immediate exertion of military power could prevent an open revolt of the town, which would probably spread throughout the provinces." The suggestion was at once acted upon, and two additional regiments were sent to Boston from Ireland.
The immediate results were ominous of an impending struggle. The reports that the army was to be employed to punish Boston and coerce the disobedient province caused great popular excitement. On September 12, 1768, a town meeting assembled in Faneuil Hall. It was resolved that "the inhabitants of the town of Boston will, at the utmost peril of their lives and fortunes, maintain and defend their rights, liberties, privileges, and immunities,"; and it was declared that "money could not be levied, nor a standing army be kept up in the province, but by their own free consent." A day was named for fasting and prayer, and threats of repelling force by force were made. "There are your arms," said Otis, moderator of the meeting, pointing to the town's stock of muskets lying in boxes upon the floor: "when an attempt is made against your liberties, they will be delivered." By a great majority, a resolution was adopted calling upon the inhabitants to provide themselves with arms, "as there is apprehension in the minds of many of an approaching war with France."
Even more significant action was taken. Bernard, while admitting that troops were expected, had refused to grant the request of the meeting that he should summon the assembly, to take such measures "for the preservation of their valuable civil and religious rights and privileges, now in precarious situation, as they in their wisdom may think proper." The people now disclosed their capacity for self-help, anticipating the method for securing united action and party organization, which soon was to be so effectively employed. Through the selectmen, a circular letter was sent out calling a convention of all the towns of the province. Delegates from ninety-six places responded. The governor refused to receive their petition, which disclaimed any pretence to "authoritative or governmental acts," and requested him to call the assembly. The next day, he sent word that "summoning such a meeting was an offence of a very high nature," admonished them instantly to separate, and assured them that those who persisted in usurping the king's sovereignty over the province would repent of their rashness." The convention defended itself against the charge of illegal or criminal action, drew up a statement of grievances, and adjourned after a six-day session.
On the day when the convention adjourned (September 28), two regiments of the line, with artillery, arrived from Halifax. Three days later, under the guns of eight men-of-war, they were landed without opposition. "Each soldier having received sixteen rounds of shot, they marched, with drums beating, fifes playing, and colors flying, through the streets, and by four in the afternoon they paraded on Boston Common." At first, one regiment was encamped on the common, and the other, after some altercation, found shelter in Faneuil Hall and the Town House. The commander demanded permanent quarters and supplies under the billeting act, but, insisting on a strict construction of the law, both the provincial council and the selectmen refused to comply so long as there was room for the troops in the barracks at the castle. In the end, after much squabbling and irritation, General Gage, who had come from New York to settle the controversy, "found it necessary to hire houses for the troops, which were obtained with difficulty, and to procure articles required by act of parliament at the charge of the crown."
If the ministry was rash in appealing to military force, the Parliament, which met in December — several months after it was known in England that Massachusetts had refused to rescind — took a still more hazardous step. Both houses censured the assembly for its course, condemned the non-importation agreements, and declared that the calling of the convention by the selectmen of Boston showed a design to set up independence. At the same time, an address was adopted expressing "sincere satisfaction in the measures" taken by the government, giving assurance of future support of like measures, and suggesting that the names of the more active agitators in America should be sent to one of the secretaries of state. Parliament also advised that an old statute of Henry VIII, which empowered the government to bring to England for trial prisoners accused of treason outside the kingdom, should be put in force, a measure which, says the English historian Lecky, "added a new and very serious item to the long list of colonial grievances. ... By virtue of an obsolete law, passed in one of the darkest periods of English history and at a time when England possessed not a single colony, any colonist who was designated by the governor as a traitor might be carried three thousand miles from his home, from his witnesses, from the scene of his alleged crime." In fact, we have now reached the crisis of the impending revolution; and whatever the faults of American demagogues may have been, the chief responsibility for the violence which followed rests on the shoulders of the infatuated king and his docile servants.
Once more, the American people were put on the defensive, but now they were challenged to protect their dearest personal as well as their political rights. In the press, the misrepresentations of the placemen were indignantly denounced. "It is enough to make a man's bones crack," said a writer in a Boston journal, "that, when the manly, fair, dispassionate arguments of the colonists in support of their rights and privileges remain totally unanswered, every mushroom upstart and petty officer of the revenue should cry out rebels and traitors."
The first protest came from Virginia, which the ministry had refrained from punishing, apparently with the view of dividing the colonial opposition. A new governor, Lord Botetourt — sensible, industrious, and in the main just — had recently arrived in the province. Among the burgesses at this time were Patrick Henry, Richard Henry Lee, and Thomas Jefferson, who sat for the first time. It was understood that the governor desired that silence on political questions should be observed, but this was by no means the purpose of the house. It adopted a series of resolves protesting against the ministerial policy, and in particular beseeching the king, "as the father of his people however remote from the seat of his empire, to quiet the minds of his loyal subjects of this colony, and to avert from them those dangers and miseries which will ensue from the seizing and carrying beyond sea any person residing in America, suspected of any crime whatsoever, to be tried in any other manner than by the ancient and long established course of proceeding." These resolutions the speaker was ordered to send to the several assemblies on the continent, asking their concurrence. The members of the house, when it was dissolved by Lord Botetourt, retired to a private residence, where they signed a non-importation agreement, probably drafted by George Mason. Like agreements were signed throughout the colonies, and the Virginia resolves or similar declarations were adopted by all the assemblies.
