On this day 250 years ago, the H.M.S. Rose commanded by Captain James Wallace arrived at Newport, Rhode Island and discovered that the cannon had been removed from Fort George. Wallace met with Governor James Wanton and Watson reported that the Governor “very frankly told me, they had done it to prevent their falling into the hands of the King, or any of his Servants and that they meant to make use of them, to defend themselves against any power that shall offer to molest them.”

Source: Norton, Mary Beth, 1774 the Long Year of Revolution, New York: Vintage Books, 2021 at p. 249.