In the aftermath of the French and Indian War, Parliament had passed the Proclamation of 1763, a document that drew a line roughly along the crest of the Appalachians and forbade permanent settlement west of it. The western boundaries of the existing colonies—many of which had been thought to extend westward to… well, no one was quite sure—were now given a finite demarcation, and British lands west of that line, just won from France, were designated a vast Indian reserve. Even hard-won Fort Duquesne, rechristened Fort Pitt and quickly morphing into Pittsburgh, was west of the line. The truth of the matter was that this settlement prohibition was rarely enforced, and for a decade it did little to deter men like George Washington and others who had land interests there.
But now the Quebec Act gave much of this vast reserve—all British land north of the Ohio River and westward to the Mississippi—to the province of Quebec. It and Nova Scotia were in fact Great Britain’s fourteenth and fifteenth colonies in North America. This destroyed the westward expansion schemes of the other thirteen colonies—but there was more. The Quebec Act restored French civil law in the province of Quebec and gave full tolerance to the dominance of the Roman Catholic Church. To British colonials the intent was clear: the recently vanquished French in Quebec were being treated better than they were.
Put in its most crude terms, a young Alexander Hamilton noted, “a superstitious, bigoted Canadian Papist, though ever so profligate, is now esteemed a better subject to our Gracious Sovereign George the Third, than a liberal, enlightened New England Dissenter, though ever so virtuous.”17
Some American propagandists conjured up ridiculous plots that had the pope dividing up the colonies, but the real threat was not in Rome. Rather, it lay along the borders with Quebec, where Frenchmen now appeared to be aligned with the British in London. In a debate in Parliament, Lord North readily acknowledged that if the king’s unruly colonies could not be brought to obedience by present forces, it was “a necessary measure to arm the Roman Catholics of Canada, and to employ them in that service.”18
The Intolerable Acts had been directed against Massachusetts, but now, by seeming to threaten the rights and religion of all colonies, the Quebec Act inadvertently went a long way toward unifying them. The protests of moderates like Joseph Galloway were swept aside and the full text of the Suffolk Resolves placed before the Continental Congress on September 17. The delegates voiced their support for the “firm and temperate conduct” of Massachusetts to date and approved the Suffolk Resolves as submitted. They trusted that the united efforts of the colonies would convey their convictions “of the unwise, unjust, and ruinous policy of the present administration” and encourage the introduction of “better men and wiser measures.”19
When John Adams heard the outcome of the vote, he was elated. “This Day convinces me,” he wrote in his diary, “that America will support Massachusetts or perish with her.”20
MORE THAN MERELY VOICING MORAL support for Boston and Massachusetts, the First Continental Congress debated significant—some said drastic—action. As the colonies had learned from the Stamp Act crisis, there was power in unity of purpose and action, particularly if it struck a financial nerve. The question was whether or not the colonies would once again endorse the nonimportation of British goods and, if so, whether they would be able to enforce it.
The earlier boycott in response to the Stamp Act and other tariffs had largely run its course by 1770. Not only had the Stamp Act been repealed in 1766, merchants who honored the embargo had increasingly seen that it benefited the pockets of importers who ignored the ban without much regard for the cause of American freedom.
Now, however, the Continental Congress was determined to curry wide popular favor for a trio of agreements forbidding the importation of British goods, the exportation of colonial crops to the British Isles, and the consumption of British goods that might arrive in North America via whatever circuitous route an importer might devise. Measures supporting all three issues were passed in October of 1774 and came to be called the Continental Association. The ease with which the nonimportation and nonconsumption measures passed showed how quickly moderates such as Joseph Galloway had been overshadowed by the radical members of the assembly.
