On this day 250 years ago the Patriots of Boston had a tea party and threw 342 chests of tea (weighing 92,000 pounds and worth approximately $1.5 million in US dollars today) into Boston Harbor. There are many misconceptions (italicized below) about the Boston Tea Party:

1. The Patriots called it the “Boston Tea Party”. The name we all know today was first used in the 19th Century after most of the participants were dead. The Patriots usually referred to the “Destruction of the Tea.”
2. The “Mohawks” who dumped the tea in the harbor were disguised and are unknown today. Although the Patriots who dumped the tea were poorly disguised as “Mohawk” Indians, and the Patriots did not publicly proclaim the identities of the “Mohawks” to shield them from arrest, the identities of the participants were well known in Patriot circles in Boston. Bostonians, including British authorities, knew that William Molineaux and Paul Revere were leaders of the tea party and the British arrested one of the participants. Historians in the 19th Centtury conducted interviews to build comprehensive lists of the participants. See the link below. Although the lists have some discrepancies (was Patriot leader Dr. Thomas Young a partipant or did he stay behind at the Boston Meeting House?) and some of the names may represent wishful thinking by elderly purported participants, the names of the Patriots who participated in the Boston Tea Party should be remembered and celebrated today.
3. Samuel Adams organized and led the Boston Tea Party. Although Samuel Adams led the Boston Sons of Liberty and chaired the 5000-person meeting at the Old South Meeting House that immediately preceded the Tea Party, Sam Adams, John Hancock and other prominent Patriot leaders such as Joseph Warren and John Adams pointedly stayed at the Meeting House and did not proceed to the Harbor. The Patriots kept no records of the planning of the Tea Party and it has never been proven that Sam Adams secretly planned the Tea Party or his final words closing the meeting on December 16 was the signal for the Tea Party to begin.
4. The Boston Tea Party was an isolated event. Readers of this blog will know that prior to the Tea Party in Boston, Patriots in Charleston, New York, and Philadelphia had already taken action to block the importation of East India Company tea, and were egging on Bostonians to do the same. some smaller towns had also already taken action, and over the next year dozens of American communities in most, if not all, 13 Colonies would stage their own “tea parties.”
5. The Patriots were protesting a tax hike. As explained in an earlier blog post, Parliament’s imposition of the tax on tea would have lowered, rather than increased, the price of tea in America. The Patriots were not rebelling against taxes, they were rebelling against their lack of representation in the British Parliament.

Sources: https://www.bostonteapartyship.com/participants-in-the-boston-tea-party

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-many-myths-of-the-boston-tea-party-180983399/

https://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/boston-tea-party#who-organized-the-boston-tea-party

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/samuel-adams

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/articles/boston-teapot-tonight

https://www.battlefields.org/learn/biographies/thomas-young

My apologies for posting this long blog at the end of this very important 250th anniversary. I am under the weather and meant to have this out first thing this morning.