i
not a clause in the declaration of independence sets forth the real and underlying cause of the american revolution. the attention of its writer was bent upon recent events, and he dwelt only upon the immediate reasons for throwing off allegiance to the british government. in the dark of the storm already upon them, the men of the time could hardly look with clear vision back to ultimate causes. they could not see that the english kings had planted the seeds of the revolution when, in their zeal to get america colonized, they had granted such political and religious privileges as tempted the radicals and dissenters of the time to migrate to america. only historical research could reveal the fact that from the year 1620 the english government had been systematically stocking the colonies with dissenters and retaining in england the conformers. the tendency of colonization was to leave the conservatives in england, thus relatively increasing the conservative force at home, while the radicals went to america to fortify the radical political philosophy there. thus england lost part of her potentiality for political development.
not only were radicals constantly settling in the colonies, because of the privileges granted them there, but the crown neglected to enforce in the colonies the same regulations that it enforced at home. the act of uniformity was not extended to the colonies, though rigidly80 enforced in england; the viceregal officers, the governors, permitted themselves again and again to be browbeaten and disobeyed by the colonial legislatures;42 and even the king himself had allowed massachusetts (1635) to overreach him by not giving up her charter.43
after a century of great laxity toward the colonies—a century in which the colonists were favored by political privileges shared by no other people of that age; after the environment had established new social conditions, and remoteness and isolation had created a local and individual hatred of restraint; after the absence of traditions had made possible the institution of representation by population, and self-government had taken on a new meaning in the world; after a great gulf had been fixed between the social, political, and economic institutions of the two parts of the british empire—only then did the british government enter upon a policy intended to make the empire a unity.44
independence had long existed in spirit in most of the essential matters of colonial life, and the british government had only to seek to establish its power over the colonies in order to arouse a desire for formal independence. the transition in england, therefore, to an imperial ideal, about the middle of the eighteenth century, doubtless caused the rending of the empire. walpole and newcastle, whose administrations had just preceded the reign of george iii., had let the colonies alone, and thus aided the colonial at the expense of the imperial idea; while their successors, grenville and townshend, ruling not wisely but too well, forced the colonists to realize that they cared more for america than for england.
the time had come, though these ministers failed to see it, when the union of great britain with her colonies81 depended on the offspring’s disposition toward the mother-country. good feeling would preserve the union, but dissatisfaction would make even forcible control impossible. social and political and economic ties still bound the colonists to the home land, but these were weak ties as compared with an irrepressible desire for self-growth. the expression of their political ideals unrestrained by the conservatism of the parent was a desired end to which they strove, almost unconscious of their object.
to understand the american revolution, therefore, several facts must be clearly in mind—first, that great britain had for one hundred and fifty years been growing to the dignity of an empire, and that the thirteen colonies were a considerable part of that empire; second, the colonies had interests of their own which were not favored by the growing size and strength of the empire. they were advancing to new political ideals faster than the mother-country. their economic interests were becoming differentiated from those of england. they were coming to have wants and ambitions and hopes of their own quite distinct from those of great britain.
at the fatal time when the independent spirit of america had grown assertive, the politically active part of the british people began unconsciously to favor an imperial policy, which their ministers suggested, and which to them seemed the very essence of sound reasoning and good government. they approved of the proposed creation of executives who should be independent of the dictation of the colonial assemblies. there were also to be new administrative organs having power to enforce the colonial trade regulations; and the defensive system of the colonies was to be improved by a force of regular troops, which was in part to be supported by colonial taxes.
in order to accomplish these objects, the king’s new minister, the assiduous grenville, who knew the law better82 than the maxims of statesmanship, induced parliament, in march, 1764, to resolve upon “certain stamp duties” for the colonies. a year later the “gentle shepherd,” as pitt had dubbed him, proved his watchfulness by getting a stamp act passed,45 which, though nearly a duplicate of one in force in england, and like one of massachusetts’ own laws, nevertheless aroused every colony to violent wrath.
