A Necessary Evil
Mob attacks on those loyal to the King known as loyalists or Tories by the Patriots during the revolution were brutal yet necessary in the fight for independence. Attacks on the loyalists were not simply a matter of unrest or heathenry, they were a statement of resistance and the outcome of the overbearing need to end tyranny under the crown by any means. Those that were loyal to British rule, British oppression and British control of matters in the colonies were considered an enemy of Americas and were dealt with harshly. Mob attacks included, tar and feathering, mock hangings, destruction of property and the more judicial approach of banishment. In the modern era such acts would be intolerable, even criminal, yet in context of rebel colonial life these attacks were an absolute necessary evil. Richard Brown, author of Strain of Violence: Historical Studies of American Violence and Vigilantism perhaps solidifies the necessity of violence best as “In our two great national crises—the Revolution and the Civil War—we called on violence to found and to preserve the nation. Apart from its role in the formation and preservation of the nation, violence has been a determinant of both the form and the substance of American life.” (Brown, 1975) Revolutionary Colonial America was a divided nation and violence and uprising was inevitable
Of Men and Rats or Of Patriots and Loyalists.
Loyalists or Tories were faithful to the king and supported British rule of the Americas and were to their misfortune a minority in every colony. Loyalists were socially diverse and included farmers, merchants, Anglicans, as well as Dutch, Scottish and German immigrants and the Iroquois Indians. Long Island and New York City had such a large population of Loyalists or Tories that they became known as Torytown. Tories were despised by the Patriots and very harshly treated, even women of Patriotic inclinations were known to suspend their gentle meetings to tar and feather outspoken loyalists. It was of the opinion of the rebels that “A Tory is a thing whose head is in England…its body in Ameri-ca, and its neck ought to be stretched’” (Grant and Blakeley, 1982). A Patriot in contrast may have had loyalty to the King but fought passionately for self-Governance and fair representation. Patriots were known as Rebels, Revolutionaries, Congress-Men, American Whigs and the Sons of Liberty.
The Congress men were the 13 delegates from the colonies that made of the first Continental Congress which formed and convened on the matter of unfair taxation and eventually drafted the Declaration of Independence. Patriots that felt that it was parliament’s duty to keep King in order formed the American Whigs, modeled after the English Whigs. The name Whig first appeared in the England during the 1680s in England referring to the Protestants, who held that Parliament could prevent the establishment of a line of Catholic Kings through succession. Of those most resistant and radical in their fight against a Catholic monarchy were the Whigamores, a Presbyterian group in Scotland, hence the name Whigs. Interesting note, the name Tories came from the same period and referred to the party tending to the doctrine of the rights of King James II. The secret society, The Sons of Liberty served to protect the rights of the colonists against the abuses of the British government.
In 1773 The Sons of Liberty resisted through the Boston Tea Party, the Tea Act, the act passed by parliament that allowed the British India tea company to ships its tea directly to North America duty free of taxes. The Patriots believed in republicanism, where the head of state is a representative of the people, chosen by the people who hold shared authority rather than the people being subjects of the head of state. Thomas Jefferson, John Adams and Thomas Paine were leaders of the idea of governing through a republic. The Patriots were gravely concerned with unfair taxation without representation. Their slogan was “No taxation without representation, “as the believed their interest were not represented in British parliament. Both the Patriots and the Loyalists strongly believed in their own just cause, while the Patriots sought Independence that would free them from tyranny the Loyalists believed that the firm hand of Parliament was necessary to maintain order. The Loyalists stood firm that the Crown was the legitimate government and resisted the American Revolution. Loyalists were generally older, more established, had a sentimental attachment to Britain through business or family and felt British rule was necessary for trade and military protection. Loyalists through tradition believed that the colonial assemblies and Parliament were the absolute means of democracy and government, many even relied on land negotiations and treaties that Brittan had contracted between European settlers and Native Americans. African Americans were loyal because they had been promised freedom from slavery.
The American Patriots rejected the authority of Parliament to tax them without elected representation and felt that Brittan was not looking at the interest of the Colonies nor allowing them self-governance. Patriots resisted the British government as having violated the constitutional rights of Englishmen and began protesting British rule in earnest. In 1773 protests escalated into the Boston Tea Party, in which an entire shipment British tea was dumped into the Boston Harbor, resulting in quick reaction by Parliament. Parliament imposed punitive laws, the Intolerable Acts. Four of which were The Boston Port Act which closed the port of Boston until the East India Company had been repaid for the destroyed tea and until the king was satisfied that order had been restored. The Massachusetts Government Act that allowed only the King. Parliament or the Governor to appoint positions in Colonial government ad restricted town meetings in Massachusetts to once a year limiting Colonial control. The Administration of Justice Act placed the Royal governor in the position to order that trials of accused royal officials take place in Great Britain or elsewhere within the Empire if he decided that the defendant could not get a fair trial in Massachusetts, which limited the true justice in cases of maltreatment by the officials. And finally the Quartering Act which allowed a governor to house soldiers in other buildings if suitable quarters were not provided. These acts not only evoked outrage in the Massachusetts colonists, but elsewhere as well colonists feared more than ever the limits of the Kings power to dominate the American colonies. American Patriots viewed the Coercive Acts, the Intolerable Acts as a violation of their constitutional rights, their natural rights, and their colonial charters and the acts themselves as a threat to the liberties of all of the thirteen colonies, not just Massachusetts. Retaliations by the Patriots quickly escalated into Mob attacks and individual humiliations in acts such as Tar and Feathering.
