American Rebels

by Nina Sankovitch

  Nine years later, Josiah’s admonition proved prophetic: “May ye never forfeit it by a tame and infamous submission to the yoke of slavery and lawless despotism!”24

  When accused by Governor Hutchinson of being part of the group of traitors who planned the Tea Party, and guilty of “High Treason,” Josiah Jr. responded, “Who is the Traitor, who is the Betrayer of Government? He who openly assembles with his brethren to consider public affairs; who speaks his sentiments freely, and determines his conduct in the face of all men?—Or he who conspires against the very being of the State … and who writes Secret and Confidential letters to the enemies of his country, blasts its reputation with calumny, and points the way to its overthrow and ruin?”25

  And in an essay widely read throughout the colony, Josiah wrote, “when THIS PEOPLE are driven to desperation, they who thus abuse them, will no longer dwell in safety.”26

  Josiah Jr. must have penned the word “desperation” with a slight puckering of his soul. His consumption had worsened—most likely with the coming of winter and its cold and damp conditions—and the symptoms were as desperate as any man could endure. Daytime chills and coughing spells plagued him, along with nighttime fevers.

  Abigail tended to her husband as best she could, following Dr. Warren’s instructions, dosing him with steeped Peruvian bark and rhubarb root tea (to ease digestion and increase his appetite) and, when needed, a tincture of opium for the pain. Dr. Warren was careful to call the Peruvian bark by its medical name, cinchona, and not by its more common name, Jesuit’s Bark, as Abigail, with her Congregationalist distrust of Catholics, might have waivered from dispensing it.

  * * *

  Earlier in the fall, Samuel Quincy received a letter from a young man, the son of avowed patriots but a hidden Loyalist himself. John Trumbull wrote to Samuel for guidance, declaring, “I am determined to be of no party but of truth.”27 But to which party did truth belong? The spark had been lit, the tea sunk, the lines drawn. Truth was claimed on either side of those lines, while the gap between them only widened.

  Sam Quincy watched his brother, his cousins, his father, and his childhood friends plant themselves firmly on the side opposing English rule of the colonies. But Sam couldn’t join them; he was convinced, as articulated by Abigail’s cousin Isaac Smith that it was better to live under a “hundred other acts, proceeding from a British Legislature … than be subject to the capricious, unlimited despotism of a few of my own countrymen, or behold the soil, which gave me birth, made a scene of mutual carnage and desolation.”28

  For Josiah and Abigail Quincy, John and Abigail Adams, John Hancock and Dolly Quincy, all truth and honor belonged to their side, the side populated by the Sons of Liberty, the Massachusetts Committee for Correspondence, and those who had physically carried out the dumping of the tea. Did they imagine the carnage and desolation to come?

  Not yet. Instead, they hoped, these rebels of Braintree, to manage the fire that had started. What they were certain of was that the time had come to claim their liberty—not as a favor to be granted by Parliament but as their inalienable and undeniable right as Americans. Reverend Hancock had preached of liberty as a “solemn covenant”; fulfilling its promise was their sacred duty.

  PART THREE

  Flame

  1774–1776

  The flame is lit, and like lightning,

  it catches from soul to soul.

  —ABIGAIL ADAMS

  20

  Rocks and Quicksands on Every Side

  A spark of fire inflames a compact building,

  a spark of spirit will as soon kindle a UNITED PEOPLE.

  —JOSIAH QUINCY JR.

  Early in the morning of a cold February day in 1774, Josiah Quincy Jr. opened the door of his office to fellow lawyer John Lowell. The two men had been meeting regularly for the past month; having procrastinated once before, Josiah had promised his father that with the new year he would finally complete a last will and testament, and Lowell was the man to help him. Josiah explained to Lowell that the provisions were simple; but as Lowell explained to Josiah, nothing in estate law was simple, and although what Josiah desired was plain, the language in which his desires had to be couched was not.