this sudden flame of colonial passion rose from the embers of discontent with grenville’s policy of enforcing the trade or navigation laws—those restrictions upon colonial industries and commerce which were the outgrowth of a protective commercial policy which england had begun even before the discovery of america.46 as the colonies grew they began to be regarded as a source of wealth to the mother-country; and, at the same time that bounties were given them for raising commodities desired by england, restrictions were placed upon american trade.47 when the settlers of the northern and middle colonies began manufacturing for themselves, their industry no sooner interfered with english manufactures than a law was passed to prevent the exportation of the production and to limit the industry itself. this system of restrictions, though it necessarily established a real opposition of interest between america and england, does not seem on the whole to have been to the disadvantage of the colonies;48 nor was the english colonial system a whit more severe than that of other european countries.
in 1733, however, the molasses act went into effect,4983 and, had it been enforced, would have been a serious detriment to american interests. it not only aimed to stop the thriving colonial trade with the dutch, french, and spanish west indies, but was intended to aid english planters in the british west indies by laying a prohibitive duty on imported foreign sugar and molasses. it was not enforced, however, for the customs officials, by giving fraudulent clearances, acted in collusion with the colonial importers in evading the law; but, in 1761, during the war with france, the thrifty colonists carried on an illegal trade with the enemy, and pitt demanded that the restrictive laws be enforced.
the difficulty of enforcing was great, for it was hard to seize the smuggled goods, and harder still to convict the smuggler in the colonial courts. search-warrants were impracticable, because the legal manner of using them made the informer’s name public, and the law was unable to protect him from the anger of a community fully in sympathy with the smugglers. the only feasible way to put down this unpatriotic trade with the enemy was to resort to “writs of assistance,” which would give the customs officers a right to search for smuggled goods in any house they pleased.50 such warrants were legal, had been used in america, and were frequently used in england;51 yet so highly developed was the american love of personal liberty that when james otis, a boston lawyer, resisted by an impassioned speech the issue of such writs his arguments met universal approval.52 in perfect good faith he argued, after the manner of the ancient law-writers, that parliament could not legalize tyranny, ignoring the historical fact that since the revolution of 1688 an act of parliament was the highest guarantee of right, and parliament the sovereign and supreme power. nevertheless, the popularity of otis’ argument showed84 what america believed, and pointed very plainly the path of wise statesmanship.
when, in 1763, the pontiac indian rebellion endangered the whole west and made necessary a force of soldiers in canada, grenville, in spite of the recent warning, determined that the colonies should share the burden which was rapidly increasing in england. he lowered the sugar and molasses duties,53 and set out to enforce their collection by every lawful means. the trouble which resulted developed more quickly in massachusetts, because its harsh climate and sterile soil drove it to a carrying-trade, and the enforced navigation laws were thought to threaten its ruin. it was while american economic affairs were in this condition that grenville rashly aggravated the discontent by the passage of his stamp act.
as the resistance of the colonies to this taxation led straight to open war and final independence, it will be worth while to look rather closely at the stamp tax, and at the subject of representation, which was at once linked with it. the terms of the stamp act are not of great importance, because, though it did have at least one bad feature as a law, the whole opposition was on the ground that there should be no taxation whatever without representation. it made no difference to its enemies that the money obtained by the sale of stamps was to stay in america to support the soldiers needed for colonial protection. nothing would appease them while the taxing body contained no representatives of their own choosing.
to attain this right, they made their fight upon legal and historical grounds—the least favorable they could have chosen. they declared that, under the british constitution, there could be no taxation except by persons known and voted for by the persons taxed. the wisest men seemed not to see the kernel of the dispute.85 a very real danger threatened the colonies—subject as they were to a body unsympathetic with the political and economic conditions in which they were living—but they had no legal safeguard.54 they must either sever the existing constitutional bond or get parliament of its own will to limit its power over the colonies. all unwittingly the opponents of the stamp act were struggling with a problem that could be solved only by revolution.
two great fundamental questions were at issue: should there be a british empire ruled by parliament in all its parts, either in england or oversea? or should parliament govern at home, and the colonial assemblies in america, with only a federal bond to unite them? should the english understanding of representation be imposed upon the colonies? or should america’s institution triumph in its own home? if there was to be a successful imperial system, parliament must have the power to tax all parts of the empire. it was of no use to plead that parliament had never taxed the colonies before, for, as doctor johnson wrote, “we do not put a calf into the plough: we wait till it is an ox.”55 the colonies were strong enough to stand taxation now, and the reasonable dispute must be as to the manner of it. to understand the widely different points of view of englishmen and americans, we must examine their systems of representative government.
