Heroes of the American revolution

Contents

CHAPTER PAGE

I The Men of Massachusetts .... i

II The Royal Province of Virginia . . 26

Chapter I

WE talk in a wise way about events in history; we even know the dates of certain great events. The names, too, of certain great men stand prominently forth and we are only too apt to believe that such and such an event was the making of such and such a man, when in reality it is the other way round. The man of power is bound to shape the events of his time. It is men who make history for all time, and this was notably the case during that wonderful period of the American struggle for independence, when a handful of determined men flung the gauntlet of defiance in the faces of the English King and his Parliament. They never thought of making history — these earnest, straightforward, manly men — when they presided at great councils and raised their voices in indignant protest, as, link by link, England forged the chains of slavery.

They were only struggling, like all lovers of freedom, to be free.

It is not our purpose to tell the causes of the Revolution. Every American boy and girl could answer in chorus: ''Taxation without representation." Instead, we are dealing with the mighty men who fanned the flame of open rebellion, and who were not only willing, but eager to stand by their country or lay down their lives in the issue.

On Thursday, December 16, 1773, there had been a steady downpour of rain in Boston Town, such a downpour as only a bleak, sobbing December day in old New England could conjure up; but for all that, there were stir and excitement and a surging of crowds towards the Old South Meeting House. From every quarter they came, from all the surrounding villages for a distance of twenty miles or more, old and young, rich and poor, men, women and children, all trudging towards Boston with buoyant step, with grave, yet eager faces, willing to brave the driving rain that they might reach the town in time to sit in the vast assembly and listen to the words of wisdom from the patriotic leaders of the day. Many were to be seen there: the serious and dignified Samuel Adams, the most determined of them all; the dapper young aristocrat, John Hancock; the much-loved Joseph Warren; the stalwart, broad-shouldered Paul Revere, and many others known as "Sons of Liberty."

These people, with the rain running in rivulets from their three-cornered hats and streaming over their shoulders — for the umbrella was a recent innovation used only by a privileged few — were hurrying onward that they might hear the latest news of the tea ships, then anchored at Griffin's Wharf, in Boston Harbor, still loaded with their unwelcome cargoes of tea, still hesitating whether to turn back to England and satisfy the Patriots who had ordered them to go home, or to curry the favor of England's most unreasonable King and his handful of unwise councillors, and brave the anger of a roused populace.

Noticeable among the crowds was the goodly array of sturdy young men and boys, with a look of expectation on their faces. We all know that look on a boy's face when there is fun or a frolic or even a fight ahead, and men are only grown-up boys after all, and the young farmers and landholders streaming into Boston Town were bubling over with excitement, for the patience of the Patriots was nearly exhausted and something was sure to happen. And something did happen. The world was stirred by the news of the Boston Tea-Party. Boston Harbor for a single night became a gigantic teapot and masquerading Indians emptied into it chest after chest of the tea which had been a forbidden article in patriotic households. Everybody knows the story — how the good dames had put away their lacquered tea-chests, their fat silver kettles and teapots and their pretty teacups, for nobody who was anybody could drink tea those days; indeed, all the ladies of fashion, young and old, signed a pledge that they would drink no tea until the odious tax was removed.

It seemed a trifling matter — this dispute about tea — but the tea was only another name for liberty, and the Americans, as we know, felt at this crisis that it might as well be tea as anything else, and if our side yielded one jot, England would take advantage and oppress us more than ever.

Meanwhile, the people of Boston held indignation meetings, and sent protest after protest to the Governor, but no attention was paid to them, and so at last, with Samuel Adams at their head, they decided to make one last stand and then —

Up he rose in the crowded meeting-house, after a last fruitless appeal ; his tall substantial brownsuited figure towering above them all, and spoke the fateful words: "This meeting can do nothing more to save the country."

This was the invitation to the Tea- Party and the Boston Patriots responded heartily, rushing to Griffin's Wharf led by a handful of men disguised as Indians. The hatches of the three vessels moored there were broken open, the tea-chests were dragged on deck. There was little noise and no confusion. The chests were opened with hatchets and their contents dumped into the harbor.

In three hours' time all was done, and by ten o'clock the town of Boston was sleeping quietly, while huge quantities of the detested tea floated out into the ocean, much of it being carried by wind and tide to the Dorchester shore, and the next day it was literally lined with tea, which had to be shoveled back into the ocean, and woe betide the wily person who tried to secrete so much as a tea-leaf. All that was preserved is now owned by the descendants of Thomas Melville, whose shoes, after his return home the night of the Tea- Party, were full of tea-leaves. The precious relics were bottled and handed down through generations. Who took part in the Tea- Party was never divulged until long years after America was a free country. But what the well-ordered mob did so thoroughly was the carefully wrought plan of a handful of earnest and determined men.