  All of Josiah’s worldly goods were to go to his wife. Abigail would also hold guardianship of all his “political and legal papers,” which would pass to his son when he came of age.1 His son was also to receive Josiah’s complete library at age sixteen. “May the Spirit of Liberty rest upon him” with the gift of these books: these were the words he dictated to Lowell.2 There were other bequests, to Harvard College and also to friends. As for his final wishes, Josiah asked that when he died, he be buried in Braintree beside his ancestors and close by the Third Parish Church.

  For the last three months, Josiah’s symptoms had not worsened, but nor had they improved. He had grown thinner through the winter. His collarbones jutted out beneath the warming cravat that wound around his throat, and his heavy wool jacket hung loosely on his bony shoulders. But his hand was steady as he reached for the final will prepared by Lowell; the time had come to sign it.

  Josiah reviewed all its terms and then wrote his signature at the bottom. Dr. Joseph Warren, William Tudor, and John Gill served as witnesses; they signed after Josiah. By noon Josiah was alone in his office once more and back at work on a matter that pressed more urgently on him than his last will and testament. There was still much to do in the matter of saving his country, his America, and he had no intention of giving in to his illness anytime soon. His sword in the cause was his pen, and he set to it like a man lit by lightning, the quill point leaving a burning mark across ream after ream of paper.

  For the first months of 1774, the focus of his ire was Governor Hutchinson. “Subterfuge and evasion are the true characteristics of a little mind; and so are falsehood and cowardice,” he wrote, and then warned, “he who practices the low arts of political cunning, will, in the end, be detected, and sink into contempt.” He derided Hutchinson “as the dark assassin of … HIS NATIVE COUNTRY.”3

  Soon there would be a greater target for Josiah’s anger, and a larger breadth to his arguments. All through February, the newspapers in Boston had been filled with guesses as to what exactly Parliament would do to punish the colonists of Boston for destroying the East India Company’s tea. While the severity of the rumored punishments varied, this much was certain: six warships with seven regiments aboard were on their way to America, winter seas or not. As reported in the Boston Evening Post, “Tea will be forced upon Americans with a fleet and troops.”4

  More reports arrived from England, confirming that John Hancock, Sam Adams, Dr. Joseph Warren, and Thomas Cushing, recognized by the King’s Ministry as the organizers of Boston’s agitation against the Tea Act, were to be tried for the crimes of “High Treason” and “High Misdemeanors.”5 Orders for their immediate arrest came from London, to be implemented by Samuel Quincy, solicitor general of the colony, and Jonathan Sewall, attorney general.

  Josiah Sr. and Jr. both waited to see what Sam Quincy would do. There was no doubt Sewall would secure the arrests if he could—having succumbed to “the vices and treachery which have advanced [him] from Indigence to Opulence”—but what about Sam?

  * * *

  On the morning of March 1, 1774, four days before the third annual commemoration of the Boston Massacre, John Adams traveled back from Braintree to Boston. He was a satisfied man, having now become owner of the house where he’d been born and its large barn, along with thirty-five acres of land. He’d bought the buildings and property from his brother, to add to the small farmhouse and bit of land he’d been left by his father.

  “That beautifull, winding, meandering Brook, which runs thro this farm, always delighted me,” John wrote in his diary—and now it was his.6 He had big dreams for how he would improve his expanded Braintree estate: “introduce fowl Meadow And Herds Grass, into the Meadows … or still better Clover and Herdsgrass.… The Meadow is a great Object … a
nd may be made very good.… Flowing is profitable, if not continued too late in the Spring.”7

  But he had no time to pursue his dreams for the farm in Braintree. Bigger pots needed stirring and John Adams had taken it upon himself to do so.

  Adams had come up with a plan to impeach the chief justice of Massachusetts, Peter Oliver. Of the five judges on the bench of the High Court, Oliver was the only one who proudly and publicly announced that he would receive his salary directly from the king. Oliver’s declaration had brought the wrath of the people down on his head; there were even threats of taking him out to the Liberty Tree and letting him swing.

  But John Adams could not countenance threats of physical violence against a judge, no matter how crooked the judge might appear. The law must take its course against Justice Oliver, and the method to do so was impeachment.

