Episode 021: Colonies React to Taxes

Last week, I discussed Britain’s desire to reduce debt and costs of maintaining their colonies.  Parliament decided it was time to get the American colonies involved in paying these costs.  As a result, Parliament passed the Sugar Act and the Currency Act in 1764.  No one likes paying more taxes of course, but conditions in the colonies made the new laws particularly difficult on the colonists.

It’s the Economy, Stupid

The end of the war led to an economic depression in the colonies.  All that money that had been flowing into the colonies during the war was drying up.  Military contractors and militiamen with payroll money to spend had been a boon to colonial business.  Now, virtually all of that was gone.  With the war in Europe now over, many merchants began to invest in new ships and inventory to take advantage of expected trade.  Yet, debt in Britain and Europe meant that demand for colonial goods also fell.  In 1763-64, many merchant firms went bankrupt, thus contributing to the economic problems.  Veterans returned home, looking for work and finding none.  Unemployment reached dangerous levels.

Wealthy Virginia planters found themselves in particular trouble as tobacco prices plummeted.  Credit in London dred up and demands for payment of old debt increased.  The end of the Seven Years War in Europe led to a collapse grain prices, which in turn caused commodity traders in Amsterdam to take huge losses and banking crisis.  Amsterdam bankers who held much of Britain’s debt, began calling in loans, in turn making made London creditors desperate for cash.  London creditors therefore made concerted efforts to collect from their debtors in the colonies.

Boston Harbor (from historyofmassachusetts.org)

So, as the British cut back on military spending in America, private creditors demanded repayment of loans.  The Currency Act prevented colonial governments from creating paper money and trade restrictions of the Sugar Act prevented merchants from bringing in hard money from other parts of the world.

One normal outlet for such tough times, land speculation, was largely curbed by the prohibition on settlement west of the Allegheny Mountains.  The only colonists settling west of the Alleghenies were illegal squatters, who were not going to pay eastern land speculators. Even worse, Pontiac’s War was still in its late stages, meaning many western settlers were still seeking refuge, and needed economic support further east.

Ever decreasing available land east of the mountains was revitalizing old rivalries that had been put aside during the war.  Border disputes between New Hampshire and New York, as well as Connecticut and Pennsylvania flared up again.  Pennsylvania and Maryland returned to internal power struggles between the governor and legislature.  Even tiny Rhode Island was hopelessly divided by political faction.

Wheelwright Scandal

It did not help matters in New England that a financial crisis exploded in January 1765.  There were no banks in North America at this time. As a result, private men of substance, trustworthy members of the community, would often take deposits and offer interest bearing notes to the depositor.

Nathaniel Wheelwright ran the largest such enterprise in New England.  From a prominent New England family, Wheelwright was a well respected merchant and trader.  He greatly increased his already substantial wealth as a contractor during the war.

Like many merchants, though, Wheelwright over extended himself and regularly took financial risks in order to increase his profits.  In the postwar recession of 1764, Wheelwright found himself undercapitalized and unable to pay his debts.  Faced with imminent scandal and debtors prison, Wheelwright skipped town in January 1765 for the island of Guadeloupe, where he died a few months later.

The Wheelwright bankruptcy hit New England harder than any of the recent Acts of Parliament.  He had outstanding notes totalling over £170,000 due to be paid to almost all the merchants in Boston, on down to hundreds of poorer working class depositors.  The possibility of repayment of those debts disappeared into the night along with Wheelwright, leaving everyone without their money.

The sudden disappearance of £170,000 in the already cash strapped colonies sent shockwaves through the economy.  Depositors suddenly found themselves unable to pay off other debts.  Debtor prisons began to fill and bankruptcy court filing swelled.

Thomas Hutchinson
(from Colonial Society of Mass.)

Lt. Gov. Thomas Hutchinson held a number of different offices, including Chief Justice of the Superior Court.  He issued dozens of warrants for the arrest of debtors and the seizure of property, collecting a sizable percentage for each case.  Hutchinson’s vigorous enforcement of these cases only increased the already sizable percentage of the colony that actively hated him.  His name virtually became a curse among the merchant community.