The man who stirred the seething pot of rebellion was Samuel Adams, and, led by him, Massachusetts sent forth her defiance to England whose King smiled at the idea of the little Puritan Colony matching its strength against the might of the Mother Country. But he forgot that a land settled by pioneers must be a land of brave and fearless men, and he forgot besides that these self-same men had in their veins some of the best blood of England and France. The same spirit which sent the Puritans and the Huguenots to find a new home in America, where free from persecution they might worship God in their own way, moved them to rebel against the tyranny which followed them across the sea.

We are as familiar with the name of Samuel Adams as we are with the name of America. Yet, questioned as to what manner of man this was, who for years stood almost alone against the King and Parliament, few of us could answer. Many would say: "Oh yes, we know all about Samuel Adams; he was the leader of the Boston Patriots, and Boston, of course, was the leader of the rebellion against England's tryanny." And so the big man would be swallowed up in the big cause and nothing more would be known of him ; but to be a leader one has to be a very great man indeed. The Puritan streak once made an Oliver Cromwell, who tore a King from his throne; it made also a Samuel Adams, who was the first to shout defiance at another King and point the way to freedom. Samuel Adams has justly been called the Father of the American Revolution. It was Massachusetts that led the thirteen colonies in their revolt. Boston led Massachusetts, and Samuel Adams led Boston.

This remarkable man was born September 16, 1722, and his first recorded ancestor was one Henry Adams, who, while not mentioned as one of the Mayflower passengers, must have landed about that time. He settled, with his family of eight children, near Mount Wollaston, in Quincy. He was originally a native of Devonshire, England, and the English families of that name boasted of Welsh ancestry, so there was the blood of warriors in the Adams pedigree.

The two grandsons of the original Henry were, Joseph Adams, a citizen of Braintree and the grandfather of John Adams, our second President, and John Adams, a sea captain, the grandfather of Samuel Adams, whose father — also Samuel Adams — was born on May 6, 1689, in Boston, where he lived always, a respected and honored citizen, marrying one Mary Fifield when he was twenty-four years old, and our Samuel Adams was one of twelve children, only three of whom survived their lusty father.

Little is known of his mother except that she was a good and a pious woman, but it is evident that she had the Puritan idea that children should be seen and not heard, for no fond mother's account has been handed down to us of Samuel's precocious childhood and probably interesting little boyhood, and only mothers can provide such details.

We see him first as a big, studious school-boy, older than his years, and it was said of him that his punctuality in going to and from school was so marked that the laborers regulated their hours of work by him. There is no foundation, however, for this story. We only know that, as the boy grew older, he and his father worked together for the good of Boston Town, and very early in life young Samuel began to look suspiciously upon England's treatment of her American colonies.

The Adams family was supposed to be rich, for Samuel Adams, Sr., owned a handsome estate in Purchase Street. They lived in a fine mansion fronting the river, but we know little of the life that went on behind its doors. The boy, Samuel, passed unnoticed into manhood and graduated from Harvard; his thesis, for which he received the degree of A.B. in 1740, showed the fighter. It was " Whether it be lawful to resist the Supreme Magistrate, if the Commonwealth cannot otherwise be preserved." No one paid much attention to the young graduate and his paper, but it was the first word of defiance, though Governor Shirley and the other officers of the Crown, who listened to the unfledged speakers at Commencement, probably thought of the speech as a bit of puffed-up oratory, little dreaming that they were looking down upon the great leader of the Revolutionary group.

It is hard to say just what makes a man a leader. He may have the gift of oratory, or the gift of persuasion ; he may have the money to draw the people, or the mind to govern them, or the presence to attract them. Whatever it was in Samual Adams, it was not the force that worked swiftly and suddenly, but slowly and surely. For many years he stood alone in his opposition to the Mother Country, but, as England began to encroach upon her rights, little by little he was able to draw around him the group of men who represented the patriotism of Boston. Samuel Adams had inherited from his father the fine public spirit which makes a good citizen. Samuel Adams, the elder, had occupied many public positions in Boston Town, and his influence could be felt in both church and state. "A wise man and a good man," his son called him.

When the young man was twenty-one, the family fortunes looked unpromising, and so "Sam" Adams turned to mercantile life and entered the office of Thomas Cushing. The profession of law had been his choice, but his pious mother, disappointed that he had not chosen the ministry for which he had been intended, opposed the law.