Tar, Feather, Terrorize and Banish. Mob attacks were the result of frustrations with the monarchies control in America and lack of support from British Parliament that fell on the heads of those loyal to the King. Tarring and feathering was a popular almost folksy means of intimidation and fear tactic used by the Patriots against the Loyalist. Tarring and feathering did not originate in Rebel America but dates back as far as medieval times.
In 1189, Richard I of England ordered that any crusaders found guilty of theft “were to have their heads shaved, to have boiling Pitch dropped upon their Crowns; and after having Cushion-Feathers stuck upon the Pitch, they were to be set on shore, in that figure, at the first place they came to.” Centuries later, in 1623, the Bishop of Halverstade ordered that tar-and-feathers be applied to a party of drunken friars and nuns. From this brief survey it is clear that the practice of tarring and feathering was imported to the New World rather than created there. (Irvin, B. H. (2003).
To tar-and-feather was more than the act itself to the Patriots, it was a means to shame and humiliate. The victims of this form of attack were often paraded through town amidst a crown of onlookers to expose, ostracize and embarrass the offending Tory and hopefully reform and deter others. Patriots also hindered courts, as was the case in the Berkshires when a mob assembled & “forced the Justices of the Court of Common Pleas from their Seats on the Bench and shut up the Court House, preventing any Proceedings at Law. At the same Time driving one of his Majesty’s Justices of the Peace from his Dwelling.” (Oliver, 1774) And in Taunton when the Mob attacked the House of Daniel Leonard, Esqr. One of his Majesty’s Justices of the Peace; & a Barrister at Law, firing Bullets into the House &obliged him to fly from it to save his Life. (Oliver, 1774)
Tories were victim of not only Mob attacks, tar and feathering, looting but also faced prosecution in by local magistrates for any number of offenses that would justify removal of the Tory from the population. John Howe, a third generation Bostonian was the only member of his family to remain a loyalist and was eventually one of the 309 citizens accused of treason under the) Confiscation and Banishment act signed April 30th 1779.
From Violence to Freedom. The acts of the Patriots which would now be considered criminal if not a form of domestic terrorism where in truth key to the success of American Independence from the crown. Mob attacks against Loyalists put fear in those resisting independence and limited the resistance from loyalist within the colonies. Few that had endured the humiliation of being tarred and feathered would speak out against the idea of revolution again and no witness to the violence the Patriots were willing to use would willingly place themselves in the position to be publicly ridiculed or possibly harmed, effectively reducing any outward show of loyalty to the crown. The Boston Tea Party as well not only clearly spoke against unfair taxation, but sent a message to the King that the Americas were not easily controlled and would use whatever tactic necessary to resist British rule. The intolerable Acts that resulted in the Sons of Liberty attack on British tea served only to resolve the American fight for Independence. In response to these acts, Massachusetts patriots issued the Suffolk Resolves, formed a secret Government, the Provincial Congress, and began training militia outside British-occupied Boston to wage war if necessary, all of which were acts of Treason in Revolutionary America as they would be in modern times. In September 1774, the First Continental Congress convened, consisting of representatives from each of the colonies, to determine the course of action or actions needed to end British rule in the Americas. The first act of Congress was to accept the proposal of John Adams that Americans would obey Parliament, but would resist all taxes in disguise. Later that year Congress called for a boycott of all British goods enforced by new committees authorized by the Congress. July 4th 1776, Continental Congress declared Independence from Brittan and formed a new nation, The United States of America, truly united against tyranny and unfair representation. The American revolutionary war would eventually become a world war involving Brittan, Spain, France, the Netherlands and Mysore. Twenty thousand plus men were lost to battle for both America and Britain before Indolence was finally achieved in 1783. A harsh reality is in fact that every great change in The Americas and other nations has been won not only by great speakers, forward thinkers and vigilant fighters but also with a degree of violence that pushed the urgency of the matter in a manner that words would fail to convey. In the case of the mob attacks of Loyalist by Patriots we see clearly the path from violence to freedom.
References
Brown, Richard Maxwell. Strain of Violence: Historical Studies of American Violence and Vigilantism. New York: Oxford University Press, 1975. EBook Academic Collection (EBSCOhost), EBSCOhost (accessed May 24, 2014).
Grant, John N., and Phyllis R. Blakeley. 1982. Eleven Exiles: Accounts of Loyalists of the American Revolution. Toronto, Ont: Dundurn Press, 1982. EBook Academic Collection (EBSCOhost), EBSCOhost (accessed May 24, 2014).
Irvin, B. H. (2003). Tar, feathers, and the enemies of American liberties, 1768-1776. The New England Quarterly, 76(2), 197-238. Retrieved from http://ezproxy.snhu.edu/login?url=http://search.proquest.com/docview/215294471?accountid=3783
Oliver, peter. Origin and Progress of the American Rebellion, 1781; appendix based on events compiled in The Boston Weekly News-Letter, 23 Feb. 1775
Schlesinger, A. M. (1955). Political mobs and the American Revolution, 1765-1776. Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society, 99(4), 244-250. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/3143703
Remarkably Relevant 