8
The keener minds among the radicals were not blind to
the change that had come over the merchant class and to the
resulting paralysis which had seized on the public mind.
The keener minds among the radicals were not blind to
the change that had come over the merchant class and to the
resulting paralysis which had seized on the public mind.
Arthur Schlesinger - Colonial Merchants and the American Revolution
2
Hutchinson's estimate was evidently wide of the mark, for
even Samuel Wharton, who gravely averred that the fron-
tiersmen and many Indians shared the popular habit of im-
bibing tea twice a day, placed the total consumption at a
million and a half pounds less. * The London tea merchant,
William Palmer, judged more dispassionately when he
hazarded a figure about half of that named by Hutchinson,
remarking that Hutchinson's estimate of "19,200 chests
is more than has been hitherto annually imported from
China by all foreign companies. " * Assuming Palmer's
conservative figure to be approximately correct, the con-
clusion would seem valid that in a year, like 1771, marked
by unusually large importations of customed tea, more
than nine-tenths of the tea consumed was illicitly imported. *
The incentive to smuggling existed in spite of the well-
intentioned efforts of the British government. The Towns-
hend act of 1767, although imposing a small import duty of
threepence a pound in America, had removed all British im-
1 Bos. Go*. , Nov. 27, 1775.
1 The amount of dutied tea imported from Dec. 1, 1770 to Jan. 5, 1772
was 344,771 pounds, according to an abstract prepared in the office of the
inspector of imports and exports; quoted by Channing, op. cit. , vol. iii,
p. 128 n.
*" Observations," Pa. Mag. , vol. xxv, p. 140.
4 Drake, op. cit. , p. 197.
6 Hutchinson in 1771 set the figure at nine-tenths for New York and
Philadelphia and five-sixths for Massachusetts. Bos. Gaz. , Nov. 27,
1775. He said elsewhere that the contraband tea consumed' at Boston
came there by way of New York and Philadelphia. Mass. Arch. , vol.
xxvii, p. 317.
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? THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
port duties from tea exported to America,1 and had thus,
for a time at least, reduced the cost of English tea to the
American consumer below that of the contraband article.
This advantageous situation of English tea could, in the
nature of things, continue only so long as the wholesale
price of the tea in the English market did not go up, or the
price of smuggled fell. The former occurred. The
East India Company, although not permitted to sell at
retail, were permitted to name an upset price at their public
auction sales. Treading the edge of a quicksand of bank-
ruptcy and obliged by the act of 1767 to make good any
deficiency in the revenues resulting from the discontinuance
of certain tea duties, the company sought to recoup its
losses by advancing the upset price of tea. Governor Hutch-
inson wrote to Lord Hillsborough on August 25, 1771: " If
the India company had continued the sale of their teas at 2s.
2d. to 2s. 4d. as they sold two years ago, the Dutch trade
would have been over by this time; but now that the teas
are at 3s. the illicit traders can afford to lose one chest in
three . . . " * Meantime, Dutch teas were selling in Hol-
land from 18d. to 2s. per pound and paid no import duty
into America. * Hutchinson urged constantly in his busi-
ness and political correspondence that "by some means or
other the price of Teas in England to the Exporter ought
to be kept nearer to the price in Holland. " *
The next act of Parliament dealing with the East India
1 7 George III, c. 56. Vide Farrand's article already referred to, in
Am. Hist. Rev. vol. iii, pp. 266-269.
1 Bos. Gaz. , Nov. 27, 1775.
* Drake, op. cit. , pp. 191, 102, 194-197. Hutchinson calculated the cost
of landing smuggled tea at five per cent.
* Letters to William Palmer and Lord Hillsborough, in Mass. Arch. ,
vol. xxvii, pp. 206-207; Bos. Gas. , Nov. 27, Dec. 4, 1775. Vide also me-
morial of Barkly, the Philadelphia merchant, to the same purpose.
Drake, op. cit. , pp. 199-202.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY
251
Company, enacted in June, 1772, relieved the company from
future liability for deficiency in the tea revenues but granted
a drawback of only three-fifths of the English import duties
on tea exported to America instead of a complete reim-
bursement as formerly. 1 This act failed to alter the situ-
ation materially, so far as the American dealer in dutied
teas was concerned. 2 The tea smuggler continued to con-
trol the situation, particularly at New York and Philadel-
phia; and in the period from December 1, 1770 to the ter-
mination of the customs service in 1775, only 874 pounds
of customed ter were imported at New York and 128 pounds
at Philadelphia. 8
Illicit traffic in other commodities was also carried on,
although probably in lesser volume than ever before. The
total duties collected on wines and molasses in all the colonies
increased steadily until 1773. 4 During the year 1772, ships-
of-war all along the coast displayed greater activity and
more than doubled the amount of their seizures. 5 Exces-
112 George III, c. 60. The East India Company were obliged to pay
the British government more than ? 115,000 as a result of the falling off
? of the tea revenues during the first four years under the act of 1767.