in electing members to the house of commons in england certain ancient counties and boroughs were entitled to representation, each sending two members, regardless of the number of people within its territory. for a century and a half before the american revolution only four new members were added to the fixed number in parliament. meanwhile, great cities had grown up which had no representation, though certain boroughs, once very86 properly represented, had become uninhabited, and the lord who owned the ground elected the members to parliament, taking them, not from the district represented, but from any part of the kingdom. the franchise was usually possessed either by the owners of the favored pieces of land or in the boroughs chiefly by persons who inherited certain rights which marked them as freemen. a man had as many votes as there were constituencies in which he possessed the qualifications.
in the colonial assemblies there was a more distinct territorial basis for representation, and changes of population brought changes of representation. new towns sent new members to the provincial assembly, and held the right to be of great value. all adult men—even negroes in new england—owning a certain small amount of property could vote for these members. in the south only the landholders voted, but the supply of land was not limited, as in england, and it was easily acquired. finally, the voter and the representative voted for must, as a rule, be residents of the same district. from the first the colonial political ideals were affected by new conditions. when they established representative government they had no historic places sanctified by tradition to be the sole breeding-places of members of parliament.
backed by such divergent traditions as these, the two parts of the british empire, or, more accurately, the dominant party in each section of the empire, faced each other upon a question of principle. neither could believe in the honesty of the other, for each argued out of a different past. the opponents of the stamp act could not understand the political thinking which held them to be represented in the british parliament. “no taxation without representation” meant for the colonist that taxes ought to be levied by a legislative body in which was seated a person known and voted for by the person taxed. an englishman only asked that there be “no taxation except that voted by the house of commons.”87 he was not concerned with the mode of election to that house or the interests of the persons composing it. the colonists called the stamp act tyranny, but the british government certainly intended none, for it acted upon the theory of virtual representation, the only kind of representation enjoyed by the great mass of englishmen either at home or in the colonies. on that theory nothing was taxed except by the consent of the virtual representatives of those taxed. but, replied an american, in england the interests of electors and non-electors are the same. security against any oppression of non-electors lies in the fact that it would be oppressive to electors also; but americans have no such safeguard, for acts oppressive to them might be popular with english electors.56
when the news of the stamp act first came oversea there was apparent apathy. the day of enforcement was six months away, and there was nothing to oppose but a law. it was the fitting time for an agitator. patrick henry, a gay, unprosperous, and unknown country lawyer, had been carried into the virginia house of burgesses on the public approval of his impassioned denial, in the “parson’s cause” (1763), of the king’s right to veto a needed law passed by the colonial legislature. he now offered some resolutions against the stamp tax, denying the right of parliament to legislate in the internal affairs of the colony.57 this “alarum bell to the disaffected,” and the fiery speech which secured its adoption by an irresolute assembly, were applauded everywhere. jefferson said of henry, that he “spoke as homer wrote.”
as soon as the names of the appointed stamp-distributers were made known (august 1, 1765) the masses expressed their displeasure in a way unfortunately too common in america. throughout the land there was rifling of stamp-collectors’ houses, threatening their lives, burning88 their records and documents, and even their houses. their offices were demolished and their resignations compelled—in one case under a hanging effigy, suggestive of the result of refusal. the more moderate patriots cancelled their orders with british merchants, agreed not to remit their english debts, and dressed in homespun to avoid wearing imported clothes.
on the morning that the act went into effect (november 1, 1765) bells tolled the death of the nation. shops were shut, flags hung at half-mast, and newspapers appeared with a death’s-head where the stamp should have been. mobs burned the stamps, and none were to be had to legalize even the most solemn and important papers. the courts ignored them and the governors sanctioned their omission. none could be used, because none could be obtained. all america endorsed the declaration of rights of the stamp-act congress, which met in new york, october, 1765. it asserted that the colonists had the same liberties as british subjects. circumstances, they declared, prevented the colonists from being represented in the house of commons, therefore no taxes could be levied except by their respective legislatures.58
this great ado was a complete surprise to the british government. on the passage of the stamp act, walpole had written,59 “there has been nothing of note in parliament but one slight day on the american taxes.” that expressed the common conception of its importance; and when the grenville ministry fell (july, 1765), and was succeeded by that of rockingham, the american situation had absolutely nothing to do with the change. the new ministry was some months in deciding its policy. the king was one of the first to realize the situation, which he declared “the most serious that ever came before parliament” (december 5, 1765). weak and unwilling89 to act as the new ministry was, the situation compelled attention. the king at first favored coercion of the rebellious colonies, but the english merchants, suffering from the suspended trade, urged parliament to repeal the act. their demand decided the ministry to favor retraction, just as formerly their influence had forced the navigation laws and the restrictions on colonial manufactures. if the king and landed gentry were responsible for the immediate causes of the revolution, the influence of the english commercial classes on legislation was the more ultimate cause.
