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which_chick) wrote2025-12-29 12:32 pm
which_chick) wrote2025-12-29 12:32 pm
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I've been thinking about how we teach history... or don't... in the US
One of the things I like to randomly ask people (I am a delight and super fun at parties) is if they know how many people were killed in the Boston Massacre.
Most folks know that there was a thing called the Boston Massacre. If you're in the US, probably you heard about it in school as part of the history of the Revolutionary War. I remembered the name, the The Boston Massacre part. It's a catchy name. I remembered some of the facts of the thing -- British soldiers fired guns into a crowd of unarmed colonials and some of those colonial people died.
IT WAS A MASSACRE, that's the important thing, a massacre in Boston, where British soldiers shot unarmed civilians for no reason. But seriously, IT WAS A MASSACRE. It says so right there in the name.
Come on, let's pull on that thread a little. It'll be fun.
The Boston Massacre was on the evening of March 5, 1770. Nine British soldiers wound up facing an angry crowd of over 300 colonists throwing slush/ice balls and brandishing sticks and yelling taunts and stuff.
Nine British soldiers. Three hundred angry colonials in a mob, yelling and throwing shit. Tensions were high. One of the British soldiers fired his musket into the crowd. Then the other British soldiers also fired their muskets into the crowds. However, Captain Preston (officer on the scene, in charge of the British soldiers) never gave any order to fire.
As a result of the musket fire, five colonists were killed, three instantly and two later on "from injuries", medical science in those days being not particularly adept at saving the gutshot.
We need to rewind a little.
Why were there British soldiers in Boston?
At the time, the region was a colony of the British Empire and Boston was the largest city in the colonies. It was also a port city. Ports are where shipping and customs and tariffs happen. The British soldiers were there to enforce order and see to it that the official government could continue to function despite a certain amount of civil unrest.
Officials in the Massachusetts colony had asked England for military backup because the political situation wasn't great. The British officials were concerned for their safety and their ability to carry out... unpopular duties like collecting tariffs and taxes. By 1770, British troops had been on the ground in Boston for more than a year.
The British troops in Boston were not popular. Contemporary accounts record ongoing friction and incidents between the British troops and the colonial people. One contemporary source is A Journal of the Times, a series of anonymous articles that were written from a very pro-patriot perspective and published in colonial newspapers as well as being eventually published in England. In the 1930's Oliver Morton Dickerson PhD collected these writings up and put them into the linked document, with a nice forward. (An aside: In this discussion, "pro-patriot" means favoring the independence of the colonies from Britain.)
Anyway, in the linked contemporary account, there are numerous incidents between the troops and the colonists. It's an ongoing thing. There's also a lot of bitching about the quartering of troops. The quartering of troops was 100% unpopular. We don't regard it as a thing these days, but it's in the Bill of Rights because it was a big fucking deal for the colonists and they cared A LOT about it.
The linked documents also cover the arrest of John Hancock for allegedly smuggling and the seizure of his boat the Liberty (lol, guess he was one of them thar patriots).
So that's how we got Boston + British troops. The troops were in the town to keep order, being unpopular, and pissing off the citizenry. What precipitated the Boston Massacre? What set this damn tinder keg off?
It was incredibly stupid.
Seriously. It's fucking dumb. Let me just blockquote from Wikipedia:
That's the start of the incident. A small crowd gathered. Other soldiers showed up to support those two. Church bells were rung, drawing more colonists. Colonists started to throw ice balls, rocks, etc and taunt the soldiers. Things spiraled out of control for more than an hour until one of the soldiers, Private Hugh Montgomery, got hit with a thrown object which knocked him down and caused him to drop his musket. He gathered up his musket, stood back up, and fired into the crowd. There was a short pause, then the other soldiers also fired although no order had been given by Preston for firing.
The soldiers were taken into custody and (eventually) stood trial in the fall of that year. John Adams (I know him, that can't be, that's that... little guy who spoke to me, all those years ago, what was it, '85? That poor man, they're going to eat him alive.) was a Boston lawyer who defended the British soldiers before he became the second President of the United States. Preston (officer on the scene) was acquitted because he had not given an order to fire. Six of the privates were acquitted, two were convicted of manslaughter, pled benefit of the clergy (reduced sentence for first-time offenders), and were branded on the thumb in open court.