  There was no precedent for impeachment by the Massachusetts House of Representatives. Adams, undaunted, set himself to researching how it might be done, using impeachment cases that had been pursued in England as his model. He very likely consulted Josiah Quincy Jr. as well, who had studied Blackstone’s Commentaries as diligently as John had and knew a bit about English impeachment practices in the House of Commons.

  * * *

  John Hancock was chosen as orator for the third annual commemoration of the Boston Massacre, to be held in Faneuil Hall. It was a paramount goal of the planners that the commemoration be peaceful and respectful while also reminding colonists of what they were fighting for. But two days before the event, Andrew Oliver died. Oliver—Peter Oliver’s brother and Hutchinson’s brother-in-law—had served as lieutenant governor under Hutchinson. Colonial leaders feared that his funeral would bring out a mob of protesters, especially following so closely on the heels of the commemoration.

  The nonviolent execution of the Tea Party had been the hallmark of the policy carefully crafted by Joseph Warren, Josiah Quincy Jr., and Sam Adams, of holding only orderly and legal protests against British tyranny. The approval and support that had come into Boston from all over Massachusetts, as well as from the other colonies, following the tea dumping, was due in large part to its sober execution. It was imperative to maintain that support as well as to encourage pro-colonial forces in Parliament—and the behavior of local rebels had to be kept in check.

  Fearing violence, Chief Justice Peter Oliver and many of Andrew’s friends had announced their intention to stay away from the funeral. Samuel Quincy was outraged: Andrew had been a close friend. Just weeks earlier Sam had addressed him in a letter as his “most amiable, patriotic, musical, philosophical friend.” He had ended his letter to Andrew with the wish, now never to be fulfilled, that “we may both live to See the Return of those Halcyon days, when both private and public confidence shall be restored; and yes the period when the Lion shall lie down with the Lamb, and every one Lies Secure under his own Vine, & under his own Fig-tree.”8

  Samuel announced that he would attend the funeral of his close friend and honor the man who had been such a sincere and concerned citizen of his native country.

  * * *

  On the afternoon of March 5, 1774, John Hancock stood before a packed Faneuil Hall to give his Boston Massacre commemoration speech. He began with a quiet nod to the teachings of his father, taken in years ago on a sunny slope overlooking the bay waters of Massachusetts: “I have always from my earliest youth, rejoiced in the felicity of my Fellow-men, and have ever considered it as the indispensable duty of every member of society to promote, as far as in him lies, the prosperity of every individual, but more especially of the community to which he belongs.”9

  The “vast crowd” with “rainy Eyes” listened, silent and rapt, to Hancock’s every word as he continued, turning next to the duty of government to oversee and foster community.10 “I am a friend to righteous government, to a government founded upon the principles of reason and justice,” he explained. “But I glory in publicly avowing my eternal enmity to tyranny.”11

  The crowd erupted in cheers and then fell silent again. Hancock’s “composition, the pronunciation, the action, all exceeded the expectation of everybody,” John Adams noted. “They exceeded even mine, which were very considerable.”12

  Hancock called for a union of the colonies and the establishment of a militia, and for a meeting of a “general Congress of Deputies from the several Houses of Assembly on the Continent, as the most effectual method of establishing such an Union.… At such a Congress, a firm foundation may be laid for the security of our Rights and Liberties; a system may be formed for our common safety … [so] we shall be able to frustrate any attempts to overthrow our constitution; restore peace and harmony to America, and secure honor and wealth to Great-Britain.”13

  In closing, Hancock exhorted the crowd, “I conjure you, by all that is dear, by all that is honorable, by all that is sacred, not only that ye pray, but that you act; that, if necessary, ye fight, and even die for the prosperity of our Jerusalem.”14

  Thoughts and prayers were not enough: action was necessary, and by the roars of the crowd, it was clear: action would be taken.

  That night, John Hancock celebrated with a small group of friends and allies at the Bunch of Grapes, with salutations made and drinks taken, and backslapping all around. Sam Adams, who had written much of the oration, was proud and happy with how well it had been delivered and sat back in the tavern, satisfied.