after one of the longest and most heated debates in the history of parliament, under the advice of benjamin franklin, given at the bar of the house of commons,60 and with the powerful aid of pitt and camden, the stamp act was repealed. another act passed at the same time asserted parliament’s power to legislate for the colonies in all cases whatsoever.61 thus the firebrand was left smouldering amid the inflammable colonial affairs; and burke was quick to point out that the right to tax, or any other right insisted upon after it ceased to harmonize with prudence and expediency, would lead to disaster.62
it is plain to-day that the only way to keep up the nominal union between great britain and her colonies was to let them alone. the colonies felt strongly the ties of blood, interest, and affection which bound them to england.63 they would all have vowed, after the repeal of the stamp act, that they loved their parent much more than they loved one another. they felt only the normal adult instinct to act independently. could the british government have given up the imperial idea to which it so tenaciously clung, a federal union might have been preserved.
the genius of dissolution, however, gained control of90 the ministry which next came into power. when illness withdrew pitt from the “mosaic ministry,” which he and grafton had formed, townshend’s brilliant talents gave him the unquestioned lead. this man, who is said to have surpassed burke in wit and chatham in solid sense, determined to try again to tax the colonies for imperial purposes.64 he ridiculed the distinction between external and internal tax; but since the colonists had put stress on the illegality of the latter he laid the new tax on imported articles, and prepared to collect at the customhouses. the income was to pay the salaries of colonial governors and judges, and thus render them independent of the tyrannical and contentious assemblies. writs of assistance, so effective in enforcing the revenue laws but so hated by the colonists, were legalized. the collection of the revenue was further aided by admiralty courts, which should try the cases without juries, thus preventing local sympathy from shielding the violators of the law.65
all the indifference into which america had relapsed, and which the agitators so much deplored, at once disappeared. the right of trial by jury was held to be inalienable. the control of the judiciary and executive by the people was necessary to free government, asserted the pamphleteers. parliament could not legalize “writs of assistance,” they rashly cried. the former stickling at an internal tax was forgotten, and they objected to any tax whatever—a more logical position, which john dickinson, of pennsylvania, supported by the assertion “that any law, in so far as it creates expense, is in reality a tax.” samuel adams drew up a circular letter, which the massachusetts assembly dispatched to the other colonial assemblies, urging concerted action against this new attack on colonial liberties.66 the british government,91 through the colonial governors, attempted to squelch this letter, but the massachusetts assembly refused to rescind, and the other colonies were quick to embrace its cause.
signs were not wanting that the people as well as the political leaders were aroused. when the customs officials, in 1768, seized john hancock’s sloop liberty for alleged evasion of the customs duties, there was a riot which so frightened the officers that they fled to the fort and wrote to england for soldiers.
this and other acts of resistance to the government led parliament to urge the king to exercise a right given him by an ancient act to cause persons charged with treason to be brought to england for trial. the virginia assembly protested against this, and sent their protest to the other colonies for approval.67 the governor dissolved the assembly, but it met and voted a non-importation agreement, which also met favor in the other colonies. this economic argument again proved effective, and the townshend measures were repealed, except the tax on tea; parliament thus doing everything but remove the offence—“fixing a badge of slavery upon the americans without service to their masters.”68 the old trade regulations also remained to vex the colonists.