To summarize: This was a riot where five guys engaged in rioting got shot more or less accidentally/justifiably by the nine soldiers they were rioting against. Even the jury who sentenced the nine soldiers didn't think they did a ton of shit wrong. Seven acquittals and two thumb-brandings for five dead guys isn't the heaviest justice ever doled out. Besides, the shooters were using SINGLE SHOT FIREARMS so clearly three more guys did actually shoot folks besides the two soldiers who got hit with manslaughter charges. That's just math.
But the actual riot and its actual criminal charges and prosecution and sentencing and stuff... didn't, in the end, fucking matter.
What MATTERED was the propaganda, the optics. The Boston Massacre was exceedingly useful to turn public sentiment against King George III and the British government.
Henry Pelham made an engraving (copied by Paul Revere) depicting the incident, with some incorrect but inflammatory details. However, since a picture's worth a thousand words, this was a big deal on the propaganda front.
But also there were pamphlets, those being popular back in the day. One pamphlet, innocuously titled A short narrative of the horrid massacre in Boston, perpetrated in the evening of the fifth day of March, 1770, by soldiers of the 29th Regiment, which with the 14th Regiment were then quartered there; with some observations on the state of things prior to that catastrophe purports to tell about what happened. I wonder which side the author favors?
A different pamphlet, A Fair Account of the Late Unhappy Disturbance at Boston in New England is about the same event. I wonder which way this author leans?
Was it an Unhappy Disturbance?
Was it a Horrid Massacre?
Yeah. The Boston Massacre would have been a lot more interesting if we'd gone over this shit in school instead of just infodumping like "Yeah, okay, Boston Massacre. After Stamp Act (1765), Before Boston Tea Party (1773). Brit soldiers shot civilians and this shifted public sentiment in the colonies towards the Patriot side of things."
Also, fun fact, Boston Tea Party was in mid-fucking-December in Boston. Bet that was a cold damn night.
Most folks know that there was a thing called the Boston Massacre. If you're in the US, probably you heard about it in school as part of the history of the Revolutionary War. I remembered the name, the The Boston Massacre part. It's a catchy name. I remembered some of the facts of the thing -- British soldiers fired guns into a crowd of unarmed colonials and some of those colonial people died.
IT WAS A MASSACRE, that's the important thing, a massacre in Boston, where British soldiers shot unarmed civilians for no reason. But seriously, IT WAS A MASSACRE. It says so right there in the name.
Come on, let's pull on that thread a little. It'll be fun.
The Boston Massacre was on the evening of March 5, 1770. Nine British soldiers wound up facing an angry crowd of over 300 colonists throwing slush/ice balls and brandishing sticks and yelling taunts and stuff.
Nine British soldiers. Three hundred angry colonials in a mob, yelling and throwing shit. Tensions were high. One of the British soldiers fired his musket into the crowd. Then the other British soldiers also fired their muskets into the crowds. However, Captain Preston (officer on the scene, in charge of the British soldiers) never gave any order to fire.
As a result of the musket fire, five colonists were killed, three instantly and two later on "from injuries", medical science in those days being not particularly adept at saving the gutshot.
We need to rewind a little.
Why were there British soldiers in Boston?
At the time, the region was a colony of the British Empire and Boston was the largest city in the colonies. It was also a port city. Ports are where shipping and customs and tariffs happen. The British soldiers were there to enforce order and see to it that the official government could continue to function despite a certain amount of civil unrest.
Officials in the Massachusetts colony had asked England for military backup because the political situation wasn't great. The British officials were concerned for their safety and their ability to carry out... unpopular duties like collecting tariffs and taxes. By 1770, British troops had been on the ground in Boston for more than a year.
The British troops in Boston were not popular. Contemporary accounts record ongoing friction and incidents between the British troops and the colonial people. One contemporary source is A Journal of the Times, a series of anonymous articles that were written from a very pro-patriot perspective and published in colonial newspapers as well as being eventually published in England. In the 1930's Oliver Morton Dickerson PhD collected these writings up and put them into the linked document, with a nice forward. (An aside: In this discussion, "pro-patriot" means favoring the independence of the colonies from Britain.)