But Samuel Adams had no head for business; he left Mr. Cushing after a few months, and went into business for himself with £1,000 his father gave him. Half of this he lent to a friend who never repaid it, and the other half he soon lost. Then he and his father became associated in a malthouse built on their place, but money-making was not the strong point of the Adams family, and Samuel Adams was looked upon as "thriftless" by many who knew him, though there were some with clearer heads who predicted for him a promising future. After his father's death in 1 748, and his marriage to Elizabeth Checkley, a minister's daughter, in 1749, he still kept up the business of the malthouse, and, sharing his father's small fortune with his brother and sister, managed to live without money worries for a while.

In 1757, however, his wife died, leaving him a son, another Samuel, and a daughter, and it was well that he had no larger family to provide for, as business misfortune pursued him. But in spite of this, people were beginning to regard him in another light ; he began to have a voice in Town government, and a very powerful voice it was too, as they very soon learned. He was appealed to to settle political disputes, and his cleverness at drawing up papers and contracts made his opinion sought after by many who had laughed at his business methods and had called him "thriftless."

THE MEN OF MASSACHUSETTS II

He held many offices in the Town government; he was on committees of all sorts, to see that chimneys were properly inspected, to see that precautions were taken against smallpox, and he was annually elected as tax collector. Always, up to this, a loyal supporter of the Crown, he saw many royal governors come and go; of all these it was Thomas Hutchinson, destined to be the last royal governor of Massachusetts, who most aroused his antagonism by trying to enforce the laws which were so detestable to the American people. Poor Hutchinson was only doing his duty in upholding the authority of the Crown, which he did at the risk of life and property, but his journals and letters show that he was opposed to the tax on tea, and was forced to act as the English Parliament commanded.

Meanwhile, as the years passed and England pressed the thumbscrew upon her loyal subjects, Samuel Adams busied himself — like the far-seeing statesman that he was — in gathering about him a circle of men who stood for strength, honesty and patriotism, — all more or less convinced that England was tyrannical, all seeking peaceful methods to bring her to terms. Yet, of that brilliant group, Samuel Adams alone saw the only way out of their difficulties, and worked towards freedom with an energy which never flagged. One by one the men about him came closer to his side.

John Adams, his cousin and intimate friend, lawyer and orator, was his warmest ally. He had formerly lived in Braintree, but removed to Boston in 1763. The cousins were more like brothers in their relations to each other, and the brilliant young lawyer's fluent tongue and pen spoke oftener than his more silent cousin. Devoted heart and soul to liberty, he used his best efforts to protest on the many occasions when England overstepped her authority, and both Samuel and John were prominent and active "Sons of Liberty."

This was a club formed first in Boston, then extending to other colonial towns, — a secret society organized for the protection of American colonists and the upholding of liberty, and the members assembled night after night at the Green Dragon Tavern or at the house of Mr. William Campbell, who kept what was known as the Salutation Tavern, so named from its quaint sign which represented two gentlemen, in the fashionable dress of the period, in the act of shaking hands. A most important branch of this club was called the North End Caucus, which had been organized by Dr. Joseph Warren, another trusty man, whom Samuel Adams had tied to him by the strongest bonds of friendship, and whose untimely death, at Bunker Hill, was mourned by Adams to the end of his life.

Another strong member of this little group was John Hancock, a young man of high social rank and ample fortune, who preferred to cast his lot with liberty than to enjoy the fickle favor of a King. Many wondered at the influence of Samuel Adams over this elegant young gentleman with his foppish tastes. Outwardly a plain, stolid, rather prosaic elderly man, who lived from hand to mouth, who wore badly cut clothes of a dingy brown, who cared nothing for the pleasures of life, it is marvelous the power Adams had of ruling others. It was at one of these meetings at the Green Dragon, held as early as October 23, 1770, that the members present pledged themselves, their lives and their fortunes, to oppose the sale of tea, and it was at the printing office of Messrs. Edes and Gills, three years later, that the resolves for the destruction of the tea were discussed behind closed doors.

"We were so careful," writes Paul Revere in his note-book, "that our meetings should be kept secret, that every time we met, every person swore upon the Bible not to discover any of our transactions but to Hancock, Warren, or Church, and to one or two more leaders."

Two more portraits we must add to this group of Patriots: James Otis, a young lawyer, and

Paul Revere, whose aid to the cause of liberty has been handed down in song and story.