Indeed, one of the few controversies that arose during the drafting of the nonimportation agreement, which was to take effect December 1, 1774, was whether to include French wine imported via Great Britain. Madeira, higher in alcoholic content than French wine and available from Portugal’s Madeira Islands, saved the day. “I drank Madeira at a great Rate [instead of wine],” boasted John Adams, “and found no Inconvenience in it.”21
The exportation ban was more problematic because it affected the middle and southern colonies disproportionately. Major rice exports to Great Britain from South Carolina, for example, were far more important to that colony’s economy than lumber exports were to New England. Virginia had similar concerns when it came to the 1774 tobacco crop now curing for next year’s delivery. The delegates resolved this matter by postponing the implementation date of the nonexportation provision until September of 1775, after which most of that summer’s crops would have been shipped. When this still wasn’t good enough for South Carolina, rice was excluded from the exportation ban altogether.
As for enforcement, the delegates bypassed the suspect merchants and importers and asked the general populace to pledge itself to the nonconsumption agreement. If the citizenry united in not consuming British products, there would be little incentive for importers to break the nonimportation measures. Nonconsumption compliance would be “encouraged” by local committees of compliance. The irony to some was that these local committees, invariably spearheaded by the more radical among the populace, inspected importers’ bills of lading and merchants’ ledger books with a fervor that surpassed the most stringent methods of royal customs officers. Some rebel sympathizers and most of those loyal to Great Britain asked themselves what the difference was between being told what to do by Parliament and the Crown and being governed by the sweeping edicts of the First Continental Congress.22
Loyalist Samuel Seabury, the Episcopal rector of a church in Westchester County, just north of New York, put it bluntly. Writing as A. W. Farmer, a pseudonym for “a Westchester farmer,” Seabury taunted his rural neighbors, exhorting them to “do as you please” in supporting local committees “chosen by half a dozen fools in your neighborhood,” but warned that if they opened their doors to such a mob, it would next be inspecting “your tea canisters, and molasses-jugs, and your wives’ and daughters’ petty-coats.”23
But women could play an important role in determining whether the nonconsumption mandates succeeded or failed. While only a very few upper-class men wrote pamphlets and engaged in legislative debates, everyone—men and women—could join the political campaign against Great Britain by adjusting their eating, drinking, and sartorial habits. Since the choice of whether to boycott the marketplace and make or mend at home was largely domestic in nature, women were essential—perhaps even more than equal—partners in the rank and file’s support for the nonimportation and nonconsumption provisions. Christopher Gadsden, a leading merchant in Charleston, South Carolina, readily conceded that “without the assistance of our wives” it would be impossible for the boycott to succeed.24 More than one woman may have thought that ironic as she listened to pleas for equality and freedom that did not extend to her.
HAVING PASSED A BOYCOTT OF trade with Great Britain, the First Continental Congress used its final days to delineate the rights of “the English Colonies in North America.” Voicing words and sentiments that would foreshadow future declarations, the delegates proclaimed they were “entitled to life, liberty, and property.” And they reminded their brethren across the Atlantic that “at the time of their emigration from the mother country, [our ancestors had been] entitled to all the rights, liberties, and immunities of free and natural-born subjects within the realm of England.”25 How could Englishmen enjoy those rights while denying
them to others of the common tree?
As to the anticipated reaction of Great Britain to these words, as well as to the boycott, there was little optimism. “I expect no redress, but, on the contrary, increased resentment and double vengeance,” John Adams remarked to Patrick Henry, showing him a letter to the Massachusetts delegation from a rebel leader in western Massachusetts. “We must fight. It is now or never, that we must assert our liberty,” Joseph Hawley had admonished Adams. “By God,” replied Henry, “I am of that man’s mind.”26
Word that the Continental Congress had passed the Suffolk Resolves reached England in early November. Lord Dartmouth, Lord North’s stepbrother and Secretary of State for the Colonies, was beside himself. “If these Resolves of your people are to be depended on,” Dartmouth told exiled former Massachusetts governor Thomas Hutchinson, “they have declared War against us.” Dartmouth later wrote to General Gage, characterizing the situation in Massachusetts as one of “actual Revolt, and shew a Determination in the People to commit themselves at all Events to open Rebellion.”27
George III seemed almost relieved. On November 18, 1774, the king wrote Lord North, “I am not sorry that the line of conduct seems now chalked out, which the enclosed dispatches thoroughly justify; the New England governments are in a state of rebellion, blows must decide whether they are to be subject to this country or independent.”28 It was a rather bold statement, as in the colonies there were many who had yet to wish themselves independent.