More generally, the scandal depressed the local economy for several years as lawyers and merchants attempted to dig out of the financial mess.  Although the recent currency act did not apply to Massachusetts, as an earlier law already restricted paper money, the Wheelwright scandal provided a prime example of why more local control over economic crises was critical, and why the local population thought this year especially was not the time for London to extract more money from the region through tariffs.

Sugar Act Protests

Amidst these economic problems came news of the Sugar Act and the Currency Act during 1764.  These acts, making much of New England’s trade far less profitable, only put more colonists on the street without jobs.  Denying colonial legislatures the ability to float more paper money as they tried to retire war debt created local tax pressures as well.  The resulting currency deflation only made it even harder for debtors to make repayment.

The Colonial response to the new laws was in part practical: you cannot drain more money out of the economy at just the time we are sinking into a post-war depression and in part ideological Parliament has no right to place such restrictions on the colonies.  Almost no one thought Parliament’s 1764 Acts were good policy.

Massachusetts Leads the Way

The Massachusetts Bay Colony had the most to lose from the Sugar Act.  Boston merchants controlled virtually all of New England’s trade.  Despite the current economic downturn,

One of the first men to make a principled argument against the new laws was James Otis. The Massachusetts lawyer, who we last saw in Episode 17, had opposed British attempts to use general warrants to look for smugglers in 1761.

In 1764, Otis published The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved in response to the Sugar Act.  The work itself is rather vague, not even referencing the Sugar Act, the British Parliament, or the power of taxation.  Rather, it focuses generally on the right of the people in a society to have a government that meets their needs.  It borrows on the social contract theory expressed by British philosophers such as Thomas Hobbes and John Locke and expresses in general terms that tyranny is bad.  In the context of the debate though, it was taken as advocacy for the idea that colonial legislatures, which are the true representatives of the people, were the ones empowered to make such decisions.  Any attempt to raise revenue by any other body, including Parliament, was tyranny and a violation of fundamental rights.

James Otis Jr.

In a series of subsequent articles where Otis attempted to debate with opponents, he ended up muddling his arguments even more.  As a result, little came of it.  We mostly remember the essay because many of its basic principles eventually found their way into the Declaration of Independence.  These writings did help cement Otis’ reputation as an early leader opposed to Parliament’s colonial policies.

Boston’s Society for Encouraging Trade and Commerce raised a more direct objection.  The Society was a group of merchants, much like the Chamber of Commerce today.  The Society sent instructions to the Massachusetts General Court to express concerns to Parliament about the harm the Sugar Act would cause the colony. Among the more practical concerns was a larger point about where all this was leading:

But what still heightens our apprehensions is, that these unexpected Proceedings may be preparatory to new Taxations upon us: For if our Trade may be taxed why not our Lands? Why not the Produce of our Lands & every thing we possess or make use of? This we apprehend annihilates our Charter Right to govern & tax ourselves--It strikes at our Brittish Privileges, which as we have never forfeited them, we hold in common with our Fellow Subjects who are Natives of Brittain: If Taxes are laid upon us in any shape without our having a legal Representation where they are laid, are we not reduced from the Character of free Subjects to the miserable State of tributary Slaves?

This was the soon to be familiar argument against taxation without representation. If Parliament could levy any revenues on the colonies, and the colonies had no voice in Parliament to object, Parliament’s taxes could only grow in form and size without check.  Therefore, Parliament had no such authority.

Samuel Adams and Boston Politics

One author on the committee that wrote those words was a middle aged bureaucrat named Samuel Adams.  Adams had been interested in radical politics.  His 1743 master’s thesis at Harvard argued that it was "lawful to resist the Supreme Magistrate, if the Commonwealth cannot otherwise be preserved."  His father, Samuel Adams Sr. had been a wealthy Boston Merchant.  Samuel Jr., like his Father and Grandfather, joined the Boston Caucus, a local political organization that debated issues and worked on local projects for public improvement.  Adams spent his formative years learning how Boston politics worked.