* It would appear that certain other trading conditions discouraged
the merchants of the Middle Colonies from undertaking the importation
of 'English teas. English ports, unlike those of Holland and certain
? other foreign countries, were seldom open for the importation of
American corn and flour; and even when they were, the sales of the
East India Company occurred at such irregular intervals that colonial
merchants did not know when to direct their proceeds to be invested
in teas as homeward freight . Moreover, American merchants received
preferential treatment at the foreign ports,--a moderate price and
"Advantageous Terms of Discount, Difference of Weight &c, amount-
ing in the whole, to near 20 per Centum. " Pa. Mag. , vol. xxv, p. 140.
1 Channing, op. cit. , vol. iii, p. 128 n.
4 Vide table compiled from accounts of cashier of the American cus-
toms; quoted by Channing, up. cit. , vol. iii, p. 90 n.
* Seizures by ships-of-war amounted to ? 719 in 1771; ? 2017 in 1772.
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? 252
THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
tpn-
dency to errjtf purpnjar fury; and indeed it was an incident
growing out of this situation that produced the first serious
clash between the British government and the colonists
during this period. Already in November, 1771, the comp-
troller of the customs at Falmouth had been aroused from
his slumbers by disguised men and, at the point of a pistol,
forced to divulge the name of the person who had lodged
an information with him. 1 In the same month, a mob of
thirty disguised men had overcome, with some brutality,
the crew of a revenue schooner anchored near Philadelphia,
and had rescued a captive vessel that was laden with contra-
band tea, claret and gin. 2
Resistance to customs authority reached its climax in the
destruction of the revenue vessel Ggsjwe on the night of June
9, 1772. The commander of the vessel, Lieutenant Dud-
ingston, had, in patrolling Narragansett Bay and the con-
necting waters, displayed "an intemperate, if not a repre-
hensible zeal to aid the revenue service. " * He had made
himself obnoxious to legitimate traders as well as to smug-
glers, and was believed to have contributed, through his
officiousness, "not a little to enhance the price of fuel and
provisions" in Rhode Island. 4 One day while pursuing a
However, seizures by land officers fell from ? 607 to ? 378. Vide Chan-
ning, op. cit. , vol. iii, p. 89 n. Notices of the Vice-Admiralty Court in
the Boston newspapers showed that large quantities of goods were being
condemned for illegal importation, especially molasses, sugars and
wines. For an example of increased activity at New York, vide R. I.
Commerce, vol. i, p. 383.
1 4 Am. Arch. , vol. i, pp. 26-27.
1 Pa. Col. Recs. , vol. x, pp. 8-15.
1Report of the royal Commission of Inquiry; Bartlett, J. R. , A His-
tory of the Destruction of His Britannic Majesty's Schooner Gaspee
. . . (Providence, 1861), p. 128.
4 Governor Wanton to Hillsborough; ibid. , p. 39.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY
253
colonial vessel, the Gaspee ran aground on a narrow spit of
land about six miles from Providence. Led by John Brown,
the most opulent merchant of that town, and by Abraham
Whipple, a ship captain in the West Indian trade, a band of
citizens boarded the vessel in the night, seized the crew and
set the vessel on fire. 1 A commission of inquiry was ap-
pointed by the king to sift the matter and to convey the
perpetrators out of the colony for trial. Although the names
of those who had taken part in the affair were known to at
least a thousand persons, no one could be found to inform
the commissioners against them. Moreover, Stephen Hop-
kins, chief justice of Rhode Island and a shipbuilder and ex-
smuggler himself, declared that not a person should be
removed for trial outside of the colony's limits. The com-
missioners abandoned the inquiry and reported their failure
to the home government. The latter did not appear anxious
to make an issue of the Gaspee incident. Lieutenant Dud-
ingston was sued by some Rhode Island merchants for al-
leged unlawful conversion of sundry casks of rum and sugar.
After three trials in local courts, he acknowledged himself
beaten, and the Customs Board at Boston made good his
losses to the extent of ? 363. ' In general, revenue vessels
relaxed their vigilance during the year 1773; and their
seizures fell off almost three-fifths.
