29, November 1773 (Monday) Boston, Massachusetts The bells began to ring at 8:30AM and the people began to walk towards Faneuil Hall. The Committee of Correspondence, directed by Samuel Adams, had already made contact with outlying communities to arrange an invitation for their own townsfolk to journey into Boston for the meeting. The invitations extended as far as Lynn, Woburn and Medfield. The hand-bills posted throughout Boston --- Friends! Brethren! Countrymen! That worst of plagues, the detested tea shipped for the port by the East-India Company is now arrived in this harbor; the hour of destruction or manly opposition to the machinations of tyranny, stares you in the Faces; every friend to his country, to himself and posterity, is now called upon to meet at Faneuil Hall, at nine o’clock this day (at which time the bells will ring), to make a united and successful resistance to this last, worst, and most destructive measure of administration. “Boston, Nov.29, 1773” The selectmen of Boston, John Scollay, John Hancock, Timothy Newell, Thomas Marshall, Samuel Austin, Oliver Wendell and John Pitts, took their places for a legal town assembly but, the inhabitants of any other towns being admitted, it could not assume the name of a legal meeting of any town. Being of vast number the meeting adjourned to the Old South Meeting-house. “Five or six thousand of respectable inhabitants met, men of the best characters and of the first fortunes.” Governor Hutchinson later remarks “the assembly consisted principally of the lower ranks of the people, and even journeymen tradesmen were brought to increase the number; and the rabble were not excluded.”Samuel Adams provided the main speech while Warren, Hancock, Young and Molinex contributed to the process. The meeting did resolve but the first vote provided a motion for a petition be sent to the governor; “NO duty on the tea should be paid in Boston; and, to give the consignees time to make the expected proposals.” The meeting then adjourned till three o’clock. At the afternoon meeting the assembly voted to inform the owner of the vessel (Dartmouth) that the entry of the tea, and the captain that the landing of it, would be at their peril; a watch of twenty-five men for the security of vessel and cargo, with Edward Proctor for the captain the night. The meet adjourned until nine o’clock for the next day. Picture 1: The Resolves of the Assembly Picture 2: From the journal of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts 29, November 1773 “Defiance of the Patriots” by B.J. Crap Chapter 5 (pages 98, 99, 100) “Samuel Adams” by Ira Stoll Chapter 4 (page 113,114) “Catalyst of the Revolution: The Boston Tea Party” by Benjamin Labaree (page 13, 14) .
Posted on: Sat, 29 Nov 2014 14:11:44 +0000
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