I am taking a break from posting today because nothing happened on this date 250 years ago. There was no February 29 in 1774.

On this day 250 years ago from Mount Vernon, George Washington wrote to William Preston, County Surveyor for Fincastle County, which was the western county in Virginia constituting the frontier with Native American territory, regarding the survey of 13,000 acres in what is now West Virginia. Washington claimed this property from a land grant that was awarded to him and three additional grants that he had purchased from other Virginia militia officers who fought in the French and Indian War. Washington mentions in the letter the involvement of Andrew Lewis, William Crawford, Thomas Bullitt, and Charles Myn Thruston in conducting the survey; all of these men and Preston later became officers in the Continental Army. Washington also complained about British Secretary

Lord Hilsborough’s Instruction’s . . . that this Bounty was intended to the Regulars only—this, though I consider it in no other light than as one, among many proofs, of that Nobleman’s Malignant disposition to American’s . . . as I can see no cause why Americans (who have serv’d his Majesty in the late War with as much fidelity, & without presumption, with as much Success, as his British Troops) should be stigmatiz’d

To my knowledge, Washington never cited this issue among the causes that drove him to support Independence from Britain, but one has to wonder if the British ministry had been supportive of land grants to Virginia militia veterans if Washington would have been slower to embrace Independence.

Source: https://founders.archives.gov/?q=Recipient%3A%22Preston%2C%20William%22&s=1111311111&r=2

On this day 250 years ago in Plymouth, Massachusetts, Mercy Otis Warren wrote a poem about the Destruction of the Tea in Boston Harbor. John Adams had requested that Warren write the poem and she mailed it to Abigail Adams.

Source: https://founders.archives.gov/?q=Ancestor%3AADMS-04-01-02-0072&s=1511311111&r=2

On this day 250 years ago in London, Benjamin Franklin wrote a letter responding to a critic who attacked him falsely claiming that Franklin had sought to benefit from the Stamp Act while publicly opposing it.

Source: https://founders.archives.gov/?q=%2226%20February%201774%22&s=1111311111&sa=&r=2&sr=

On this day 250 years ago Indian trader David Taitt wrote to John Stuart, the British Superintendent for Southern Indians, about a Talk between Indian trader George Galphin and his friend Young Lieutenant of the Creeks. Galphin warned Young Lieutenant that “You must take care to tell the Young People not to be frightening the traders and telling them they will knock them in the head as they often do when drunk.” Taitt and Stuart ended up as Loyalists who fled America at the end of the Revolution but Galphin was a Patriot and was appointed American Superintendent for the Southern Indians when Stuart continued to adhere to the Crown.

Source: Cashin, Edward J., William Bartram and the American Revolution on the Southern Frontier at pp. 74-75.

On this day 250 years ago, the Massachusetts House of Representatives in General Court Assembled (more often referred to as the “Assembly” or “General Court”) adopted Articles of Impeachment against Chief Justice Peter Oliver. The Articles of Impeachment had been drafted by Assemblyman (and subsequent Signer of the Declaration of Independence and President of the United States) John Adams. Oliver was impeached for accepting salary from the British Government rather than from the people of Massachusetts and he was accused, correctly so, of having greater loyalty to Britain than to Massachusetts. Thomas Hutchinson, Royal Governor of Massachusetts refused to recognize the Assembly’s authority to impeach Oliver or any other judges and Oliver was not removed from office until he fled Massachusetts with the departing British Army when they evacuated Boston in 1776.

Source: https://www.masshist.org/publications/adams-papers/index.php/view/PJA02dg7

On this day 250 years ago in Pittsburgh, Justice of the Peace Joseph Spear wrote to Chief Magistrate Arthur St. Clair of Pennsylvania that there had been “two or three musters” of about 20 Virginia militia at Redstone fort in Maryland under the command of Dr. Joseph Connolly and Capt. Michael Cresap. Although these militia were assembled by Connolly as a show of force in a dispute between Virginia and Pennsylvania over which colony would govern Pittsburgh, the ostensible reason was the threat of Indian raids on the Virginia frontier and the militia under Captain Cresap would be fighting the Shawnee before the end of the year.

John Connolly would later be arrested as a Loyalist, but St. Clair and Cresap both served in the Revolution for the Patriots. Michael Cresap died of illness in command of his company of Maryland militia marching to join Washington besieging Boston in 1775. Arthur St. Clair would rise to the rank of Major General in the Continental Army before the end of the Wa.

https://digital.lib.niu.edu/islandora/object/niu-amarch%3A79362/web.shtml

On this day 250 years ago from South Carolina Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Southern colonies John Stuart wrote colonial Governor Josiah Martin of North Carolina of unrest on the frontier with the Creek and Cherokee Nations:

I have received Letters from my deputies in the Creek and Cherokee nations, from which I am induced to hope that matters may still be accommodated with the Creek Indians who seem disposed to give satisfaction for the murders lately committed by them. There has been no less than fifteen white Inhabitants and two negroes murdered in Georgia and three white men in West Florida since October last. The Headmen of the Creek nation are mostly all out a hunting and at war against the Choctaws. Those who are at home seem very sorry for what has happened and have sent out to call the others in on purpose to have a general meeting to consult upon giving satisfaction for the different murders which have been committed contrary to the sense of the nation by a stragling Banditti who have separated themselves from the nation and by that means are not subject to any authority. They consist of only seventeen Indians.

