ONE:Such, then, was the state of affairs at the meeting of Parliament in November, 1768. These events in America claimed immediate attention. The petition of the Convention of Massachusetts, on its arrival, was rejected indignantly. The Opposition called for the production of the correspondence with the civil and military authorities there on the subject, but this demand was negatived. In January, 1769, the House of Lords took up the subject in a lofty tone. They complained of the seditious and treasonable proceedings of the people of Boston and of Massachusetts generally; and the Duke of Bedford, affirming that it was clear that no such acts could be punished by the magistrates or tribunals of the colony, moved an address to the king recommending that the criminals guilty of the late outrages should be brought to England and tried there, according to an Act of the 35th of Henry VIII. On the 26th of January it was introduced to the Commons. There it excited a very spirited opposition. Pownall, who had himself been governor of Massachusetts, and knew the Americans well,[195] accused the Lords of gross ignorance of the charters, usages, and character of the Americans; and Governor Johnstone as strongly condemned the motion, which was carried by one hundred and fifty-five to eighty-nine. On the 14th of March a petition from New York, denying their right to tax America in any way, was rejected, on the motion of Lord North; and, still later in the session, Governor Pownall moved that the revenue acts affecting America should be repealed forthwith. By this time everybody seemed to have become convinced of the folly of the attempt; but Ministers had not the magnanimity to act at once on the certainty that stared them in the face. Parliament was prorogued on the 9th of May, and did not meet again till the following January, as if there were nothing of moment demanding its attention.
FORE:
FORE:The animosity against the soldiers at Boston was actively kept up. The sentinel could not stand at his post without insult. Every day menaced a conflict. A fictitious account of an affray between the soldiers and the people of New York was circulated at Boston, in which the soldiers were represented as beaten. This gave impetus to the aggressive temper of the Bostonians. On the 2nd of March, a soldier, insulted by the men at Gray's rope-walk, resented it; they came to blows, and the soldier was overpowered. He fetched up some of his comrades, who, in their turn, beat and chased the rope-makers through the town. The passions of the mob were inflamed, and they began to arm themselves for an attack on the soldiery. In a few days the crowd assembled and assaulted a party of them in Dock Square. The officer prudently withdrew them to the barracks. As the evening advanced, the mob increased. They cried, "Turn out, and do for the soldiers!" They attacked and insulted a sentinel at the Custom House. A party of soldiers was sent by Captain Preston to the officers on duty to protect the man. The mob pelted them with pieces of wood, lumps of ice, etc., and denounced them as "cowards," "red-lobster rascals," and the like. The soldiers stood to defend the Custom House till they were fiercely attacked, and at length they fired in self-defence, killed three persons, and wounded several othersone mortally.