Samuel Adams
(from Wikimedia)

By the 1760’s he had already failed at a number of jobs, including work as a malter for making beer.  He was a local tax collector, but was doing a pretty terrible job at it.  Mostly, it seems, he was building his reputation as a political leader in opposition to Parliamentary authority generally and Lt. Gov. Hutchinson in particular.  Adams had become a popular leader of the Caucus in the 1750’s when a major focus was subverting the onerous tariffs and customs duties of the Molasses Act. Adams realized that his path to power was not so much writing lofty protests like James Otis, or seeking appointments from those at top of the government.  Rather it was harnessing the combined power of wealthy merchants and that of the working class people who dominated Boston and its harbor.

At the time, there were two informal groups for the working class in Boston.  One in North Boston led by Henry Swift, a local shipwright.  Another in South Boston, was led by a shoemaker named Ebenezer Mackintosh.  Mostly the groups fought one another in an annual “Pope’s Day” event on Nov. 5, commemorating the day in 1605 when a Catholic named Guy Fawkes tried to blow up Parliament.  In strongly anti-Catholic Boston, the day had been celebrated as a day to attack Catholics generally and the Pope specifically, often burning him in effigy at a city-wide event.  The event had become an excuse for a drunken party.  Over the years, the rivalry between the north-side and south-side gangs had resulted in massive brawls, that usually left many injured and occasionally a few dead.  Needless to say, the groups did not mix together much.  When they did, it usually led to blows.  Adams, however, had friends among both groups and was well respected in both north and south Boston.  It was a testament to his political influence among the working classes.

Adams not only worked with merchants and the elite to issue protests over the Sugar Act, he was slowly building a political base of power among the poorer working class of Boston, hoping to harness that to use against government elites like Bernard and Hutchinson, as well as Parliament’s anti-colonial policies.

All sides of the Colony’s political spectrum opposed the Sugar Act.  Lt. Gov. Hutchinson was less outspoken but made clear his objections to Parliament’s actions as well.  In addition to his multiple political offices, Hutchinson was also a merchant trader and had much to lose from the new law.  However, when he wrote London about the colony’s concerns, he focused on the hardships the new law caused.  He ignored the arguments about colonial rights against Parliamentary taxation, thinking it would only force Parliament to dig in its heels.  He was probably right about that.  But the rather mild point that taxes were tough on the colony did not sway anyone for repeal either.

Other Colonies

New York submitted a clear objection to the new law.  The colonial legislature submitted a petition to Parliament protesting such taxation:

But an Exemption from the Burthen of ungranted, involuntary Taxes, must be the grand Principle of every free State.-Without such a Right vested in themselves, exclusive of all others, there can be no Liberty, no Happiness, no Security; it is inseparable from the very Idea of Property, for who can call that his own, which may be taken away at the Pleasure of another?

Other colonies issued less strident protests.  Rhode Island’s legislature submitted a petition to the king which argued that “colonists may not be taxed but by the consent of their own representatives, as your Majesty’s other free subjects are.”  Connecticut issued a pamphlet opposed to internal taxation, but expressing no objection to tariffs.

Pennsylvania was in the middle of a fight to oust the Penn family and convert the government to a Royal colony with a governor appointed by the King.  The legislature directed its London agent to protest the law and to lobby against a possible Stamp tax.  It did not send a formal petition directly.  The legislature sent a second agent to London, Benjamin Franklin, who mostly went to lobby to make Pennsylvania a Royal Colony, and hopefully be appointed the colony’s first royal governor.

Virginia sent a petition to the King, as well as protests to both the House of Lords and the House of Commons.  In each, they focused on the concerns that they had a fundamental right to be taxed only by their local legislature, in whom they had representation.  To accept taxation from an outside body was akin to slavery, which as we all know is not a proper condition for British people at least.  Virginia’s petitions also focused more on the Currency Act, which was simply killing the colonial economy.

Not all reactions were in the form of political protest.  Some merchants, taking the pessimistic view that this was the beginning of an era of more oppressive trade restrictions, began looking for other ways to supply the colonies.  Some merchants began making plans to distill more alcohol from locally grown corn, rather than continue to rely on imported molasses.  Many began to increase their stock of sheep with an eye toward developing a domestic woolens and linens industry in the colonies in order to cut down on the necessity of British imports.  Even if London won the political fight, colonists were already beginning focus economic reactions that would deny Parliament the revenues they hoped to obtain.

