On This Day In The Revolution

Worcester Revolt Source: On September 6, 1774 in the First Continental Congress at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia, Patrick Henry delivered a famous speech declaring “Fleets and armies and the present state of things shew that Government is dissolved. Where are your landmarks? your boundaries of colonies? The distinctions between Virginians, Pennsylvanians, New Yorkers, and New…

On this day 250 years ago, the first Continental Congress convened at Carpenters’ Hall in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Eleven of the thirteen colonies had delegates present — Georgia did not send delegates to the Congress and the North Carolina delegation had not yet arrived. As its first order of business the Congress elected Peyton Randolph of…

On this day 250 years ago in Boston John Adams’s law clerk Edward Hill wrote to John Adams to supplement the report from William Tudor the previous day: Many people were disappointed that the Bar did not refuse to go on with any Business. An Advertisement was posted up at the Court house threatning death…

On this day 250 years ago in Boston, William Tudor, an associate of John Adams, wrote Adams about how the Patriots were shutting down the Royal courts in Massachusetts: This Week has been fruitfull of extraordinary Transactions. . . . Tuesday the Superior Court opened . . . . When the grand Jury were called upon…

On this day 250 years ago, Patriots estimated to total from 2000 to more than 20,000, occupied the towns of Charlestown (now Somerville) and Cambridge, Massachusetts in response to the Powder Alarm. The assembled crowd demanded and received the resignation of royal officials who lived in Cambridge including Lieutenant Governor Thomas Oliver and Judges Samuel…

Early in the morning on this day 250 years ago, approximately 260 British regulars removed a large quantity of gunpowder owned by the King from the Powder House in Charlestown (now Somerville), Massachusetts. Once the ammunition was removed, most of the regulars returned to Boston by boat but a small detachment marched through the adjacent…

On this day 250 years ago, General Gage, Royal Governor of Massachusetts, retrieved from the commander of the local militia the key to the storehouse (called the Powder House) where the King’s gunpowder was stored in Charlestown (now Somerville). Gage ordered a detachment of Redcoats to depart early the next morning in boats across the…

On this day 250 years ago in Springfield, Massachusetts, more than 3,000 Patriots marched “with staves and musick” to block the Hampshire County Court from convening. “Amidst the crowd in a sandy, sultry place, exposed to the sun,” the judges appointed by the Crown to replace elected officials were forced to renounce “in the most…

On this day 250 years ago, the Boston Evening Post reported on how the people of Plymouth pressured George Watson to resign from the Massachusetts Council. Watson was appointed to the Council by Governor Gage under the authority of the hated Massachusetts Government Act which abolished Massachusetts’s elected Council and replaced it with appointed Councilors.…

On this day 250 years ago, from Princeton, New Jersey, John Adams wrote to his wife Abigail. He promised to give her the details of the Massachusetts delegation’s journey from Boston to Princeton when he returned home but succinctly stated that “The Spirit of the People wherever we have been seems to be very favourable.…