Chapter 3
Who Would Be True Patriots?
In the spring of 1775, the inhabitants of the thirteen colonies were forced to make a choice between loyalty to the existing government of King George III or the hope of a less oppressive political structure. Perhaps most troubling, the lines between colonists loyal to the king and those advocating rebellion were not clearly drawn, and this uncertainty made for uneasy relationships, particularly among families, neighbors, and friends. In the absence of a united groundswell of popular uprising, the political situation was complicated, and it carried with it an ugly overtone of civil war.
Who were the true patriots—rebels who fought for a change of government or loyalists who stood by their sovereign? In hindsight, American propagandists would glory in the term patriot for those who had risen up against British oppression and apply Tory in a derogative fashion to those who fled the country, fought against them, or merely tried to avoid the fray. The political labels of Whigs and Tories were also applied. But at the beginning of 1775, rebels or loyalists were the terms usually employed.
Either way, mere labels could not adequately convey the emotional cost to personal relationships. Jonathan Sewall and John Adams were lawyers, close friends, and intellectual confidants. As early as 1759, it was Sewall who, sensing the financial burdens that Great Britain would impose on the colonies after the French and Indian War, encouraged Adams to write his first political letters for publication. “Mr. Sewall was then a patriot,” Adams later recalled. “His sentiments were purely American.”
But as the divide between the colonies and the Crown deepened, highly placed loyalists aggressively courted Sewall. Over time, they promoted his law practice and saw to his appointment first as solicitor general for the province and later as attorney general. Adams eschewed such offers, but he and Sewall “continued our friendship and confidential intercourse, though professedly in boxes of politics as opposite as east and west,” until just after Adams was chosen as a delegate to the First Continental Congress.
In that summer of 1774, finding themselves in court together in what is now Portland, Maine, the two old friends went for an early morning walk. Sewall was vehement in opposing Adams’s participation in the congress. “Great Britain was determined on her system,” Sewall lectured his friend; “her power was irresistible, and would certainly be destructive to [Adams], and to all those who should persevere in opposition to her designs.” But Adams was equally determined. “The die was now cast,” Adams replied. “I had passed the Rubicon; swim or sink, live or die, survive or perish with my country, was my unalterable determination.” The two men parted, and each took his own path, not to meet again as friends.1
Families suffered similar rifts. Colonel Josiah Quincy, a Boston merchant of some standing, had three sons. The eldest, Edmund, followed his father into business and adopted his political leanings, becoming “a zealous whig” and political writer during the Stamp Act crisis. There is little doubt Edmund’s persuasions and activities would have continued had he not died in 1768 at the age of thirty-five. The second son, Samuel, went to Harvard and became a lawyer. As with Jonathan Sewall, Samuel Quincy was courted by loyalists and later appointed solicitor general of Massachusetts. As a family biographer later delicately noted, “Influenced by his official duties and connexions, his political course was opposed to that of the other members of his family.” The third son, Josiah Quincy Jr. (sometimes referred to as Josiah Quincy II), also went into law but picked up where his brother Edmund had left off. Josiah became a blazing though short-lived meteor of rebel rhetoric, which culminated in a strident pamphlet published in May of 1774 in which he argued against the bill closing the port of Boston. Josiah sent a copy to Samuel, who, while opposing his brother’s views, rather mournfully acknowledged, “The convulsions of the times are in nothing more to be lamented, than in the interruptions of domestic harmony.”2
Later that fall, while John Adams was in Philadelphia for the Continental Congress, his wife, Abigail, who was a distant Quincy relation, dined at Colonel Quincy’s home in Braintree and found Samuel’s wife, Hannah, and the junior Josiah and his wife, another Abigail, present. Hannah remarked that “she thought it high time for her husband to turn about; he had not done half so cleverly since he left her advice” and stood by the loyalists. It is not entirely clear whether Samuel himself was there for this family gathering, but Abigail Adams reported to John, “A little clashing of parties, you may be sure.”3 Josiah junior was likely rather discreet on the occasion, as he was even then planning to leave in several weeks on a secret trip to London in an attempt to rally friendly merchants and members of Parliament to the rebel cause.
