On This Day In The Revolution

On this day 250 years ago, the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Weekly News-letter published an article describing the Destruction of the Tea six days earlier. This is one of the best contemporaneous descriptions of the Boston Tea Party. Source: https://research.colonialwilliamsburg.org/pf/declaring/bostonTeaParty.cfm

On this day 250 years ago Royal Customs officials in Charleston seized 257 chests of tea from the London for non-payment of duties. The tea was stored in the basement of the Exchange building, where it would remain until combat began in the Revolution. Source: https://www.powdermagazinemuseum.org/history250

On this day 250 years ago John Hancock wrote his agent in London about the dumping of the tea in Boston Harbor: “No one circumstance could possibly have taken place more effectively to unite the colonies than this maneuver of the tea.” Source: https://historyofmassachusetts.org/the-boston-tea-party/

On this day 250 years ago Paul Revere was on horseback carrrying important news to his fellow Patriots. Longfellow wrote a poem about only one of his many rides but Revere was the main rider who carried news from the Boston Committee of Correspondence to other Committees. He rode out of Boston on December 17…

On this day 250 years ago at midnight, Patriots in Marshfield, Massachusetts confiscated tea from the Ordinary as a protest against the Crown, emulating the actions of their fellow Patriots in Boston three days earlier. The Ordinary is still standing in Marshfield today, located at 2000 Ocean Street. After taking the tea, the Patriots knelt…

On this day 250 years ago, the North Carolina Assembly organized its Committee of Correspondence, naming Cornelius Harnett as Chairman and John Harvey, Robert Howe, Richard Caswell, Edward Vail, John Ashe, Joseph Hewes, Samuel Johnston, and William Hooper as members. These men all ended up leading the Patriots and were the Founding Fathers of North Carolina. Sources: https://www.ncpedia.org/committees-correspondence https://www.colonialwilliamsburg.org/learn/deep-dives/committees-of-correspondence/

On this day 250 years ago mass meetings were held in both Charleston and New York City to make plans for blocking the sale of British East India Company tea.  A general meeting of the inhabitants of Charleston chaired by George Gabriel Powell met in the Exchange to address the tea aboard the ship London…

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: 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…

On this day 250 years ago the Association of the Sons of Liberty of New York published Resolves that declared “That whoever shall be aiding, or assisting, in the landing, or carting of [East India Company] tea, from any ship, or vessel, or shall hire any house, store-house, or cellar or any place whatsoever, to…

On this day 250 years ago thousands of Patriots from Boston and towns across Massachusetts gathered at the Old South Meeting House to discuss how to prevent British East India Company tea from being unloaded from the ships in Boston Harbor. Samuel Phillips Savage of Weston, Massachusetts, was chosen as the moderator of the meeting. Source: https://www.bostonteapartyship.com/the-final-straw