USA > New York > New York City > Leslie's history of the greater New York, Volume I > Part 21
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The non-importation agreements were thus annulled, and at the same time no duties were left but that on tea. Without any special concert in action that one article seems to have been pretty effectu- ally boycotted, for the English East India Company was brought to the brink of ruin by its inability to export its tea to America. There- upon. in August, 1773. the Company made request to export tea to America free of duty. Tea furnished by the Dutch East India Com- pany, and carried to America in English bottoms, was freely sold there. The idea suggested itself to Lord North and his Royal Master that it would be a good thing to grant the Company's request. By taking off the export duty of 12 pence per pound, and requiring the
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payment of only 3 pence in American ports, 9 pence per pound were gained, and by so much cheaper the English Company's tea could be sold, and thus undersell the foreign Company. The temptation of getting their tea cheaper than before it was hoped would blind the colonists to the fact that they were introducing the taxed article. It was a stupid subterfuge, however, worthy of such brains as those of George III. and his Premier. Nobody in America was deceived for an instant. The moment the East India Company sent out its six hun- dred chests of tea, to be distributed among the cities of the Atlantic seaboard from Boston to Charleston, the colonists were on the alert for the arrival of the ships, and preparing to prevent the discharge of their cargoes. All the struggle for privileges and liberties dear by long possession and exercise was concentrated on the rejection of tea Openly at last an announcement was made that on a certain day an associa- tion had been formed under the name and style of " The Sons of Liberty." Five resolutions were adopted for the subscription of members, and all of them called for patriotic action in re- gard to the expected tea. Its date was November 11, 1773. But by that time there was in the city another organi- zation. " The Friends of Liberty and Trade." of the more moderate men, merchants, and landholders, who did not find it necessary to burn effigies, and have bonfires, or liberty-poles, in order to show their determination to uphold American liberty. The Sons of Liberty, who were of the more boister- SAMUEL JOHNSON. ous and less responsible class, appealed to the more dignified rival body, to unite with them on the tea-question, and of course they did. Three merchants of New York, Henry White, Abraham Lott, and Mr. Benjamin, having received the appointment of Commissioners for the sale of the English Company's tea, they were waited on by a com- mittee of these associations, and as a result they declined to handle the tea at all if liable to duty. Governor Tryon, who was now in the chair, proclaimed that in order to prevent trouble, and out of respect to the prejudices of the people, he would receive the tea in the fort, and leave it there undisturbed, until satisfactory measures could be taken for its distribution. At a meeting of the Sons of Liberty this proposition was at once rejected, for it was seen that if landed any- where the duty on it would have been paid, and the people would get taxed tea without knowing it. This meeting was held on December 16, 1773, the very date of the Boston Tea Party. It was not till April
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18. 1774, that the first tea-ship arrived in New York Harbor. As fate would have it, now that trouble was again at hand, Colden was also again at the head of affairs, Tryon having sailed to England April 7, on a leave of absence on account of ill-health, to be gone about four- teen months. The ship carrying the tea was the Nancy, Captain Lockyer. The pilot refused to bring her through the Narrows until the Sons of Liberty were heard from. They permitted the captain to bring his ship up to the city, but not to enter it at the custom house. The Nancy was therefore laid alongside of Murray's wharf at the foot of Wall Street. The captain came ashore, was conducted courte- ously to the consignees, and learned from them that they would not receive the cargo. He then made preparations for his return to Eng- land, the date for which was set on April 29, and a program of cere- monies arranged fitly to celebrate the happy result so peacefully se- cured. But on the very day appointed another tea-ship had come into harbor, the London. Captain Chambers. He had told the pilot he had no tea aboard, and hence the London had been permitted to enter. But it was not easy to deceive the " eternal vigilance" of the Sons of Liberty. They had certain information that tea was aboard the London. Owners and captain were summoned to ap- pear before an investigating committee, and then it came out that Chambers had eighteen cases of tea on board as a private speculation. This afforded a chance for a repetition of the Boston Tea Party: in the evening a number of Liberty Boys boarded the offending ship, found the tea cases, broke them open, and gave the tea in a summary way to the waters of the river. Although the next day, April 30, was a Sunday, the ceremonies intended to grace the departure of Captain Lockyer and the Nancy were now carried out. He was conducted from the Merchants' Coffee House on Wall and Queen (Pearl) streets. down Wall to Murray's wharf; as he stepped into his boat, cheers were given and guns fired, and all this occurring before nine o'clock in the morning, the church services were not disturbed. It was duly reported in the evening by a committee of observation at Sandy Hook, that the Nancy had cleared that point and was well ont at sea. The work of rejecting taxed tea was therefore thoroughly done at New York. The New England historians must be of an amazing state of mind, when they carefully note how the tea-ships were treated at Boston, Philadelphia, and Charleston, and have not a word to say about this city. Even Professor Fiske is guilty of this inexcusable wantonness of historic unfairness.