The Polly

If the legislative protests were not forceful enough, it quickly became clear to many that despite better enforcement mechanisms, resistance would continue.  There are many examples of resistance, but one of the most celebrated involves a sloop named the Polly.  John Robinson arrived in Newport Rhode Island as the new customs agent.  He was tasked with enforcing the new tariffs and by all accounts seemed motivated to do so.  When the Polly entered the harbor in April 1765, the owner reported and paid the tariff on 63 barrels.

After the ship left harbor, Robinson decided that the shipment seemed rather small for a ship of that size.  He boarded the Maidstone, a British Man-of-War, which caught up with the Polly at Dighton in Massachusetts.  While not part of the legislation itself, Grenville also had twelve navy vessels, freed up by the end of the war, assigned to the east coast of America looking for merchant ships trying to evade tariffs. The navy had authority to board vessels, demand inspections of cargo, and impound ships in violation of trade laws.  Because the ship’s officers and men received a share of any seized vessels and cargo, they had every incentive to act aggressively and capture whatever they could.  Customs officials could make use of these ships to enforce the Sugar Act and other trade laws.

After the Maidstone caught up with the Polly, Robinson conducted a full search and determined that the ship had declared only about half its cargo.  Pursuant to law, the vessel would be seized and sold.  The ship’s crew refused to assist, nor could Robinson find anyone else in the area to return the ship to Newport.  He left an assistant in charge while he returned to Newport to collect a crew.

Before he could return, about 40 men with blackened faces boarded the ship, and removed the cargo, along with just about anything else of value.  They also damaged the vessel to prevent it from being sailed back to Newport.  When Robinson returned, with sailors and marines, he asked the local justice for writs of assistance so he could find the thieves.  The Justice refused and told him it could not issue the writs.  The Justice further informed him that he and the 40 marines and 30 sailors with him were in danger of being attacked by unknown armed men.

Robinson wisely gave up his pursuit of the attackers, and returned to the Polly to attempt to put it in condition to sail back to Newport.  Before he could effect repairs, the sheriff arrived with a warrant for his arrest.  The ship’s owner had filed a complaint against him for damages.  He spent three days in jail before the Surveyor of Customs could arrive with bail.

Under the protection of a British Man of War, Robinson was able to make the ship seaworthy and removed it from Dighton.  He hoped to sail it to Halifax for condemnation so it could be sold. However, Massachusetts Gov. Bernard intervened to protest its removal from local courts.  The legal wrangling continued for over a year before the Polly was finally condemned and sold.

The story is emblematic of the problems customs officials had enforcing this highly unpopular law.  They could be subjected to mob justice, and face harassment by local authorities who also opposed their actions.  The merchants were respected members of the community who provided most of the jobs.  Customs officials were seen almost as thieves pulling money out of the colony unjustly.  Without the backing of the British Navy on just about any significant action, there was no way they could do their job properly.

Resistance was rarely violent, but it clearly existed at all levels, from the Governor, to the merchants, to the courts and sheriffs, to the common people in the streets.  Everyone clearly opposed the tariffs and would do whatever they could to make them unenforceable.

Next week, Parliament passes the Stamp Act and Quartering Act in 1765.

Next Episode 22: Stamp Act and Quartering Act of 1765

Previous Episode 20: Sugar Act and Currency Act of 1764

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Further Reading

Websites

Amsterdam Banking Crisis of 1763:  http://community.worldheritage.org/articles/Amsterdam_Banking_Crisis_of_1763

James Otis: The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/the-rights-of-the-british-colonies-asserted-and-proved

New York Petition to the House of Commons:  http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/new-york-petition-to-the-house-of-commons

Vice-Admiralty Courts and Writs of Assistance:
https://allthingsliberty.com/2015/01/vice-admiralty-courts-and-writs-of-assistance

Free Books
(from archive.org unless noted)

The Writings of Samuel Adams, Vol. 1, by Harry Cushing (ed) (1904).

Samuel Adams, by James Hosmer (1913).