Anyway, in the linked contemporary account, there are numerous incidents between the troops and the colonists. It's an ongoing thing. There's also a lot of bitching about the quartering of troops. The quartering of troops was 100% unpopular. We don't regard it as a thing these days, but it's in the Bill of Rights because it was a big fucking deal for the colonists and they cared A LOT about it.
The linked documents also cover the arrest of John Hancock for allegedly smuggling and the seizure of his boat the Liberty (lol, guess he was one of them thar patriots).
So that's how we got Boston + British troops. The troops were in the town to keep order, being unpopular, and pissing off the citizenry. What precipitated the Boston Massacre? What set this damn tinder keg off?
It was incredibly stupid.
Seriously. It's fucking dumb. Let me just blockquote from Wikipedia:
On the evening of March 5, 1770, Private Hugh White stood on guard duty outside the Boston Custom House on King Street (today known as State Street).
A wigmaker's apprentice, approximately 13 years old, named Edward Garrick called out to Captain-Lieutenant John Goldfinch, accusing him of refusing to pay a bill due to Garrick's master. Goldfinch had settled the account the previous day, and ignored the insult.
Private White called out to Garrick that he should be more respectful of the officer, and the two exchanged insults. Garrick then started poking Goldfinch in the chest with his finger; White left his post, challenged the boy, and struck him on the side of the head with his musket.
Garrick cried out in pain, and his companion Bartholomew Broaders began to argue with White, which attracted a larger crowd.
That's the start of the incident. A small crowd gathered. Other soldiers showed up to support those two. Church bells were rung, drawing more colonists. Colonists started to throw ice balls, rocks, etc and taunt the soldiers. Things spiraled out of control for more than an hour until one of the soldiers, Private Hugh Montgomery, got hit with a thrown object which knocked him down and caused him to drop his musket. He gathered up his musket, stood back up, and fired into the crowd. There was a short pause, then the other soldiers also fired although no order had been given by Preston for firing.
The soldiers were taken into custody and (eventually) stood trial in the fall of that year. John Adams (I know him, that can't be, that's that... little guy who spoke to me, all those years ago, what was it, '85? That poor man, they're going to eat him alive.) was a Boston lawyer who defended the British soldiers before he became the second President of the United States. Preston (officer on the scene) was acquitted because he had not given an order to fire. Six of the privates were acquitted, two were convicted of manslaughter, pled benefit of the clergy (reduced sentence for first-time offenders), and were branded on the thumb in open court.
To summarize: This was a riot where five guys engaged in rioting got shot more or less accidentally/justifiably by the nine soldiers they were rioting against. Even the jury who sentenced the nine soldiers didn't think they did a ton of shit wrong. Seven acquittals and two thumb-brandings for five dead guys isn't the heaviest justice ever doled out. Besides, the shooters were using SINGLE SHOT FIREARMS so clearly three more guys did actually shoot folks besides the two soldiers who got hit with manslaughter charges. That's just math.
But the actual riot and its actual criminal charges and prosecution and sentencing and stuff... didn't, in the end, fucking matter.
What MATTERED was the propaganda, the optics. The Boston Massacre was exceedingly useful to turn public sentiment against King George III and the British government.
Henry Pelham made an engraving (copied by Paul Revere) depicting the incident, with some incorrect but inflammatory details. However, since a picture's worth a thousand words, this was a big deal on the propaganda front.
But also there were pamphlets, those being popular back in the day. One pamphlet, innocuously titled A short narrative of the horrid massacre in Boston, perpetrated in the evening of the fifth day of March, 1770, by soldiers of the 29th Regiment, which with the 14th Regiment were then quartered there; with some observations on the state of things prior to that catastrophe purports to tell about what happened. I wonder which side the author favors?
A different pamphlet, A Fair Account of the Late Unhappy Disturbance at Boston in New England is about the same event. I wonder which way this author leans?
Was it an Unhappy Disturbance?
Was it a Horrid Massacre?
Yeah. The Boston Massacre would have been a lot more interesting if we'd gone over this shit in school instead of just infodumping like "Yeah, okay, Boston Massacre. After Stamp Act (1765), Before Boston Tea Party (1773). Brit soldiers shot civilians and this shifted public sentiment in the colonies towards the Patriot side of things."
Also, fun fact, Boston Tea Party was in mid-fucking-December in Boston. Bet that was a cold damn night.