Matters were now rapidly hurrying on toward independence. The King wanted a test of obedience, and he staked the issue on tea. The duty would have brought in a mere pittance as revene to England; it would have cost the Americans a mere bagatelle as tax. But it was not a question of money now, and never had been. Committees of Correspondence had been established in New England and Virginia.
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On May 12, 1774, news came to New York of the passage of the Bos- ton Port Bill by the ship Samson, after a record-breaking voyage of only twenty-seven days from London, thus strikingly supporting the old adage that bad news travels fast. On May 14, the " Sons of Liberty " and " Friends of Liberty and Trade " were assembled in mass-meeting in the Exchange on Broad Street, France's Tavern hard by being too small for them. Isaac Low was made chairman of the meeting. Two tickets were presented for the appointment of a Committee of Correspondence. The " Sons " had twenty-five names; the " Friends," i.e., the merchants, had these and twenty-five more. Some warm debate followed the double presentation, but the larger committee was elected, and one name added later, making a " Com- mittee of Fifty-one" of the New York Corresponding Committee. Three days later a character destined to become picturesque in the history both of American Independence and its literature, came to New York. This was Paul Revere, a continental post-rider, who came with dispatches from the Boston Sons of Liberty to those of New York and Philadelphia. They referred to measures to be taken in concert throughout the colonies in resentment for the despotic clos- ing of the port of Boston as the punishment for her Tea Party. The whole country was soon aflame.
The precedent of the Stamp Act Congress led to the calling of another to consider measures ex- pedient under the increasing mis- understanding between home conn- try and colonies. Massachusetts sent out the invitation for a con- gress of deputies to meet at Phila- delphia in September, 1774. She appointed five delegates. On July 4, auspicious date, New York patri- ots were in excited session, the two parties again in conflict, yet acting as beneficial balance-wheels to each other. They chose as New York's deputies five men : three merchants, Philip Livingston, John Alsop, the AUGUSTUS JAY. chairman of the Committee of Fifty- one, and Isaac Low; and two lawyers, James Dnane, afterward Mayor, and John Jay, a name destined to become illustrions. Jay was the eighth son of Peter Jay and Mary Van Cortlandt. Peter was the son of Augustus Jay, the founder of the family in America, who was a prosperous merchant of New York, with a country-seat at New Rochelle. Augustus Jay had married the daughter of Balthazar Bayard. Thus John Jay was thoroughly
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identified with the best life in the city, of intermingled Huguenot and Dutch blood. He was born in 1746, graduated from King's (Columbia) College in 1764, was now twenty-eight years old, and a bridegroom. having recently married Sarah, daughter of William Livingston, Governor of New Jersey, an ardent patriot: thus in another way linking himself with a prominent colonial New York family, for William was of the numerous Livingston clan, though in official connection with New Jersey.
The Congress met in Philadelphia at Carpenters' Hall on Septem- ber 5, 1774. Jay had left without any demonstration on August 29. The remaining four deputies took their departure on September 1 attended to the ferry by a great crowd, carrying flags, and with bands of music. John Adams and the other New England deputies passing through New York City were also enthusiastically cheered on their way. The Congress of 1774 did much the same work as that of 1765. A declaration of rights was prepared and issued; a non-importation agreement was again recommended. On October 26 it dissolved, but in expiring it provided for a resurrection which meant the beginning of independence and national life. It was voted to provide in each colony for the election of delegates to another Congress to meet on May 14, 1775. By that time the die had been cast, the appeal to arms made, and thereafter union among the colonies would be necessary not only to arrange commercial tactics, but to secure the independ- ence of a nascent nation.