  That evening John and Abigail Adams, and Abigail’s cousins Katy and Dolly, were invited to the home of Edmund Quincy. There they toasted the health of John Hancock and sang forth praises for his speech: “The Happiness of the Family where I dined, upon account of [Hancock’s] justly applauded Oration, was complete,” Adams wrote in his diary. “The Justice [Edmund Quincy] and his Daughters were all joyous.”15

  * * *

  The morning of Andrew Oliver’s funeral three days later was cold and wet, one of those New England March days when the world seemed to be rewinding back to winter. Rain mixed with snow began to fall midday as temperatures dropped. But the anger of the mob who had turned out to watch the procession of Oliver’s coffin was only just heating up.

  As the crowds grew restive, preparing to bring down on the passing procession not only catcalls and jeers but also projectiles of dung, snow, and rocks, suddenly John Hancock appeared. Dressed in his officer’s uniform, he led his eighty Cadets to fall in and march behind the wagon carrying Oliver’s coffin. In solemn and regulated lines, they followed it all the way to the burial grounds.

  As Governor Hutchinson wrote in a letter, Hancock’s decision to offer respect and honor at the funeral of his political enemy constituted “unaccountable conduct”—and drew the admiration of all who witnessed the parade of his Cadets, and all who heard about it in the coffeehouses and taverns of Boston and beyond.16 John Hancock had become even more of a hero to the people of Boston, a paragon of decency, bravery, and goodness.

  * * *

  John Adams, having carefully crafted his plan for impeaching Chief Justice Peter Oliver, set it in motion in late March 1774. One night at a dinner party attended by Adams and several members of the General Court, the dilemma of paying royal salaries to colonial judges came up. As the men lamented this “fatal Measure [that] … would be the Ruin of the Liberties of the Country,” John piped up that he just might have the answer to the problem.17 He “told them … there was one constitutional Resource … nothing more nor less than an Impeachment of the Judges by the House of Representatives before the Council.”18

  When the men of the General Court asked Adams—as he knew they would—for his help in drafting up articles of impeachment against Peter Oliver, Adams graciously agreed. For the next few days and nights he worked on the articles while members of the Massachusetts House hovered over him. As he recalled later, “One Morning, meeting Ben. Gridley, he said to me Brother Adams you keep late Hours at your House: as I passed it last night long after midnight, I saw your Street door vomit forth a Crowd of Senators.”19


  Such a “Crowd” and yet it was John himself who crafted the articles of impeachment. He used the history of the colony and its charter, and the facts of Oliver’s “false Representations and evil Advice,” as well as his “corrupt Administration of Justice,” to argue that impeachment was not only possible but necessary.

  Because Oliver accepted the “Sum of four Hundred Pounds Sterling, granted by his Majesty”—and furthermore, hoped for its “Augmentation”—John argued that Oliver had committed the “high crimes and misdemeanors” of taking “a continual Bribe in his judicial Proceedings” in clear “Violation of his Oath.” He had been compelled into “accepting and receiving the said Sum” by the “the Corruption and Baseness of his Heart, and the sordid Lust of Covetousness.”20

  The House of Representatives approved John’s articles of impeachment and quickly moved to have them published and widely disseminated. Governor Hutchinson, however, refused to recognize either the merits of the claims against Oliver or the legality of the process of impeachment. He declared that Chief Justice Oliver would not be removed, no matter how the Massachusetts House of Representatives had voted.

  John Adams did not despair; he knew that a judge without jurors could do little, and the jurors were all colonists with minds and hearts of their own. They would never serve under a man like Peter Oliver; John was sure of it.

  * * *

  In early May 1774, the vessel Harmony arrived in Boston. Captain Shayler scurried off deck as soon as the boat docked and hurried to bring news of the “the Severest Act that was ever penned against the Town of Boston” directly to John Hancock.21 By the afternoon, the town was buzzing with the news of the Boston Port Act, which had been passed in retaliation for the Boston Tea Party. This was the just the first of a series of acts that Parliament called the “Coercive Acts” but would come to be known in the colony as the “Intolerable Acts.”