The History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, from 1749 to 1774, by Thomas Hutchinson, John Hutchinson (ed) (1828) (This book was edited and published in London using Gov. Thomas Hutchinson’s personal papers.  The editor was his grandson).

The Diary and Letters of His Excellency Thomas Hutchinson, by Thomas Hutchinson, Peter Orlando Hutchinson (ed) (1884) (Editor is Thomas Hutchinson’s great-grandson).

James Otis, the Pre-revolutionist, by John Clark Ridpath (1898)

The Life of James Otis, of Massachusetts, by William Tudor (1823)

Books Worth Buying
(links to Amazon.com unless otherwise noted)*

Anderson, Fred Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, Alfred A. Knopf, 2000.

Hawke, David The Colonial Experience, Prentice-Hall, 1966.

Jennings, Francis Empire Of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies & Tribes in the Seven Years War in America, W.W. Norton & Co. 1988.

Knollenberg, Bernard Growth of the American Revolution 1766-1775, Liberty Fund, 1975.

Miller, John Origins of the American Revolution, Little Brown & Co. 1943.

Ubbelohde, Carle The Vice - Admiralty Courts and the American Revolution, Omohundro Institute, 1960.

* As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Episode 020: Sugar & Currency Acts of 1764

The end of the Seven Years War, known in America as the French and Indian War, left Britain undisputed control of North America east of the Mississippi.  Today we are going to step away from military battles to take a look at the exciting world of 18th century British tax policy!

Military victory had left Britain awash in debt and with the expenses of controlling and governing many new territories.  Raising the necessary funds to pay off debt and manage the empire led to a series of policies that probably made great sense to the politicians in London.  In hindsight though, it eventually led to even more conflict and another costly world war.

Britain Needs Revenue

In London, Prime Minister Grenville wanted to increase revenue.  The recent war had about doubled Britain’s national debt, which was sitting at about 150% of GDP.  Interest on the debt alone was a substantial and growing portion of the budget.  International lenders already considered Britain a high risk.  Even at high interest rates the government found it increasingly difficult acquire new loans.  Since the British pound was based on gold and silver, the government could not simply print more money as it might today.

George Grenville
(from Wikimedia)

With the end of the war, military costs would go down of course, payments to the German States for military defense would go down, as would subsidies to the colonies to pay for militia. The government could also shrink its army and navy.

But even after cuts, there was more work to be done, not only to end the deficits but to begin reducing the debt itself.  British possession of Canada would require a large and expensive standing army in North America to ensure the French population there would not attempt to return the territory to France.  This would be a major added expense when compared to pre-war expenses.  Grenville estimated the cost of maintaining 10,000 soldiers would be about £220,000/yr. This was down from the £350,000/yr that parliament was spending on the colonies during the war, but was still unsustainable unless the colonies could contribute a substantial amount to help cover the costs.

Understanding Money in 18th Century Britain

Since we are going to spend some time talking about money and taxes, this might be a good time to go over how money worked in the British Empire at this time.  Then, as now, British currency was based on the British pound sterling (£).  The pound at the time was literally the value of one pound of sterling silver. It is a little tricky to convert the value of £1 in 1764 to modern US dollars.  Today, in 2017, a pound of silver would cost a little over $250.

I’ve looked at a bunch of attempts to calculate inflation from the 1760s to today.  Any such calculation is tricky because you are comparing a wide variety of goods and services that changed prices at differing levels.  A comparison of wages alone makes no sense since the standard of living for a typical worker has changed greatly.  So with the caveat that others will come up with quite different conversion rates, my best calculations show that £1 in 1764 would be worth around $220 in US dollars in 2017, not too far off from simply using the value of silver then and today.

In 1971, Britain converted to a decimal system.  Before that, pennies and shillings were valued differently against the pound.

British Shilling showing George III
(from allcoinvalues.com)

A pound was worth 20 shillings (s), meaning a shilling would be worth about $11 in modern US currency.  There were also 12 pence (d) in a shilling, meaning a penny (pence is the plural of penny) back then would be worth about $1 today.  Pence could be divided further divided into farthings (4 farthings = 1 penny).  So a farthing was worth about the equivalent of a quarter is for the modern American.  You may also have heard of a Guinea.  This was a gold coin, originally the equivalent of  British pound.  But because gold and silver prices fluctuated, a guinea was often worth more than a pound.  In the this time period, a guinea was worth 21 shillings, just over one pound.