The presence of the troops in New York had not mended the situa- tion but rather aggravated it, and introduced the elements of vio- lence and bloodshed. There was a constant and fierce feud between the citizens and the troops. It began with the sacking of Major James's house on November 1, 1765. The guard there belonged to the royal artillery regiment, and they had to fly ignominiously before the mob to save their lives. This disgrace rankled in their breasts and was shared by the entire regiment, no doubt fomented by an abun- dance of taunts. In December. 1765, an imperious demand was made by the British government upon the New York Assembly to provide free quarters for as many troops as the ministry might choose to send over; and to supply them besides with firewood, bedding, drink, soap, and candles. The Assembly as peremptorily refused; for troops on the march it would provide quarters, but then only after an estimate of the cost. It was for persisting in this refusal that the Assembly was disfranchised, as told on a previous page. Such arbitrary de- mands and condign punishment on account of the troops, were sure to result in collisions between the citizens and soldiers in town. The first occurred on the night of July 21, 1766. Four officers who had been indulging too freely in liquor at one of the taverns in Broadway opposite the Commons, started out for a lark, breaking the street lamps as they went. Pretty soon thirty-four lamps along Broadway
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toward Wall Street were in ruins. This naturally brought the City Watch down upon the officers, and a lively fray occurred in which wounds and knock-down blows were liberally exchanged. One of the officers was finally arrested and locked up, whereupon the three others summoned the sentinels stationed nearby to their help, and rescued their companion. But the next day he was recognized when upon the streets, and re-arrested, and one of the others was also caught. They were taken before the Mayor and Aldermen and com- pelled to pay for the lamps and a heavy fine besides, General Gage, the Commander-in-Chief, facilitating the action of the magistrates in every way.
The main feature of these collisions between the troops and the citizens was the frequent altercations about the liberty poles. A huge mast, called a Liberty Pole, was first raised by the Sons of Lib- erty at the enthusiastic celebration of the King's birthday on June 4, 1766, after the repeal of the Stamp Act. It stood on a spot in the Commons opposite the block between Chambers and Warren streets. A large number of soldiers were quartered in the barracks running in a line across the northern end of the Commons, where Chambers Street is now. As the pole was raised to celebrate the triumph of the Ameri- cans in forcing the repeal, it was peculiarly annoying to the soldiers, and any injury to the pole was sure to exasperate the people of the town. After the fracas of July 21, out of which the officers came rather badly, the soldiers planned revenge by cutting down the Lib- erty Pole. This was done on the night of Sunday, August 10, but not without being opposed by a crowd of citizens who had got wind of the purposed outrage. A battle royal was fought, with brickbats and sticks on one side, and bayonets on the other, and many persons were hurt. The soldiers who had done the act belonged to the 28th regi- ment, then in barracks. On August 12, the Sons of Liberty had another pole up, flying the colors, and bearing the device " George, Pitt, and Liberty." The soldiers of the 28th were arraigned before the Mayor, and bail demanded for future good behavior. But on the night of September 23, the second Liberty Pole was cut down, but so . secretly that the act could not be surely traced to the soldiers. The third pole was erected the next day. It lasted till the celebration of the first anniversary of the repeal, March 18, 1767, going the way of the others a day or two later. Presumably the soldiers had perpe- trated the act, but no one saw them do it. A fourth pole was set up promptly the following day. It was larger than the others, and bound with iron bands far up from the bottom. Three nights later gunpowder was applied where the ax could do no execution, but it did not work. Now precautions were taken to frustrate the outrage. A watch was set in a tavern near by and when a party of soldiers were seen to approach the pole, they were soon driven away. The authorities of the city and of the province also interfered seriously.