in order that no disproportionate blame may be attached to the king or his ministry for the bringing on of the revolution, it must be noted that the english nation, the parliament, and the king were all agreed when the sugar and stamp acts were passed; and though parliament mustered a good-sized minority against the townshend acts, nevertheless no unaccustomed influence in its favor was used by the king. thus the elements of the cloud were all gathered before the king’s personality began to intensify the oncoming storm. the later acts of parliament and the conduct of the king had the sole92 purpose of overcoming resistance to established government. most of these coercive acts, though no part of the original policy, were perfectly constitutional even in times of peace. they must be considered in their historical setting, however, just as president lincoln’s extraordinary acts in a time of like national peril. henceforth we are dealing with the natural, though perhaps ill-judged, efforts of a government to repress a rebellion.
after the riot which followed the seizure of the liberty (june, 1768), two regiments of british soldiers were stationed in boston. the very inadequacy of the force made its relations with the citizens strained, for they resented without fearing it. after enduring months of jeering and vilification, the soldiers at last (march 5, 1770) fired upon a threatening mob, and four men were killed. much was made of the “massacre,” as it was called, because it symbolized for the people the substitution of military for civil government. a boston jury acquitted the soldiers, and, after a town-meeting, the removal of the two regiments was secured.
a period of quiet followed until the assembly and the governor got into a debate over the theoretical rights of the colonists. to spread the results of this debate, samuel adams devised the “committees of correspondence,”69 which kept the towns of massachusetts informed of the controversy in boston. this furnished a model for the colonial committees of correspondence, which became the most efficient means for revolutionary organization. they created public opinion, set war itself in motion, and were the embryos of new governments when the old were destroyed.
the first provincial committee that met with general response from the other colonies was appointed by virginia, march 12, 1773, to keep its assembly informed of the “gaspee commission.”70 the gaspee was a sort of93 revenue-cutter which, while too zealously enforcing the navigation acts, ran aground (june 9, 1772) in narragansett bay. some providence men seized and burned the vessel, and the british government appointed a commission to inquire into the affair.71 the commission met with universal opposition and had to report failure.
from this time on the chain of events that led to open rebellion consists of a series of links so plainly joined and so well known that they need only the barest mention in this brief introduction to the actual war. the british government tried to give temporary aid to the east india company by permitting the heavy revenue on tea entering english ports, through which it must pass before being shipped to america, and by licensing the company itself to sell tea in america.72 to avoid yielding the principle for which they had been contending, they retained at colonial ports the threepenny duty, which was all that remained of the townshend revenue scheme. ships loaded with this cheap tea came into the several american ports and were received with different marks of odium at different places. in boston, after peaceful attempts to prevent the landing proved of no avail, an impromptu band of indians threw the tea overboard, so that the next morning saw it lying like seaweed on dorchester beach.
this outrage, as it was viewed in england, caused a general demand for repressive measures, and the five “intolerable acts” were passed and sent oversea to do the last irremediable mischief.73 boston’s port was closed until the town should pay for the tea. massachusetts’ charter was annulled, its town-meetings irksomely restrained, and its government so changed that its executive officers would all be under the king’s control. two94 other acts provided for the care and judicial privileges of the soldiers who soon came to enforce the acts. finally, great offence was given the protestant colonies by granting religious freedom to the catholics of quebec, and the bounds of that colony were extended to the ohio river,74 thus arousing all the colonies claiming western lands. except in the case of virginia, there was no real attack on their territorial integrity, but in the excitement there seemed to be.
some strong incentive for the colonies to act together had long been the only thing needed to send the flame of rebellion along the whole sea-coast. when the british soldiers began the enforcement of the punishment meted to boston, sympathy and fear furnished the common bond. after several proposals of an intercolonial congress, the step was actually taken on a call from oppressed massachusetts (june 17, 1774).75 delegates from every colony except georgia met in philadelphia in september, 1774. seven of the twelve delegations were chosen not by the regular assemblies, but by revolutionary conventions called by local committees; while in massachusetts, rhode island, and connecticut, three of the remaining five states, the assemblies that sent the delegates were wholly dominated by the revolutionary element. local committees may therefore be said to have created the congress, and they would now stand ready to enforce its will.
the assembled congress adopted a declaration of rights, but their great work was the forming an american association to enforce a non-importation and non-consumption agreement.76 local committees were to see that all who traded with england or refused to associate were held up as enemies of their country. the delegates provided for a new congress in the following may, and adjourned.