Otis, with his fiery eloquence, swayed the discontented people by his wonderful gift of oratory, and, oddly enough, when first we hear of him he was advocate-general for the Crown, but the Stamp Act displeased him, and his patriotism forced him to resign; very shortly thereafter we find him arrayed on the side of the Patriots, fighting for American liberty. Adams, with his clear judgment, saw what service this somewhat reckless young man could render to his country if he could only bridle his tongue and keep him from any act of violence; for his hold upon the people was so wonderful that his mere entrance into any assembly was the signal for shouts and clapping. And, even in later days when he was broken down in mind and body, the people would follow his lightest word. Such a man is a great help as well as a great hindrance in times of stress.

A blow received on his head when in the height of his power, in 1769, has often been held to account for his oddities and contradictions, and his unruliness, but the magnetism which could draw a multitude still remained, even when those who knew him best felt that he was no longer responsible nor trustworthy. John Adams, whose faithful diary furnishes us with the most graphic history of those stirring times, says of him, in describing one of his speeches: "Otis was a flame of fire. With ... a torrent of impetuous eloquence, he hurried away everything before him. American independence was then and there born ; the seeds of patriots and heroes were then and there sown to defend the vigorous youth."

This speech, which lasted between four and five hours, was one of the first speeches which openly denounced taxation without representation, as tyranny. But even this "plump, roundfaced, smooth-skinned, short-necked, eagle-eyed young politician" — fiery though he was, — did not at first foresee, as Samuel Adams did, the birth of a new nation. He thought, as the Colonists thought, that he was only fighting Parliament with words, and not the King and the King's men, with sword and gun.

His voice was the drum-beat which roused the people, but when they rushed to arms, poor James Otis — his work done, his service well-nigh forgotten, his splendid mind all darkened — rushed too, and fought on Bunker Hill, escaping unscathed, while Joseph Warren, in the fulness of his youth and promise, was cut down.

Little by little the cluster of New England Patriots grew in strength and determination, and, at the time of the Boston Tea-Party, there was hardly a man of repute in Boston Town who had not pledged his life and honor to Liberty. The presence of British soldiers in Boston was in itself enough to inflame the people.

After the riots, following the Stamp Act, the Governor hinted that he would like troops to enforce order, and although he asserted that he did not want troops to quell a riot, but for the good of his country, and never really demanded them, it is a certain fact that he was responsible for their coming. The people, hearing that soldiers were expected, begged Hancock and the other Selectmen to call a meeting of protest; but it made no difference, for two regiments soon reached Boston in fifteen British men-of-war, taking a strong position in the harbor around the north of the town.

It must have been a wonderful and exciting scene to the peace-loving inhabitants of Boston. At night, the harbor was illuminated by a brilliant display of rockets, shot off from the ships' decks, and the people, casting away all thoughts of coming evil, put out in their boats to get a nearer view of the ships, and eagerly watched the scarlet-coated infantry marching to their barracks in the town. To the great indignation of the people, Faneuil Hall was taken as quarters for one regiment, while Governor Bernard ordered the State House, in King Street, to be opened for their reception. Hancock, as head of the body of Selectmen, had refused to give quarters to these ill-timed visitors, and, although Boston Common was only a cow pasture, the people resented its use as a camp for one of the regiments.

Hancock, being a man of influence and fortune, as well as a shrewd business man, became the target for many attacks, among which he was charged with trying to secure, from General Gage, the contract to supply these unwelcome troops. At this, the peppery Patriot boiled over, though the charge was of course proved false. He was the merchant prince of his time, and therefore above such petty dealings for the sake of a few pennies, even had he wished to feed the enemies of his country. From that time he threw discretion to the winds and worked side by side and hand in hand with Samuel Adams, entering into all his plans so zealously that their enemies made many spiteful remarks. When Adams's influence made him President of the first Provincial Congress, small-minded people said that he was the dupe of the wily statesman who saw in the wealthy merchant's silks and velvets and splendid coach a foil for his own poverty.

After the Tea-Party, Boston Harbor was closed to traffic, by order of the King, and would have been shut off from all communication with her sister Colonies, had it not been for the indomitable spirit of this handful of Patriots who, by means of expresses, kept in touch with New York, Philadelphia, and the surrounding country. These "expresses" were no other than trusty messengers on horseback, who knew the country and whose eagerness to be of service has earned them a niche in history. Foremost among these was Paul Revere, a sturdy patriot, who had already done much in the way of strirring the people to revolt. He was a stalwart, broad-shouldered man of about forty, but constant exercise and open-air life had trained his muscles and had given him iron sinews, and he knew every Indian trail through the forests, and every road that led from Boston.