8
The keener minds among the radicals were not blind to
the change that had come over the merchant class and to the
resulting paralysis which had seized on the public mind.
1 Based on statement of a participant many years later; ibid. , pp. 19-20.
"Many of them appeared like men of credit and tradesmen; and but
few like common men," declared the deposition of Midshipman Dickin-
son. Ibid. , p. 31.
1 Channing, op. cit. , vol. iii, p. 126.
1 Ibid. , p. 89 n. ; Stevens, Facsimiles, vol. xxiv, no. 2029, p. 5.
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? 254
THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776'
Sam Adams's comment when the Boston merchants decided
to abandon their general suspension of trade for tea non-
importation alone showed keen appreciation of the economic
basis of mercantile discontent. Admitting freely that the
merchants had held out longer than he had expected and
that his connection with them had been " but as an Auxiliary
in their Nonimportation Agreement," he wrote to a brother
radical in South Carolina in this strain:
Let the Colonies still convince their implacable Enemies that
they are united in constitutional Principles, and are resolved
they will not be Slaves; that their Dependance is not upon
Merchants or any particular Class of Men, nor is their dernier
resort a resolution barely to withhold Commerce with a nation
that would subject them to despotic Power. 1
In effect, he was saying that the merchant class had been
utilized to the utmost as fertilizers of discontent; that
their spirit for trade redress had sustained them surpris-
ingly well in their opposition to England but that hence-
forth the struggle of the colonies must be divorced from the
self-interest of the merchant class and rest on a broader
popular basis.
Adams labored hard to keep flUve radical sentiment in
Boston. James Ot1s, 1n his intervals of sanity, was pursu1ng
a strongly reactionary course. 2 John Adams withdrew him-
self from public life, devoting himself to his profession;
and for a time he ceased even to use his pen in defense of
popular rights. Sam Adams's chief care was to keep hot the
coals of Hancock's resentment against Parliament, for Han-
cock was the local Croesus,8 and some of his funds and all
'To Peter Timothy, Nov. 21, 1770; Adams, Writings (Gushing),
vol. ii, p. 65. Vide also ibid. , p. 58.
1 Adams, J. , Works (Adams), vol. ii, p. 266.
? John Adams credited the statement that "not less than one thou-
sand families were, every day in the year, dependent on Mr. Hancock for
their daily bread. " Ibid. , vol. x, p. 260.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY 255
of his influence had been employed to promote the anti-
parliamentary movement in the preceding years. But, as
was the case with many another merchant, Hancock's busi-
ness affairs had gone awry while he was playing the politi-
cian;' and he was averse to any further agitation by the
radicals while the golden fruits of commerce invited pick-
ing. "All friendship between them was suddenly at an end,"
wrote Hutchinson in his history, "and Mr. Hancock ex-
pressed his dissatisfaction with the party, and with their
extending their designs further than appeared to him war-
rantable. " 2 For the next couple of years, Hancock, al-
though resisting all efforts of Governor Hutchinson to com-
mit him to the other side, pursued the course of the typical
merchant, and at several critical times threw his influence
and vote in favor of conciliation and against the disturbing
schemes of Adams. *
What the radical cause lacked was, first, a compelling?
issue, and, second, an organization divorced from the con-
trol of the merchant class. The home government supplied
promising material for the first when the report reached
Boston in late September, 1 772, that the salar1es "oT^ the ,
Wf? uld thereafter be paid out of the
No propagandist ever utilized an opportunity more dexter-
ously than did Sam Adams on this occasionT Masquerad-
ing under the signature " Valerius Poplicola," he appeared
in the Boston Gazette of October 5, 1772 in an eloquent pro-
test against the innovation. "The Merchants of this Con-
tinent," he declared,
have passively submitted to the Indignity of a Tribute; and
1 Brown, John Hancock His Book, pp. 158, 163, 168.
1 Mass. Bay, vol. iii, p. 346. See also Wells, Samuel Adams, vol. i,
PP. 458, 459-
? Hutchinson, op. cit. , vol. iii, pp. 348, 356, 361; Wells, op. cit. , vol. i,
pp. 465-475-
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? 256 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
the Landholders, tho' Sharers in the Indignity, have been per-
haps too unconcern'd Spectators of the humiliating Scene. . . .
Had the Body of this People shown a proper Resentment, at
the time when the proud Taskmasters first made their appear-
ance, we should never have seen Pensioners multiplying like
the Locusts in Egypt. . . . Is it not High Time for the People
of this Country explicitly to declare, whether they will be
Freemen or Slaves ? . . . Let us . . . calmly look around us and
consider what is best to be done. . . . Let it be the topic of con-
versation in every social Club. Let every Town assemble.
