On this day 250 years ago in Concord, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress responded to a report from the Bristol County Committee that Col. Thomas Gilbert had begun training a Loyalist militia:

The part acted by Col. Gilbert respecting the common cause of America, since the commencement of its public troubles, . . . leaves no American room to hesitate in pronouncing him an inveterate enemy to his country, to reason, justice, and the common rights of mankind ; and, therefore, whoever has knowingly espoused his cause, or taken up arms for its support, does, in common with himself, deserve to be instantly cut off from the benefit of commerce with, or countenance of, any friend of virtue, America, or the human race.

Sources: Norton at 286; https://archive.org/details/journalsofeachprma00mass/page/130/mode/2up?view=theater

Also on this day in Concord where he was a delegate to the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, James Warren wrote to his wife Mercy Otis Warren that “all things wear a warlike appearance here. . . . The people are ready and determine to defend this Country Inch by Inch.”

Source: Norton at 337.