George III became the King of Great Britain and the American colonies in 1760. The rebellion in the colonies enraged him, and his opinion of the troops around Boston was not very high.
General William Howe was sent to Boston to support General Gage during the siege. He was in command at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill and replaced Gage as commander in chief of British forces in America in October 1775. He, too, failed to squash the rebellion and was replaced by another general before the end of the war.
THE AMERICANS
Samuel Adams of Boston was one of the most radical of the Sons of Liberty. He was a mastermind of the Boston Tea Party, a member of Congress, and an early supporter of breaking ties with England.
Benjamin Church was a prominent member of the Sons of Liberty until Steptember 1775, when he was caught spying for the British. George Washington wanted Church to be hanged for his treachery. Instead, Church was sent into exile on a ship bound for the West Indies. He disappeared at sea.
John Hancock was the richest man in Boston, a prominent Patriot and one of the Sons of Liberty. As chairman of the Continental Congress, he was the first person to sign the Declaration of Independence.
Samuel Langdon was a patriot, pastor, and president of Harvard University in Boston. On June 16, 1775, he led the Patriot soldiers in a “fervent and impressive” prayer before the Battle of Bunker’s Hill.
Charles Lee, a retired British officer living in Virginia, supported the American cause and served in the Patriot army. At the time of the siege, he was George Washington’s second in command.
Thomas Paine was an English inventor and philosopher with radical notions about liberty. He came to America and in 1776 wrote “Common Sense,” a bestseller urging the colonies to declare independence from Britain.
Colonel William Prescott marched his Minutemen from Groton, Massachusetts, to Lexington to meet the British in April 1775. His men then joined the Patriot army encamped around Boston. Along with Colonel Putnam, he was in command at Bunker’s Hill.
Israel Putnam, or “Old Put,” was a colonel in the Connecticut militia when the fighting started at Lexington. He immediately headed to Boston to take part in the siege and with Colonel Prescott was in command of the Patriots at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill.
Paul Revere was a Boston silversmith who became active in the Sons of Liberty. His engraving of the Boston Massacre was well known throughout the colonies. Revere is now most famous for his 1775 “midnight ride” to Lexington to warn the Patriots that the British were coming.
Artemas Ward, veteran of the French and Indian wars, was a Massachusetts farmer and storekeeper. He commanded the Patriot’s army around Boston until George Washington arrived. Ward led the parade of American troops into Boston when the siege ended.
Joseph Warren was a Boston doctor and Son of Liberty. At Bunker’s Hill he helped many Patriot soldiers to retreat before he was killed. Samuel Adam’s grandson wrote of Warren’s death: “When he fell, liberty wept.”
George Washington was a Virginia planter and hero of the French and Indian War. In 1775 he was unanimously chosen by the Continental Congress to be the commander in chief of the Continental army. He later became the first President of the United States.
TIMELINE
The Siege of Boston and the American Revolution
GLOSSARY
Continental army: In June of 1775, after the war with England had begun, the Continental Congress adopted the New England army and formed the new Continental army, appointing George Washington its commander-in-chief.
Continental Congress: In 1774, each colony’s legislature chose representatives to meet in Philadelphia and organize a protest to the Intolerable Acts. That was the First Continental Congress. In 1775, after the war broke out, the Second Continental Congress discussed independence and created the Continental army.
Intolerable Laws or Acts: Laws passed by the British to squash the American rebellion after the Boston Tea Party. They closed the port of Boston until the tea was paid for, changed the government of Massachusetts to bring it under the control of England, and required the colonists to house British soldiers in their own homes. Parliament called these laws the Coercive Acts because they were intended to coerce—or bully—the colonists into doing what England wanted. The colonists called the laws intolerable.
Lobsters: A slang term for a British soldier, because their coats were red as a lobster’s shell.