Let Associations & Combinations be everywhere set up to
consult and recover our just Rights. 1
With the radical program so outlined, Adams decided to
work out the plan through the agency of the town meeting.
Of these town meetings, Hutchinson had already written
several months earlier: they are {^constituted of the lowest
class of the people under the influence of a few of a higher
class, but of intemperate and furious dispositions and of
desperate fortunes. Men of property and of the best char-
acter have deserted these meetings, where they are sure of
being affronted. " 2J According to Adams' plan, a petition
for a town meeting was at once presented to the selectmen.
Hancock was a selectman and, with three or four others,
he unhesitatingly rejected the petition, disapproving of what
seemed to him precipitate measures. Other petitions were
then set on foot, and finally, after more than three weeks'
delay, the selectmen yielded to the pressure. 8 The meeting
1 Adams, S. , Writings (Cushing), vol. ii, pp. 332-337.
? This letter of Mch. 29, 1772 to Hillsborough continued: "By the
constitution ? 40 stg. , which they say may be in cloaths, household
furniture or any sort of property, is a qualification; and even with that
there is scarce ever any inquiry, and anything with the appearance of a
man is admitted without scrutiny. " Hosmer, Hutchinson, p. 231.
1Hutchinson, op. cit. , voL iii, pp. 361-362; Wells, op. cit. , vol. i, pp.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY
257
occurred on Wednesday, October 28, and two adjourned
sessions were needed to carry on an animated colloquy with
Governor Hutchinson over the question of the judges'
salaries. 1 Atlhe last meeting, on November 2, the temper
of the citizens had reached^ _the jgroger^pitch; Adams seized
the momffl* *n ^j-jrnduce a motion Jnr a standing committee
of correspondence with the purpose
state the Rights of the Colonists and of this Province in
particular . . . . to communicate and publish the same to the
several Towns in this Province and to the World as the sense
of this Town, with the Infringements and violations thereof
that have been or from time to time may be made; also request-
ing of each Town a free Communication of their Sentiments. *~J
The motion was carried unanimously.
Adams had succeeded in arousing the town meeting; he
had yet to convince the men who had been leaders in the
late agitation against the Townshend duties of the propriety
of his course. A number of these men, although asked to
serve on the committee, declined their appointments. Three
of the Boston representatives in the Assembly, Speaker
Cushing, Hancock and William Phillips, and three select-
men, Samuel Austin, John Scollay and Thomas Marshall,
all merchants, excused themselves, each alleging " his private
Business would not then admit of it. " At least three others
took a like step. * James Otis was induced to accept the
chairmanship. The twenty-one men who composed the
committee were the best who could be obtained under the
circumstances, and probably served Adams' purposes better
1 Mass. Gas. & Post-Boy, Nov. 2, 9, 1772.
1 Bos. Com. Cor. Mss. , vol. i, p. I; also Bos. Town Recs. (I77O-/777).
PP. 92-93.
* Benjamin Austin, Benjamin Kent and Samuel Swift. "Q. E. D. "
in Mass. Gas. & News-Letter, Nov. 12, 1772.
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? 258 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763. 1776