95 meanwhile, general gage and his “pretorian guard” in boston were administering the government of massachusetts with noteworthy results. a general court of the colony was summoned by gage, who, repenting, tried to put it off; but it met, formed a provincial congress, and, settling down at cambridge, governed the whole colony outside of boston. it held the new royal government to be illegal, ordered the taxes paid to its own receiver instead of gage’s, and organized a militia. gage at last determined to disarm the provincials. his raid to destroy the stores at concord (april 19, 1775) resulted in an ignominious retreat and the loss of two hundred and seventy-three men, to say nothing of bringing sixteen thousand patriots swarming about boston.
ii
the outbreak of war, 1775
though mainly social and economic forces brought the revolution to the stage of open warfare, a massachusetts politician had so used these forces that both his friends and enemies thought the blame or the honor to be his. samuel adams began to desire independence as early as 1768. from that time it was his unwearying effort to keep alive the opposition to the british ministry. for years he sought to instil in the minds of rising youths the notion of independence. his adroit mind, always awake and tireless, toiled for but one end; and he was narrow-minded enough to be a perfect politician. two opposing views could never occupy his mind at the same time. for sharp practices he had no aversion, but he used them for public good, as he saw it, and not for private gain. he was a public servant, great or small, from his earliest manhood—as inspector of chimneys, tax-collector, or moderator of town-meetings. he was ever a failure in96 business; in politics, shrewd and able. the new england town-meeting was the theatre of his action;77 he directed the boston meetings, and the other towns followed. his tools were men. he was intimate with all classes, from the ship-yard roustabouts to the ministers of the gospel. in the canvass and caucus he was supreme. others were always in the foreground, thinking that theirs was the glory. an enemy said that he had an unrivalled “talent for artfully and fallaciously insinuating” malice into the public mind. a friend dubbed him the “colossus of debate.” he was ready in tact and cool in moments of excitement; his reasoning and eloquence had a nervous simplicity, though there was little of fire, and he was sincere rather than rhetorical.
adams was of medium stature, but in his most intense moments he attained to a dignity of figure and gesture. his views were clear and his good sense abundant, so that he always received profound attention. prematurely gray, palsied in hand, and trembling in voice, yet he had a mental audacity unparalleled. he was dauntless himself, and thus roused and fortified the people. nor were his efforts confined to the town-meeting, for he was also a voluminous newspaper writer. he showed no tolerance for an opponent, and his attacks were keenly felt. “damn that adams. every dip of his pen stings like a horned snake,” cried an enemy. thus he went on canvassing, caucusing, haranguing, and writing until the maddened gage attempted to seize him and the munitions of war which he and his fellow-politicians had induced the colony to collect. concord and lexington and the pursuit into boston were the results.
at the close of that long day of fighting (april 19, 1775) it was plain that war had begun, and the massachusetts politicians who had pushed matters to that stage may well have had misgivings. a single colony could have no hope97 of success, and there was little in the past to make one believe that the thirteen colonies would unite even to defend their political liberties. franklin gave a vivid picture of their different forms of government, different laws, different interests, and, in some instances, different religious persuasions and different manners.78 their jealousy of one another was, he declared, “so great that, however necessary a union of the colonies has long been for their common defence, ... yet they have never been able to effect such a union among themselves.” they were more jealous of each other than of england, and though plans for union had been proposed by their ablest statesmen, they had refused to consider them.79 there were long-standing disputes between neighboring colonies over boundaries, over relations with the indians, and over matters of trade.
the greatest danger, however, that confronted the american cause was political division on the subject of the relations with england. as the quarrel with the mother-country grew more bitter, it was seen that the british government had many friends in america who, if they did not defend the action of the ministry, at least frowned upon the violent opposition to it. they believed that america’s best interests lay in the union with great britain. the aristocracy of culture, of dignified professions and callings, of official rank and hereditary wealth tended to side with the central government.80 the more prosperous and contented men had no grievances, and conservatism was the character one would expect in them. they denounced the agitators as demagogues and their followers as “the mob.”
through the long ten years of unrest preceding the revolution, these tories, as they were called, had suffered at the hands of mobs, and now, when gage was powerless98 outside of boston, an active persecution of them began.81 millers refused to grind their corn, labor would not serve them, and they could neither buy nor sell. men refused to worship in the same church with them. they were denounced as “infamous betrayers of their country.” committees published their names, “sending them down to posterity with the infamy they deserve.” after the siege of boston had begun, those who were even suspected of toryism, as their support of the king was called, were regarded as enemies in the camp. the massachusetts committees compelled them to sign recantations or confined them in jails for refusal. if they escaped they were pursued with hue and cry.
