The "Boston Tea-Party"
ON Monday morning, the 29th of November, 1773, a handbill was posted all over Boston, containing the following words: "Friends! Brethren! Countrymen!--That worst of plagues, the detested tea, shipped for this port by the East India Company, is now arrived in the harbor; the hour of destruction, or manly opposition to the machinations of tyranny, stares you in the face. Every friend to his country, to himself and to posterity, is now called upon to meet at Faneuil Hall, at nine o'clock THIS DAY (at which time the bells will ring), to make united and successful resistance to this last, worst, and most destructive measure of administration."
The ship Dartmouth, from London, with a cargo of tea, had anchored off the castle the day before. By invitation of the Boston Committee of Correspondence those of Roxbury, Cambridge, Dorchester and Brookline assembled in the room of the selectmen, while crowds of citizens were pouring into Faneuil Hall, and resolved, by unanimous vote, to use their joint influence to prevent the landing of the tea. It was also resolved to invite all the town-committees in the province to co-operate with them. The crowd soon became so great that the Hall could not contain them, and the meeting was adjourned to the Old South Meeting-house. There the people resolved that the tea should not be landed; that no duty should be paid; and that it should be sent back in the same bottom. They also voted that Francis Rotch, the owner of the vessel, should be directed not to enter the tea, at his peril, and that the captain of the Dartmouth should also be warned not to suffer the tea to be landed. Orders were given for the ship to be moored at Griffin's Wharf, and twenty citizens were appointed a guard to watch her.
A letter came to the meeting from the consignees, offering to store the tea until they could write to England and receive instructions. "Not a pound of it shall be landed," said the meeting. They also resolved that two other tea-ships, then hourly expected, should, on their arrival, be moored alongside the Dartmouth, in charge of the same volunteer guard. The meeting quietly adjourned, and the movements of the people were governed by the Committee of Correspondence. They appointed a number of post-riders to carry news to the other towns, in case there should be an attempt to land the tea by force.
On the 14th of December, another meeting was held in the Old South, when it was resolved to order Mr. Rotch to immediately apply for a clearance for his ship and send her to sea, for his cargo had all been landed excepting the chests of tea. In the meantime, the governor had taken measures to prevent her sailing out of the harbor before the tea should be landed; and he wrote to the ministry, advising the prosecution of some of the leaders of the Sons of Liberty in Boston, for high crimes and misdemeanors. He ordered Admiral Montagu to place two armed ships at the entrance to Boston harbor, to prevent the egress of vessels; and he directed Colonel Leslie, who was in command of the Castle, not to allow any vessel to pass out from the range of his great guns, without a permit signed by himself.