than if the more weighty citizens had been persuaded to
sacrifice their private interests. Otis soon retired to the
madhouse; and the " Grand Incendiary of the Province " *
himself assumed the "chairmansh1p, a subst1tution which,
to Hutchinson's view, was probably little better than a
change from Philip drunk to Philip sober. In the commit-
tee as completed, the merchant element was in the minor-
ity; and the effective activity of the committee was largely
directed by the chairman. Hutchinson had as yet no sus-
picion that "the foulest, subtlest and most venomous ser-
pent that ever issued from the eggs of sedition " 2 was
growing before his eyes. "The restless faction," he wrote
jeeringly t6 England, were unable "to revive the old plan
of mobbing; and the only dependence left is to keep up a
correspondence through the Province by committees of the
several towns, which is such a foolish scheme that they must
necessarily make themselves ridiculous. " *
The plan began to yield fruit when the committee re-
ported to the town meeting on November 20 a cogently
reasorjfrl pnpnn "frititt" ^v Adams, which was unanimously
"""Tiff1 hV rhf tV|ree hundred men present. This docu-
ment revealed the consummate ability of the master agita-
tor. Frankly designed to arouse the public from their
lethargic sleep, the paper bristled with allusions to past irri-
tations and future perils; it gave to current abstractions a
practical application; it made bold appeals to the self-inter-
est of smuggling merchants and to the self-esteem of home-
manufacturing farmers; it pictured the dwindling sphere
1 Hutchinson's characterization of Adams; Wells, op. cit.
Hutchinson's estimate was evidently wide of the mark, for
even Samuel Wharton, who gravely averred that the fron-
tiersmen and many Indians shared the popular habit of im-
bibing tea twice a day, placed the total consumption at a
million and a half pounds less. * The London tea merchant,
William Palmer, judged more dispassionately when he
hazarded a figure about half of that named by Hutchinson,
remarking that Hutchinson's estimate of "19,200 chests
is more than has been hitherto annually imported from
China by all foreign companies. " * Assuming Palmer's
conservative figure to be approximately correct, the con-
clusion would seem valid that in a year, like 1771, marked
by unusually large importations of customed tea, more
than nine-tenths of the tea consumed was illicitly imported. *
The incentive to smuggling existed in spite of the well-
intentioned efforts of the British government. The Towns-
hend act of 1767, although imposing a small import duty of
threepence a pound in America, had removed all British im-
1 Bos. Go*. , Nov. 27, 1775.
1 The amount of dutied tea imported from Dec. 1, 1770 to Jan. 5, 1772
was 344,771 pounds, according to an abstract prepared in the office of the
inspector of imports and exports; quoted by Channing, op. cit. , vol. iii,
p. 128 n.
*" Observations," Pa. Mag. , vol. xxv, p. 140.
4 Drake, op. cit. , p. 197.
6 Hutchinson in 1771 set the figure at nine-tenths for New York and
Philadelphia and five-sixths for Massachusetts. Bos. Gaz. , Nov. 27,
1775. He said elsewhere that the contraband tea consumed' at Boston
came there by way of New York and Philadelphia. Mass. Arch. , vol.
xxvii, p. 317.
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? THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
port duties from tea exported to America,1 and had thus,
for a time at least, reduced the cost of English tea to the
American consumer below that of the contraband article.
This advantageous situation of English tea could, in the
nature of things, continue only so long as the wholesale
price of the tea in the English market did not go up, or the
price of smuggled fell. The former occurred. The
East India Company, although not permitted to sell at
retail, were permitted to name an upset price at their public
auction sales. Treading the edge of a quicksand of bank-
ruptcy and obliged by the act of 1767 to make good any
deficiency in the revenues resulting from the discontinuance
of certain tea duties, the company sought to recoup its
losses by advancing the upset price of tea. Governor Hutch-
inson wrote to Lord Hillsborough on August 25, 1771: " If
the India company had continued the sale of their teas at 2s.
2d. to 2s. 4d. as they sold two years ago, the Dutch trade
would have been over by this time; but now that the teas
are at 3s. the illicit traders can afford to lose one chest in
three . . . " * Meantime, Dutch teas were selling in Hol-
land from 18d. to 2s. per pound and paid no import duty
into America. * Hutchinson urged constantly in his busi-
ness and political correspondence that "by some means or
other the price of Teas in England to the Exporter ought
to be kept nearer to the price in Holland. " *
The next act of Parliament dealing with the East India
1 7 George III, c. 56. Vide Farrand's article already referred to, in
Am. Hist. Rev. vol. iii, pp. 266-269.
1 Bos. Gaz. , Nov. 27, 1775.
* Drake, op. cit. , pp. 191, 102, 194-197. Hutchinson calculated the cost
of landing smuggled tea at five per cent.
* Letters to William Palmer and Lord Hillsborough, in Mass. Arch. ,
vol. xxvii, pp. 206-207; Bos. Gas. , Nov. 27, Dec. 4, 1775. Vide also me-
morial of Barkly, the Philadelphia merchant, to the same purpose.
Drake, op. cit. , pp. 199-202.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY
251
Company, enacted in June, 1772, relieved the company from
future liability for deficiency in the tea revenues but granted
a drawback of only three-fifths of the English import duties
on tea exported to America instead of a complete reim-
bursement as formerly. 1 This act failed to alter the situ-
ation materially, so far as the American dealer in dutied
teas was concerned. 2 The tea smuggler continued to con-
trol the situation, particularly at New York and Philadel-
phia; and in the period from December 1, 1770 to the ter-
mination of the customs service in 1775, only 874 pounds
of customed ter were imported at New York and 128 pounds
at Philadelphia. 8
Illicit traffic in other commodities was also carried on,
although probably in lesser volume than ever before. The
total duties collected on wines and molasses in all the colonies
increased steadily until 1773. 4 During the year 1772, ships-
of-war all along the coast displayed greater activity and
more than doubled the amount of their seizures. 5 Exces-
112 George III, c. 60. The East India Company were obliged to pay
the British government more than ? 115,000 as a result of the falling off
? of the tea revenues during the first four years under the act of 1767.