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and for a few years the liberty pole was left at rest. In 1770, however, the conflict broke out afresh. Another regiment was now in the bar- racks, the 16th having superseded the 28th. The new ocenpants took up the traditions of the former regiment, and began their attempts to destroy the pole on JJammary 13, 1770. They failed and then marched into a tavern on Broadway kept by one La Montagne oppo- site the Fields, breaking the windows. Four attempts followed the other, and finally, on January 16, the pole was destroyed and its pieces piled np in front of Montagne's tavern. An indignation meeting was held in the Commons on January 17. at which three thousand peo- ple were present. The soldiers were roundly denounced, and declared to be public enemies. The citizens asked leave of the Mayor and Cor- poration to erect another pole in place of the one destroyed. But it was feared that it would only give rise to more disturbances, and the petition was denied. The Sons of Liberty were ready for the emer- gency: they found that a strip of land in the Commons, 11 x 100, was private property. It was at once purchased, and npon this was erect- ed, not far from the former site, a fifth liberty pole, consisting of two sections, a mast forty-six feet high and a topmast twenty-two feet. It bore a gilt vane with the word " Liberty " inscribed upon it. The soldiers did not interfere with its erection. But on March 24 tronble again broke ont on account of the pole. A party of fifteen soldiers were seen by some boys attempting to nnship the topmast and take off the vane. They spread the news and soon the Sons of Liberty rushed in hot haste to the Commons to defend their trophy. The sol- diers drove them off and they songht shelter in their tavern, Hampden Hall. The bell of St. Paul's chapel now rang an alarm, and the sol- diers thought it prudent to retire to their barracks, where their colonel kept watch for the remainder of the night. The Sons of Lib- erty determined to disappoint the boast of the men of the 16th to carry a portion of the pole with them when they left the city. Their departure having been fixed for May 3, a gnard of Liberty Boys sur- rounded the pole every night nntil that date. The 16th was succeeded by the 26th regiment, and no further trouble was had about the lib- erty pole, for the conduet of the new regiment was so exemplary as to win the praise instead of the resentment of the citizens.
It was due to the animosity awakened by the offensive conduct of the 16th that New York must be accorded the honor of precedence to Boston, in spite of its mich famed " Massacre," for the first blood shed and first life sacrificed in the cause of independence. The Bos- ton " Massacre " took place in March, 1770; the New York " Massa- cre." of quite as portentous a nature as to umbers involved, took place on January 18, 1770, on Golden Hill, the part of John Street between William and Cliff. This was the next day after the great meeting in the " Fields," at which the soldiers were declared to be public enemies. In response to this severe aspersion, the soldiers of
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the 16th prepared a placard, exalting their own character and ser- vices, and full of taunts and flings at the Sons of Liberty, even going so far as to call them rebels. At the bottom was printed: " Signed by the 16th Regiment of Foot." While a party of three soldiers were en- gaged posting this placard, the resolute Captain Sears (" King Sears ") and another Liberty Boy, Walter Quackenbos, came upon them. Sears seized one and Quackenbos another, and when the third soldier advanced upon Sears with his bayonet, the latter hurled into his face the first object upon which he could lay his hands, and with such force that he reeled back. The two patriots conducted their cap- tives to the Mayor's office at the City Hall. Before they reached it twenty soldiers had collected and prepared to rescue their comrades, but citizens in abundance had also flocked together, and a battle was imminent. At this juncture Mayor Hicks appeared and ordered the soldiers to retire to their barracks. They moved in the direction of Chambers Street, but when they had gone as far as John Street. they met a larger party led by one who pretended to be an officer in disguise. A halt was made at the corner of William and John streets, and the command given to charge upon the people down the slope called Golden Hill, to- ward Pearl Street. The citizens had nothing but stakes wrenched from some sleighs or wagons standing near, the soldiers had their bayonets and side-arms. No bullets seem to have been fired, but in the fray some very serious wounds were given. Sailors from the merchant vessels were always MAYOR WHITEHEAD HICKS. ready to fight on the side of the citizens, and one of these sturdy fellows received a thrust from which he died. Another man " got his skull cut in the most cruel manner," of which probably he died also, making two martyrs to the cause of liberty. The soldiers were pretty badly cut up also, figuratively as well as literally speaking, and as the citizens kept in- creasing in numbers, completely surrounding them upon the hill, it might have gone very hard with them, had not a detachment of their comrades come up in the rear of the crowd. As they were about to charge and penetrate to the rescue, a party of officers appeared on the scene, and ordered the soldiers back to the barracks, the people open- ing their ranks to let them through. The next day two conflicts took place, one on the Commons in front of the new jail, and the other in