JUST HOW DEEPLY DIVIDED A region might be was evidenced in and around Marshfield, a community of about twelve hundred inhabitants roughly halfway between Boston and Plymouth. The town had a long history of outspoken loyalty to Great Britain and in the aftermath of the Boston Tea Party had passed a town resolution decrying the action as “illegal and unjust and of a dangerous Tendency.”4
In mid-January of 1775, one hundred and fifty Marshfield residents voted against supporting the trade edicts of the Continental Congress. Instead, they voiced support for an association promoted by Timothy Ruggles, a Massachusetts lawyer who had been president of the 1765 Stamp Act Congress but who was now a staunch loyalist. The Ruggles Covenant, as some called it, promised that its signers would do everything in their power to enforce “obedience to the rightful authority of our most gracious Sovereign; King George the third, and of his laws.”5
To that end, Marshfield residents formed a local militia to counter those of the rebels and called themselves “the Associated Loyalists of Marshfield.” But when this became known down the road in Plymouth, “the faction there,” as one loyalist termed the rebel movement, threatened to march en masse and either force the Marshfield loyalists to recant or drive them off their farms. Marshfield appealed to General Gage for assistance, and Gage dispatched four officers and about one hundred men via two small ships to Marshfield along with three hundred stands of arms “for the use of the gentlemen of Marshfield.”6
This response had the desired effect, and when the local rebel militia attempted to muster in opposition, “no more than twelve persons presented themselves to bear Arms” against the king. As another loyalist gloated, “It was necessary that some apology should be made for the scanty appearance of their volunteers, and they coloured it over with a declaration that ‘had the party sent to Marshfield consisted of half
a dozen Battalions, it might have been worth their attention to meet and engage them.’ ”7
Meanwhile, the British troops were quartered outside Marshfield on the fifteen-hundred-acre estate of Nathaniel Ray Thomas, one of the mandamus councilors scorned by the rebels. “The King’s troops are very comfortably accommodated, and preserve the most exact discipline,” boasted the same observer. And to the rebels’ chagrin, they showed no inclination to leave anytime soon. To the loyalists, the troops provided an extra measure of security in town so that “now every faithful subject to his King dare freely utter his thoughts, drink his tea, and kill his sheep as profusely as he pleases.”8 (One of the Continental Association’s many mandates in preparing for a full-scale boycott against Great Britain was to prohibit the slaughter of sheep under the age of four, a measure intended to build domestic flocks.)
General Gage was quite pleased by this request for assistance from Marshfield. While he was forced to acknowledge that despite his efforts, “the Towns in this Province become more divided,” Marshfield was a glowing example of local opposition to the rebels. “It is the first Instance of an Application to Government for assistance,” Gage reported to Lord Dartmouth, “which the [rebel] Faction has ever tried to perswade the People they would never obtain.”9
Even though they had not put up a military resistance to Gage’s rescue of Marshfield, rebels in nearby towns did not take this intrusion of British regulars lightly. Selectmen in six towns in the county of Plymouth petitioned General Gage to remove the public disgrace they felt the military deployment reflected upon their county. Swearing a regard for the truth that they claimed their adversaries had overlooked, these representatives asserted that the fears and intimidation of Marshfield residents “were entirely groundless” and that “no design or plan of molestation was formed against them.” This petition came from the neighboring towns of Plymouth, Kingston, Duxbury, Pembroke, Hanover, and Scituate, and one look at the map showed that, at least geographically, the rebels had Marshfield surrounded.10
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