* It would appear that certain other trading conditions discouraged
the merchants of the Middle Colonies from undertaking the importation
of 'English teas. English ports, unlike those of Holland and certain
? other foreign countries, were seldom open for the importation of
American corn and flour; and even when they were, the sales of the
East India Company occurred at such irregular intervals that colonial
merchants did not know when to direct their proceeds to be invested
in teas as homeward freight . Moreover, American merchants received
preferential treatment at the foreign ports,--a moderate price and
"Advantageous Terms of Discount, Difference of Weight &c, amount-
ing in the whole, to near 20 per Centum. " Pa. Mag. , vol. xxv, p. 140.
1 Channing, op. cit. , vol. iii, p. 128 n.
4 Vide table compiled from accounts of cashier of the American cus-
toms; quoted by Channing, up. cit. , vol. iii, p. 90 n.
* Seizures by ships-of-war amounted to ? 719 in 1771; ? 2017 in 1772.
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? 252
THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
tpn-
dency to errjtf purpnjar fury; and indeed it was an incident
growing out of this situation that produced the first serious
clash between the British government and the colonists
during this period. Already in November, 1771, the comp-
troller of the customs at Falmouth had been aroused from
his slumbers by disguised men and, at the point of a pistol,
forced to divulge the name of the person who had lodged
an information with him. 1 In the same month, a mob of
thirty disguised men had overcome, with some brutality,
the crew of a revenue schooner anchored near Philadelphia,
and had rescued a captive vessel that was laden with contra-
band tea, claret and gin. 2
Resistance to customs authority reached its climax in the
destruction of the revenue vessel Ggsjwe on the night of June
9, 1772. The commander of the vessel, Lieutenant Dud-
ingston, had, in patrolling Narragansett Bay and the con-
necting waters, displayed "an intemperate, if not a repre-
hensible zeal to aid the revenue service. " * He had made
himself obnoxious to legitimate traders as well as to smug-
glers, and was believed to have contributed, through his
officiousness, "not a little to enhance the price of fuel and
provisions" in Rhode Island. 4 One day while pursuing a
However, seizures by land officers fell from ? 607 to ? 378. Vide Chan-
ning, op. cit. , vol. iii, p. 89 n. Notices of the Vice-Admiralty Court in
the Boston newspapers showed that large quantities of goods were being
condemned for illegal importation, especially molasses, sugars and
wines. For an example of increased activity at New York, vide R. I.
Commerce, vol. i, p. 383.
1 4 Am. Arch. , vol. i, pp. 26-27.
1 Pa. Col. Recs. , vol. x, pp. 8-15.
1Report of the royal Commission of Inquiry; Bartlett, J. R. , A His-
tory of the Destruction of His Britannic Majesty's Schooner Gaspee
. . . (Providence, 1861), p. 128.
4 Governor Wanton to Hillsborough; ibid. , p. 39.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY
253
colonial vessel, the Gaspee ran aground on a narrow spit of
land about six miles from Providence. Led by John Brown,
the most opulent merchant of that town, and by Abraham
Whipple, a ship captain in the West Indian trade, a band of
citizens boarded the vessel in the night, seized the crew and
set the vessel on fire. 1 A commission of inquiry was ap-
pointed by the king to sift the matter and to convey the
perpetrators out of the colony for trial. Although the names
of those who had taken part in the affair were known to at
least a thousand persons, no one could be found to inform
the commissioners against them. Moreover, Stephen Hop-
kins, chief justice of Rhode Island and a shipbuilder and ex-
smuggler himself, declared that not a person should be
removed for trial outside of the colony's limits. The com-
missioners abandoned the inquiry and reported their failure
to the home government. The latter did not appear anxious
to make an issue of the Gaspee incident. Lieutenant Dud-
ingston was sued by some Rhode Island merchants for al-
leged unlawful conversion of sundry casks of rum and sugar.
After three trials in local courts, he acknowledged himself
beaten, and the Customs Board at Boston made good his
losses to the extent of ? 363. ' In general, revenue vessels
relaxed their vigilance during the year 1773; and their
seizures fell off almost three-fifths.
8
The keener minds among the radicals were not blind to
the change that had come over the merchant class and to the
resulting paralysis which had seized on the public mind.
1 Based on statement of a participant many years later; ibid. , pp. 19-20.
"Many of them appeared like men of credit and tradesmen; and but
few like common men," declared the deposition of Midshipman Dickin-
son. Ibid. , p. 31.