Samuel Adams had a perfect genius for drawing about him exactly the right sort of men. Hancock's wealth and social position "gave the lie to the Tory sneer that the Whigs were obscure, pettifogging attorneys, smugglers, and bankrupt storekeepers." John Adams, with his knowledge of the law and his heart with the struggling people, could hold them in check. James Otis could inflame them when the right moment came. Joseph Warren could draw up resolutions, form societies, hold meetings, preserve law and order even among a mob. Adams himself had the gift of knowing just when to speak and to act. But among them all, Paul Revere came closest to the very heart of the people, for he was of the people, earning a livelihood with his skillful hands. He was a gold and silversmith by trade, and many were the beautiful tankards and teapots and kettles and dishes which he designed for the use of the wealthy Colonial families, and many are the heirlooms handed down through generations, showing his artistic workmanship.

As a very young man he learned the art of engraving, and when events crowded thick and fast on the American people his clever caricatures of America's plight, expressed, better than whole pages of history, just how the people felt about taxation without representation. He was an active "Son of Liberty," was present at all of their meetings, and could always be counted on in any emergency. Such a man was more than useful — he was invaluable — and many a secret message he carried through the trackless forests to New York and to Philadelphia, and all the towns around Boston, before he took the famous ride "On the eighteenth of April in seventy-five," which Longfellow has so vividly described. It is pretty well understood that he took a prominent part in the destruction of the tea in Boston Harbor, but it is also recorded that he was quite refreshed the next morning and ready to carry despatches to New York and Philadelphia, telling the good news and begging assistance from all the sister Colonies. The far-seeing leaders recognized his usefulness, and trusted this one man with secret messages which, had they fallen into British hands, would have hung or beheaded half of Boston.

We may be sure, while the tempest was brewing, Paul Revere was in the midst of it. He was one of the men who guarded the tea ships and prevented the captains from landing their cargoes, and he was — as has been hinted — one of the disguised "Mohawk" Indians who helped in its destruction.

After this open act of rebellion, England closed the port of Boston, supplies were cut off in all directions, and the attitude of the soldiers became menacing. The King and his councillors had further inflamed the people by putting a price upon the heads of Samuel Adams and John Hancock, and those soldiers encamped upon the Commons, which faced the Hancock mansion, did everything they could to deface his beautiful home, the officers with their swords cutting and hacking his fence in a most scandalous manner. Another night his enclosure was entered by soldiers who refused to leave, telling him that "his house and stable would soon be theirs, and then they would do as they pleased."

Already England had forbidden the shipment of firearms and ammunition to the Colonists, and the "Sons of Liberty" formed themselves into what was known as the Committee of Safety, their object being to gather together all the gunpowder and small cannon around Boston and its vicinity. The Committee of Safety expanded later into the Provincial Congress, which came together for the purpose of opposing the tyranny of England. It first met at Cambridge, then at Concord, and finally at Cambridge, and the many indignities offered by England were discussed in session, widening the breach day by day.

John Hancock, as President, spent much of his time in Lexington when busy with the duties of the Congress. His own home, threatened as it was, was hardly a safe spot for an outlawed man. Yet nevertheless it had its advantages, for every movement of the soldiers on the Common could be watched from its windows.

Such was the state of affairs in Boston Town during the absence of the Patriots, who were attending the Provincial Congress. Dr. Joseph Warren, left in charge of all public affairs, had his hands full, for rumor had reached him that some of the secret councils had been betrayed by a traitor in their own camp, afterwards proved to be Dr. Benjamin Church. The British troops had been informed that there were military stores at Concord, and that John Hancock and Samuel Adams could easily be captured in Lexington, where they were lodging during the sessions of

Congress, on the way to seize the stores, and preparations were being quietly made to march.

Now. indeed, was the time for action. The two Patriots must be warned and Concord put in readiness for defence. Warren had not far to look for a messenger. Paul Revere was at his side, his friend and confidant —

"Ready to ride and spread the alarm Through every Middlesex village and farm, For the country folk to be up, and to arm."

Longfellow has given us in glowing verses the history of this wonderful ride, the most dangerous part of which has been overlooked in the "hurry of hoofs through the village street" and the noise and confusion of the roused "minute men" as they answered the call of the galloping rider, and that was the daring act of crossing the ferry in full view of the British man-of-war, Somerset.

"Just as the moon rose over the bay Where, swinging wide at her moorings, lay The Somerset, British man-of-war, A phantom ship with each mast and spar Across the moon like a prison bar, And a huge black hulk that was magnified By its own reflection in the tide."