1774

 

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“There is no man among us that would not be happy to see accommodation with Britain.”

 

John Adams

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March 31: Angered by the colonists’ dumping of the tea, Parliament, at the urging of King George III, passes the Boston Port Act (which will go into effect on June 1.)

 

    As Andrews describes it: “The king’s anger led to the Boston Port Bill, which… closed Boston harbor to all commerce.” “Town meetings were forbidden except for elections.” (2/49)

 

NOTE TO TEACHERS: It might work to ask students which rights, that we are guaranteed today, would be curtailed by such British acts.

 

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LANCASTER AND PLUMB explain the results of the Port Bill:

 

The port of Boston was closed, even to the shortest ferry-run, and the city could be supplied only across the narrow neck that linked it to the mainland. The Royal Government was leaving Boston for Salem and the Customs were being shifted to Marblehead. To make sure that this tight cloture be enforced, additional regiments of infantry were to reinforce the 14th and the 29th, backed by the Royal Navy in the harbor. This state of affairs was to endure until such time as the Bostonians had paid for the jettisoned tea, plus the duty which would have accrued to his Majesty’s Customs had that cargo been landed. (48/78-79)

 

    As men in Delaware and New York and Virginia and Georgia studied this last step it was all too clear to them that the sacred Charter of Massachusetts had been virtually cancelled, leaving only vestigial traces of self-government. The governor's council was to be Crown-appointed and responsible only to the Crown. The attorney general, judges, sheriffs, and justices of the peace were to be named by the governor, and even juries were to be selected by a Crown-appointed sheriff. The town meeting, mainspring of Massachusetts life, could still be held, but only when the governor gave his written consent. Even then the agenda had to be approved by him. These measures, along with the Port Bill, became known as the “Intolerable Acts” and shook all the colonies, although their specified target was fractious Massachusetts alone. (48/80)

 

    Meanwhile, in Massachusetts, Thomas Hutchinson was turning over the highest office in the colony not to another civilian appointee, but to General Thomas Gage, who assumed the titles of Vice-Admiral, Captain-General, and Governor-in-Chief. Boston, and the lands stretching inland from it, were to all intents and purposes passing from civil rule to military occupation. (48/81)

 

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August 1: George Washington promises the Virginia Convention: “I will raise one thousand men, subsist them at my own expense, and march myself at their head for the relief of Boston.” (109/41)

 

NOTE TO TEACHERS: If you’ve never asked your students, I found it interesting to query them on the idea: Do you think all young people, at age 18, should have to join the military (or some other public service group) or not? 

   As a former Marine, I’ve asked a lot of veterans that question. Most of us think it would be good.

 

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September: General Gage decides to exercise his troops, sending them out on route marches across the narrow Neck from Boston and into the interior.

 

    Flippant young officers, pushing on to Waltham or Dedham, were amused to see rustics drilling in the fields, but more sober-minded seniors were impressed by the unity and purpose in these formations.

 

   Without warning, one such march turned out to be more than mere practice. A few scarlet-coated companies swung over the Charles into Cambridge, and seized powder and arms belonging to the Province. Then they passed on to Charleston, nobbled up more Province supplies and returned, rejoicing to Boston. (48/90)

 

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JOHN ADAMS can still say, late in the year, “There is no man among us that would not be happy to see accommodation with Britain.” (48/86)

 

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December 6: Rhode Island lawmakers order Colonel Nightingale to remove all cannon and ammunition from Fort George, save three guns, which he does.

 

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December 14: “News of this was carried to New Hampshire, and resulted in the capture of Fort William and Mary at New Castle… which some have referred to as the opening act of the Revolution. This deed was accomplished by fourteen men from Durham, who entered the fort at night when the officers were at a ball in Portsmouth. The powder which they captured is said to have done duty at Bunker Hill.” (2/59)

 

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ON THE TREATMENT of the natives, Thomas Jefferson writes, 

 

    Whoever shall attempt to trace the claims of the European Nations to the Countrys in America from the principles of Justice, or reconcile the invasions made on the native Indians to the natural rights of mankind, will find that he is pursuing a Chimera, which exists only in his own imagination, against the evidence of indisputable facts. (125/22)

 

NOTE TO TEACHERS: I sometimes paired the terrible fate of Col. Crawford with the terrible fate of Chief Logan’s family, wiped out by settlers in 1774, and tried to show students how one atrocity led to another, in a chain of events, until it became almost impossible to see who was to blame. Usually, the innocent suffered for the sins of the guilty, on both sides of the fighting.

 

    I called it the “Cycle of Violence.” I think the same cycle plays out in gang warfare in American cities, in clashes between Bosnians and Serbs, and for many years did also in Northern Ireland, between Protestant and Catholic.

 

    You can pick all kinds of examples: Israeli vs. Palestinian, Hindu vs. Muslim in India, etc.