Loyalist: An American who stayed loyal to King George. Loyalists were also called Tories.
militia: In America, an organized group of citizens who helped to defend their communities. Unlike regular soldiers who volunteered for the army, local militia groups promised to help in case of an emergency. Some members of the militia could be called upon at a moment’s notice and were called Minutemen.
Minuteman: A Patriot ready to take up arms at a minute’s notice.
New England army: The army that formed outside of Boston after the Battles of Lexington and Concord. It was called the New England army because most of the troops were from New England in the early days of the Boston siege.
parliament: The British parliament is the legislative arm of Great Britain’s government—like our present-day Congress.
Patriot: Someone who loves his country. During the American Revolution, a colonist who supported the war of independence called himself a Patriot. The British called him a rebel.
Redcoat: A British soldier, so called because they wore red coats.
ringer: A marble game in which the marbles are placed in the middle of a circle. The point is to knock as many marbles out of the circle as possible using a larger, heavier marble called the shooter.
selectmen: The Board of Selectmen in Boston was the local government. They were elected by the people in town meetings. The Intolerable Acts, passed by the British Parliament, brought an end to town meetings unless they were approved by the royal governor.
siege: The act of surrounding a city or town, cutting it off from food and other supplies, to force it to surrender.
smallpox: A contagious disease that killed as many as forty out of one hundred people who caught it. People with smallpox broke out in painful pustules, or pox, that lasted for as long as a month. Those who survived the disease were often left with scars, or pock-marks.
Sons of Liberty: A secret group of American patriots that protested the taxes imposed by England. The first group probably formed in Boston, but they soon existed in almost every colony.
tyranny: A government in which a single leader has all the power and the people have no say in their own rule. When the British parliament passed the Intolerable Acts with King George’s support, some Americans felt the parliament had acted illegally, ignoring their rights as Englishmen. These colonists believed they were living under tyranny, which they had a right to oppose.
FURTHER READING
Want to learn more about the American Revolution?
Here are some great nonfiction sources.
A Young Patriot: The American Revolution as Experienced by One Boy by Jim Murphy, published by Clarion Books, 1996. Joseph Plumb Martin enlisted in the army in 1776 at the age of fifteen. This book uses his diary to show us what life was like for one boy in the Continental army.
Fight for Freedom: The American Revolutionary War by Benson Bobrick, published by Atheneum, 2004. This is an excellent overview of the entire war with maps of some of the most important battles.
George Washington: An American Life by Laurie Calkhoven (yes that’s me!), published by Sterling Publishing, 2006. Read about Washington’s early experiences in the American wilderness, his role in the revolution, and his years as the nation’s first president.
George Washington, Spymaster: How the Americans Outspied the British and Won the Revolutionary War by Thomas B. Allen, published by National Geographic, 2004. Washington’s only hope of beating the British was to wage a war of spies and deception. This book is all about that secret world.
Give Me Liber
ty: The Story of the Declaration of Independence by Russell Freedman, published by Holiday House, 2000. This is an excellent look at the events leading up to the decision to declare independence and the personalities behind the famous document.
Acknowledgments
There truly are no words strong enough to express thanks for making a dream come true, but I’ll try.
My heartfelt thanks go out to all of the wonderful people at Dutton who helped shepherd Daniel’s story into print—Mark McVeigh, who started it all, along with Stephanie Owens Lurie, Steve Meltzer, Margaret Woollatt, and Rosanne Lauer.
I am so grateful to have so many good friends in my life who generously helped make this book a reality: Chris Dubois and Marjetta Geerling, the Thursday night champagne sisters (Josanne LaValley, Kekla Magoon, Connie Kirk, and Bethany Hegedus), and the Marcian Goddesses (Marnie Brooks, Marcia Thornton Jones, Martha Levine, Joanne Nicoll, Rebecca Rector, Susan Spain, and Barbara Underhill). Without their cheers, check-ins, critiques, and handholding, I never would have started, let alone finished.
John L. Bell did a fabulous job of pointing out where the facts in my story veered too far from the truth. Any errors that remain, of course, are mine.
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