1 Channing, op. cit. , vol. iii, p. 126.
1 Ibid. , p. 89 n. ; Stevens, Facsimiles, vol. xxiv, no. 2029, p. 5.
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? 254
THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776'
Sam Adams's comment when the Boston merchants decided
to abandon their general suspension of trade for tea non-
importation alone showed keen appreciation of the economic
basis of mercantile discontent. Admitting freely that the
merchants had held out longer than he had expected and
that his connection with them had been " but as an Auxiliary
in their Nonimportation Agreement," he wrote to a brother
radical in South Carolina in this strain:
Let the Colonies still convince their implacable Enemies that
they are united in constitutional Principles, and are resolved
they will not be Slaves; that their Dependance is not upon
Merchants or any particular Class of Men, nor is their dernier
resort a resolution barely to withhold Commerce with a nation
that would subject them to despotic Power. 1
In effect, he was saying that the merchant class had been
utilized to the utmost as fertilizers of discontent; that
their spirit for trade redress had sustained them surpris-
ingly well in their opposition to England but that hence-
forth the struggle of the colonies must be divorced from the
self-interest of the merchant class and rest on a broader
popular basis.
Adams labored hard to keep flUve radical sentiment in
Boston. James Ot1s, 1n his intervals of sanity, was pursu1ng
a strongly reactionary course. 2 John Adams withdrew him-
self from public life, devoting himself to his profession;
and for a time he ceased even to use his pen in defense of
popular rights. Sam Adams's chief care was to keep hot the
coals of Hancock's resentment against Parliament, for Han-
cock was the local Croesus,8 and some of his funds and all
'To Peter Timothy, Nov. 21, 1770; Adams, Writings (Gushing),
vol. ii, p. 65. Vide also ibid. , p. 58.
1 Adams, J. , Works (Adams), vol. ii, p. 266.
? John Adams credited the statement that "not less than one thou-
sand families were, every day in the year, dependent on Mr. Hancock for
their daily bread. " Ibid. , vol. x, p. 260.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY 255
of his influence had been employed to promote the anti-
parliamentary movement in the preceding years. But, as
was the case with many another merchant, Hancock's busi-
ness affairs had gone awry while he was playing the politi-
cian;' and he was averse to any further agitation by the
radicals while the golden fruits of commerce invited pick-
ing. "All friendship between them was suddenly at an end,"
wrote Hutchinson in his history, "and Mr. Hancock ex-
pressed his dissatisfaction with the party, and with their
extending their designs further than appeared to him war-
rantable. " 2 For the next couple of years, Hancock, al-
though resisting all efforts of Governor Hutchinson to com-
mit him to the other side, pursued the course of the typical
merchant, and at several critical times threw his influence
and vote in favor of conciliation and against the disturbing
schemes of Adams. *
What the radical cause lacked was, first, a compelling?
issue, and, second, an organization divorced from the con-
trol of the merchant class. The home government supplied
promising material for the first when the report reached
Boston in late September, 1 772, that the salar1es "oT^ the ,
Wf? uld thereafter be paid out of the
No propagandist ever utilized an opportunity more dexter-
ously than did Sam Adams on this occasionT Masquerad-
ing under the signature " Valerius Poplicola," he appeared
in the Boston Gazette of October 5, 1772 in an eloquent pro-
test against the innovation. "The Merchants of this Con-
tinent," he declared,
have passively submitted to the Indignity of a Tribute; and
1 Brown, John Hancock His Book, pp. 158, 163, 168.
1 Mass. Bay, vol. iii, p. 346. See also Wells, Samuel Adams, vol. i,
PP. 458, 459-
? Hutchinson, op. cit. , vol. iii, pp. 348, 356, 361; Wells, op. cit. , vol. i,
pp. 465-475-
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? 256 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763-1776
the Landholders, tho' Sharers in the Indignity, have been per-
haps too unconcern'd Spectators of the humiliating Scene. . . .
Had the Body of this People shown a proper Resentment, at
the time when the proud Taskmasters first made their appear-
ance, we should never have seen Pensioners multiplying like
the Locusts in Egypt. . . . Is it not High Time for the People
of this Country explicitly to declare, whether they will be
Freemen or Slaves ? . . . Let us . . . calmly look around us and
consider what is best to be done. . . . Let it be the topic of con-
versation in every social Club. Let every Town assemble.
Let Associations & Combinations be everywhere set up to
consult and recover our just Rights. 1
With the radical program so outlined, Adams decided to
work out the plan through the agency of the town meeting.