I have likewise received a Message from the Cherokee Indians of 4th instant expressing the strongest attachment to His Majesty’s white subjects, and their present pacifick disposition, with their disapprobation of the late conduct of the Creek Indians towards us. That nation is still extreamly uneasy at the encroachments of the white people on their hunting Grounds at Wataga River, where a very large Settlement is formed upwards of fifty miles beyond the established Boundary, and as I am apprehensive that it consists of Emigrants from your province to which it is contiguous I must beg your Excellency’s Interposition to endeavour to prevail on them to remove otherwise the consequences may in a little time prove very fatal. I have in the mean time ordered an Interpreter with a party of principal Indians to warn them to remove within a certain time, and should they then neglect to move off, I am much afraid it will be impossible to restrain the Indians from taking redress themselves by robbing and perhaps murdering some of them.

Within a couple of years Stuart and Martin would be encouraging the Creek and Cherokee Nations to go to war against the Watauga settlers and other Patriots.

Source: https://docsouth.unc.edu/csr/index.php/document/csr09-0248

On this day 250 years ago in Boston, the Massachusetts General Assembly petitioned the Royal Governor to remove Peter Oliver, Chief Justice of the Massachusetts Superior Court from his post. Oliver had accepted payment from the British government to supplement the salary approved by the Massachusetts Assembly, even though his fellow justices had refused the supplement. The Assembly stated that Oliver had “proved himself an Enemy to the Constitution of this Province; and has placed himself under an undue Byass; detached himself totally from his Connection with this People and lost their Confidence. And that he hath rendered himself altogether disqualified to hold and act any longer in the office of a Justice of the said Superior Court.”

Source: https://www.masshist.org/dorr/volume/4/sequence/533

Note: This post originally stated that the Massachusetts Assembly “passed articles of impeachment” on February 21, 1774, however I was misinterpreting the source document. The Massachusetts Assembly was considering impeachment on February 21, but the actual Articles of Impeachment were not completed and presented in the Assembly until February 24. See my post for February 24, 1774.

On this day 250 years ago in London, John Temple wrote to his father-in-law James Bowdoin in Boston that

Dr. Franklin is dismissed from his office of Post-Master in America; but it is impossible the Province will let him be a loser by it, they must fall upon some Means of raising Money for paying their Agent . . . I should think that in their several Town taxes over the Mode of which the Governor hath no Controul, a sum might be raised for this purpose. You have Nothing to hope or expect from the Justice of Ministry, who after all will be afraid to come to extremities with you. You must be firm Resolute and Cautious; but discover no Marks of temidity, for they will take advantage of [them] to teize [tease] you in mean pitifull ways. The next thing hoped for, and expected by the friends of America, and in perticular the Dr. himself is that Boston, New York, and Philadelphia will immediately fall upon a Method to Starve the Post Office which hath always been given as a president for taxing the Colonies. This may be done the Dr. says in the easiest Manner, by a private Carriers being set up by one person, and the Merchants of York Boston and Philadelphia subscribing each such a sum as they suppose their postage now Costs them, which will be much more than Sufficient to Maintain such a Carrier and all poor peoples letters go Gratis. . . . I hope a small Committe from Boston will immediately treat with the two other Colonies to whom letters are written on the subject. You cannot expect any very explicit letters on this subject from the Dr. or any other of the friends to America; hints must be sufficient. You may rely on it, that prudent, yet manly and resolute Conduct on your parts is what will Carry you through. The Eyes of all Europe are watchfully on you, and will not suffer Tyranny to prevail against you, but there must be firm spirit on your parts. . . .  In writing this, you will consider what I have said as being the sentiments of your Best friends to be Communicated for the Public good of America. It is also thought by Dr. Lee, Dr. F. and other friends to America that it would be proper for the Assembly of Massachusetts Bay to pass some spirited resolves in Contempt of Mr. Wedderburn the Soliciter General for his Scurilous treatment of the Assembly and province,

Bowdoin was a prominent Patriot and would continue as a leader of the Patriots of Massachusetts throughout the Revolution, including serving as Governor of Massachusetts. Although John Temple was an enthusiastic supporter of the Patriot cause, he remained in England during the War and served as Britain’s first Consul to the United States after the War.

Source: https://founders.archives.gov/?q=%2220%20February%201774%22&s=1111311111&r=2