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Chapel Street (West Broadway), near Barclay. No lives were lost in these affrays, however. " We are all in confusion in this city." wrote a citizen of New York to a friend in London, on January 22, 1770, " on Friday last (18th) was an engagement when much blood was spilt, one sailor got run through the body, who since died: on Saturday (19th) the Hall Bell rang for an alarm, when was another battle. What will be the end of this God knows! "
Out of the disaffection between citizens and troops also grew an interesting case bearing on the freedom of the press. Just a month before the Golden Hill affair the Assembly, at Colden's instance, and by some sudden and unaccountable impulse of compliance, had voted the supplies for the troops so often refused. It roused the anger of the citizens to the highest pitch. There appeared in one of the jour- nals of the day an article entitled " To the betrayed inhabitants of the City and Colony of New York," in which the Assembly was openly accused of having betrayed the common cause of liberty. The men- bers were also challenged to appear at a meeting in the Fields set for December 18, when they would learn what their constituents thought of them. At that meeting resolutions denunciatory of the Assembly were adopted. The Provincial Council offered a reward of one hun- dred pounds for the discovery of the author of the paper, and John Lamb, secretary of the Sons of Liberty, and member of the Assembly was summoned by the latter body to the bar of the House. He was dismissed, as he claimed his action at the meeting was not based on the paper declared to be " an infamous and scandalous libel." Next. James Parker, the printer of the Gazette and Post Boy. was ar- rested, and upon information elicited from him by Colden and the Council, Alexander MeDougal, one of the most turbulent spirits among the Liberty Boys, was arrested as the author of the " infa- mous " article. He refused to give bail and was confined in the new jail on the Commons, the present Hall of Records. He was called the American Wilkes, and as the latter's offending criticisms of the King had appeared in No. 45 of the North Britain, that figure became prominent also in MeDougal's case. The prisoner held regular recep- tions at the jail every afternoon between the hours of three and six. On March 18, 1770, another anniversary of the repeal of the Stamp Act, forty-five toasts were drank to Wilkes and MeDougal at the Hampden Hall, a tavern put up on ground purchased for that pur- pose by the Sons of Liberty opposite the Commons, upon the site of the recent Herald building. After the banquet the company marched over to the jail and gave MeDougal forty-five cheers. The day happened to be the forty-fifth of his imprisonment. His case lin- gered along for over a year, part of which time, from April to Decent- ber, he was out on bail. In December. 1770, he was summoned to the bar of the Assembly; he refused to answer and was committed to jail for contempt. On April 17, 1771, he was finally released from jail on
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demand of his counsel, John Morin Scott, upon his own recognizance.
Among the many meetings called in order to take action in concert with the other colonies to manifest their detestation of the Boston Port Bill must not be forgotten one held in the Fields on July 6, 1774. It will be remembered that, on July 4, five delegates had been elected to represent New York at the Colonial Congress called to meet in Philadelphia in September. But there had been some friction be- tween the more violent and the more moderate spirits, and to secure final harmony a meeting of citizens was called to assemble at the City Hall on the 7th at noon " to concur in the nomination or choose others." The more aggressive party, led by Sears and MeDougall, is- sued a call the next day (5th) for a mass meeting on the Commons on July 6, and at this open air assembly McDougall, the American Wilkes, presided. The people were treated to a genuine surprise. After several addresses had been made, they beheld the slight figure of a boy making his way to the speakers' stand. It was a piece of immense andacity, and no wonder the bold boy was a little em- barrassed as he began to speak. But to the amazement of the audience the em- barrassment soon changed into the ease and confidence of the practiced orator. Words of eloquence, closely packed with thoughit, reason, and logic, at white heat, marked even that maiden speech, as it marked the thinking and speaking of that remarkable boy all through his eventful life. He was recognized as an attendant at King's College; " it is a col- ALEXANDER MCDOUGALL. legian, it is a collegian," passed from mouth to mouth. And it was: it was no less an individual than Alexander Hamilton, then just about seventeen years of age.
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