Of these town meetings, Hutchinson had already written
several months earlier: they are {^constituted of the lowest
class of the people under the influence of a few of a higher
class, but of intemperate and furious dispositions and of
desperate fortunes. Men of property and of the best char-
acter have deserted these meetings, where they are sure of
being affronted. " 2J According to Adams' plan, a petition
for a town meeting was at once presented to the selectmen.
Hancock was a selectman and, with three or four others,
he unhesitatingly rejected the petition, disapproving of what
seemed to him precipitate measures. Other petitions were
then set on foot, and finally, after more than three weeks'
delay, the selectmen yielded to the pressure. 8 The meeting
1 Adams, S. , Writings (Cushing), vol. ii, pp. 332-337.
? This letter of Mch. 29, 1772 to Hillsborough continued: "By the
constitution ? 40 stg. , which they say may be in cloaths, household
furniture or any sort of property, is a qualification; and even with that
there is scarce ever any inquiry, and anything with the appearance of a
man is admitted without scrutiny. " Hosmer, Hutchinson, p. 231.
1Hutchinson, op. cit. , voL iii, pp. 361-362; Wells, op. cit. , vol. i, pp.
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? COLONIAL PROSPERITY
257
occurred on Wednesday, October 28, and two adjourned
sessions were needed to carry on an animated colloquy with
Governor Hutchinson over the question of the judges'
salaries. 1 Atlhe last meeting, on November 2, the temper
of the citizens had reached^ _the jgroger^pitch; Adams seized
the momffl* *n ^j-jrnduce a motion Jnr a standing committee
of correspondence with the purpose
state the Rights of the Colonists and of this Province in
particular . . . . to communicate and publish the same to the
several Towns in this Province and to the World as the sense
of this Town, with the Infringements and violations thereof
that have been or from time to time may be made; also request-
ing of each Town a free Communication of their Sentiments. *~J
The motion was carried unanimously.
Adams had succeeded in arousing the town meeting; he
had yet to convince the men who had been leaders in the
late agitation against the Townshend duties of the propriety
of his course. A number of these men, although asked to
serve on the committee, declined their appointments. Three
of the Boston representatives in the Assembly, Speaker
Cushing, Hancock and William Phillips, and three select-
men, Samuel Austin, John Scollay and Thomas Marshall,
all merchants, excused themselves, each alleging " his private
Business would not then admit of it. " At least three others
took a like step. * James Otis was induced to accept the
chairmanship. The twenty-one men who composed the
committee were the best who could be obtained under the
circumstances, and probably served Adams' purposes better
1 Mass. Gas. & Post-Boy, Nov. 2, 9, 1772.
1 Bos. Com. Cor. Mss. , vol. i, p. I; also Bos. Town Recs. (I77O-/777).
PP. 92-93.
* Benjamin Austin, Benjamin Kent and Samuel Swift. "Q. E. D. "
in Mass. Gas. & News-Letter, Nov. 12, 1772.
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? 258 THE COLONIAL MERCHANTS: 1763. 1776
than if the more weighty citizens had been persuaded to
sacrifice their private interests. Otis soon retired to the
madhouse; and the " Grand Incendiary of the Province " *
himself assumed the "chairmansh1p, a subst1tution which,
to Hutchinson's view, was probably little better than a
change from Philip drunk to Philip sober. In the commit-
tee as completed, the merchant element was in the minor-
ity; and the effective activity of the committee was largely
directed by the chairman. Hutchinson had as yet no sus-
picion that "the foulest, subtlest and most venomous ser-
pent that ever issued from the eggs of sedition " 2 was
growing before his eyes. "The restless faction," he wrote
jeeringly t6 England, were unable "to revive the old plan
of mobbing; and the only dependence left is to keep up a
correspondence through the Province by committees of the
several towns, which is such a foolish scheme that they must
necessarily make themselves ridiculous. " *
The plan began to yield fruit when the committee re-
ported to the town meeting on November 20 a cogently
reasorjfrl pnpnn "frititt" ^v Adams, which was unanimously
"""Tiff1 hV rhf tV|ree hundred men present. This docu-
ment revealed the consummate ability of the master agita-
tor. Frankly designed to arouse the public from their
lethargic sleep, the paper bristled with allusions to past irri-
tations and future perils; it gave to current abstractions a
practical application; it made bold appeals to the self-inter-
est of smuggling merchants and to the self-esteem of home-
manufacturing farmers; it pictured the dwindling sphere
1 Hutchinson's characterization of Adams; Wells, op. cit.