some fled to other colonies, but found that, “like cain, they had some discouraging mark upon them.” in exile they learned that the patriot wrath visited their property: their private coaches were burned or pulled in pieces. a rich importer’s goods were destroyed or stolen, and his effigy was hung up in sight of his house during the day and burned at night. beautiful estates, where was “every beauty of art or nature, every elegance, which it cost years of care and toil in bringing to perfection,” were laid waste. looking upon this work of ruin, a despairing loyalist cried that the americans were “as blind and mad as samson, bent upon pulling the edifice down upon their heads to perish in the ruins.”
the violence of the patriots’ attack upon the loyalists seemed for a time to eliminate the latter from the struggle. the friends of royal power in america expected too much, and while the king’s enemies were organizing they waited for him to crush the rising rebellion. they looked on with wonder as the signal flew from one local committee to another over thirteen colonies, who now needed only a glowing fact like lexington to fuse them into one defensive whole. the news reached putnam’s connecticut farm in99 a day; arnold, at new haven, had it the next day, and in four days it had reached new york.82 unknown messengers carried it through philadelphia, past the chesapeake, on to charleston, and within twenty days the news in many garbled forms was evoking a common spirit of patriotism from maine to georgia. it was commonly believed that america must be saved from “abject slavery” by the bands of patriots encompassing boston.
the farmers and mechanics who had hurried from their work to drive the british from concord into boston were not an army. they settled down in a great half-circle around the port with a common purpose of compelling gage to take to his ships, but with no definite plan. confusion was everywhere. men were coming and going, and there were no regular enlistments.83 a few natural leaders were doing wonders in holding them together.84 among them the brave and courteous joseph warren, the warm friend of samuel adams and zealous comrade in the recent work of agitation, was conquering insubordination by the manly modesty and gentleness of his character. others who were old campaigners of the french and indian wars worked ceaselessly to bring order out of chaos.
yet not even the fanatic zeal of the siege could banish provincial jealousies. there were as many leaders as there were colonies represented. new hampshire men were led by john stark, a hero of the french war; connecticut men were under israel putnam, more picturesque as a wolf-slayer than able as a leader. nathanael greene, the philosophic and literary blacksmith, commanded the rhode island militia.85 it was with difficulty that “the grand american army,” as the massachusetts congress called it, finally intrusted the chief command to general artemas ward, who, in turn, was controlled by the massachusetts committee of safety.
100 even with some organization and a leader there was little outward semblance of an army. in the irregular dress, brown and green hues were the rule. uniforms like those of the british regulars, the hunting-shirt of the backwoodsman, and even the blankets of savages were seen side by side in the ranks of the first patriot armies. there was little distinction between officer and private.86 each company chose its own officers out of the ranks,87 and the private could not understand why he should salute his erstwhile friend and neighbor or ask his permission to go home. the principle of social democracy was carried into military life to the great detriment of the service. difference in rank was ignored by the officers themselves, who in some cases did menial work about camp to curry favor with their men.
fortunately, there was in this raw militia a good leaven of soldiers seasoned and trained in the war with france. these men led expeditions to the islands of boston harbor in the effort to get the stock before it should be seized by the british.88 numerous slight engagements resulted, turning favorably, as a rule, for the patriots, and the new recruits gained courage with experience. thus nearly two months passed away, and an elated patriot wrote that “danger and war are become pleasing, and injured virtue is now aroused to avenge herself.”
the only way to drive gage out of boston was to seize one of the commanding hill-tops either in dorchester or charlestown, whence they might open a cannonade on the city. gage saw this danger, and with the arrival of reinforcements under howe, clinton, and burgoyne a plan was made to get control of the dangerous hill-tops. with ten thousand well-equipped soldiers to pit against an ill-trained and poorly commanded multitude of farmers the101 task seemed easy. after trying to terrify the rebels by threatening with the gallows all who should be taken with arms, and offering to pardon those who would lay them down, gage prepared to execute this plan. the patriots forestalled him by sending twelve hundred men under the veteran colonel prescott to seize bunker hill, in charlestown.