Events in Massachusetts presaged a struggle, for the way of compromise was steadily closing. Various incidents show how the popular anger was kept alive. Under orders from Hillsborough, evidence was being collected by the governor and other crown officers to enable them to send offenders to England for trial under the Act of Henry VIII. Affidavits against Samuel Adams, "sworn to before Hutchinson, were sent to England, to prove him fit to be transported." This did not increase Bernard's popularity, and the publication in April 1769 of some of his letters to the ministry in the preceding November and December not only "caused an inconceivable alienation" between him and the council, but enraged a great part of the province, who considered the cause of the council as their own.
A long letter signed by eleven members of the council was sent to Hillsborough, charging the governor with "want of candor, with indecent, illiberal, and most abusive treatment of them," with "aiming at exorbitant and uncontrollable power, with a design to represent things in the worst light, with unmanly dissimulation, and with untruth." A second letter was sent, criticising Bernard for recommending, contrary to the charter, that a council be appointed by royal mandamus, and accusing him of gross misrepresentations.
Later, the house petitioned for his recall, and in July, he went to England, leaving the government in the hands of Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson.
Quartering troops in Boston and surrounding the town with an armed fleet did not prove an effective means of reconciliation, but more than two years passed without riot or serious collision. The soldiers had nothing to do; for in the absence of martial law, they could only be employed on call of a civil magistrate. Yet they were hated and ostracized by the people, and, under the circumstances, it is not at all surprising that their "simple presence" was "treated as an intolerable grievance." Unquestionably, the officers and the men found themselves in a trying position, and on the whole, they acted with prudence and self-control. They were often abused and insulted, scurrilous attacks upon them were made in the newspapers, and frequent affrays between the soldiers and townsmen took place.
"Little matters, being novelties, soon caused great uneasiness. Though the people had been used to answer to the call of the town watch in the night, yet they did not like to answer to the frequent calls of the centinels posted at the barracks, and at the gates of the principal officers ...; and either a refusal to answer, or an answer accompanied with irritating language, endangered the peace of the town"; so the officers "relaxed the rigid rules of the army; and, at most places, no challenge was made." Moreover, the noise of fifes and drums on Sunday drew forth a petition from the selectmen asking the general to "dispense with the band." During the winter of 1769 feeling became more tense. The two regiments, says Hutchinson, "were a continual eyesore to the inhabitants," and affrays became more frequent.
The long-delayed collision approached on March 2, 1770, when a fight took place between some rope-makers and soldiers of the 29th Regiment, eliciting a letter of complaint from the commander to the lieutenant-governor. On March 5 occurred a tragedy that had much influence in hastening the Revolution. It was an evening of unusual excitement; according to Hutchinson, the people were called into the streets by a false alarm of fire, and bands of soldiers were running about. Whether the fracas of the 2d had anything to do with what followed is not clear. A sentinel at the custom-house was insulted and pelted by the crowd. According to some accounts, he had struck a boy earlier in the evening. At his call, a corporal and a squad of six men, commanded by Captain Preston, came to his aid. These were surrounded by fifty or sixty men and boys, some of them carrying bludgeons, shouting, "Cowardly rascals, lobsters, bloody-backs," and daring them to shoot. A soldier, hit by a club, fired, killing a mulatto named Crispus Attucks. At once, the other soldiers discharged their muskets into the mob. Including Attucks, three persons were killed, two mortally wounded, and six injured. It is alleged that Preston gave the word to fire, but the fact is not clearly established.
As the news spread, the wildest excitement prevailed in the town. Drums were beaten, and the church-bells rang. The people rushed into the streets, some with arms in their hands. Captain Preston and the soldiers were arrested and committed to prison. The next day, under the leadership of Samuel Adams, the town meeting demanded that both regiments should be sent away to the castle. After some parley, as a bloody contest seemed imminent, Hutchinson consented to give the order. Seven months later, the soldiers were tried before a Boston jury, John Adams and Josiah Quincy appearing as their counsel. All were acquitted, save two, and these were lightly punished for manslaughter.
Such was the "Boston Massacre" which patriotic writers have represented as the first blood-offering for independence; and of a truth, the historian who would understand the American Revolution will not belittle its significance. It may be true that immediately, the townsmen were far more guilty than the soldiers. The real responsibility rests upon the statesmen who created the conditions rendering such a result almost inevitable. In that fact lies the meaning of the "massacre," and the meaning is very grave.