The symbols for each British denomination are based on latin monetary terms.  The pound symbol (£) is basically a fancy L that comes from the latin word librae. The s for shillings comes from the latin solidi.  The d used for pence comes from the latin denarii.

It might also be helpful to know how much a the typical worker earned compared to today.  Wage data is a little spotty from this era.  But the studies I’ve seen indicate that unskilled laborers earned about 12 pence per day for farm labor in England.  A craftsman in the building trade made about 22 pence per day.  Work weeks were typically six days long, meaning an unskilled laborer could take home a little over £1 per month.  In other words, in inflation adjusted dollars, a common laborer had to work and support a family on less than $3500/yr.  Say what you will about the problems caused by the industrial revolution.  It definitely increased our expectations about reasonable pay and standards of living!

Pay in the colonies, where there was less supply and greater demand for labor, was usually higher than in England.  Making direct comparisons can be difficult because some colonial pay was made using colonial pounds, which tended to be worth less than British pounds.  It is not always clear which currency is listed in wage records.  However, records show that a common laborer in the colonies could make around 2 shillings (24 pence) per day.   A more skilled worker, like a brick layer might make three times that amount.  Therefore, common laborers in the colonies made about double their counterparts in England.  Colonial workers with some skills made an even greater premium over their English counterparts.  Even so, making £1 required a week or two worth of work for most low level working class jobs.

Don’t worry.  None of this will be on the test.  I just thought it helpful so that when we talk about a 3 shilling tax on something, you have some frame of reference as to what that really cost people.

Taxes in England

Alright, back to Grenville’s revenue problems: Since many of the costs were coming from the need to maintain larger militaries to protect newly acquired colonies, it seemed only reasonable that the colonies could assist in shouldering some of that financial burden.  British subjects in England, Scotland, and Ireland were already taxed to the hilt.  One historian estimated that the average English subject paid about 23 shillings per year in taxes.  By contrast, Massachusetts, which is thought to be the highest taxed colony at the time, paid about 1 shilling per year in taxes.  The British colonies, in fact, were probably one of the least taxed areas in the world.

British subjects were already hit with a wide variety of taxes.  Import tariffs also contributed greatly to British coffers.  Unlike tariffs in the colonies, British customs agents diligently collected tariffs in Britain and enforced trade laws.

During the war, Parliament raised revenue by levying a new tax on cider.  The opposition to the cider tax was in part because people already felt overtaxed, but also because most cider was made locally on farms in England and Wales.  Enforcement, therefore, required government officials to search farms for cider production and make sure proper taxes were paid.  This intrusion on people’s homes did not sit well with the farmers.  This issue was a big part of what brought down Lord Bute’s ministry in 1763.  It remained unpopular during Grenville’s term as well.

With the war over, members are Parliament were feeling constituent pressure to lower taxes, not raise them.  Increasing taxes on workers was impossible since they were barely getting by on subsistence pay.  Increasing taxes on the wealthy in Britain was not a popular option either.  The aristocracy controlled Parliament.  Raising taxes on your friends and family was not going to go over well at home.   Everyone already felt overtaxed in England.  Members were in no mood to hit up voters for any more money.

Grenville, therefore, did not see any way to get Parliament to go along with new taxes at home. Since much of the increased costs were the result of the colonies, the colonies had to cover at least some of those costs themselves.  Still, with the well known sensitivity that colonists had about taxes, Grenville knew he had to tread lightly.  The best place to start was with trade tariffs.  Tariffs could be collected at ports, meaning one did not have send tax collectors all over the colonies.  Further, tariffs on certain imports had existed for decades, even if poorly enforced.  Therefore, there was no valid principle that should prohibit its collection.

The Sugar Act of 1764

An easy place to start would be a tariff on sugar.  Almost all the colonists’ sugar came from the French controlled islands in the West Indies, what we call the Caribbean today, - you know, the islands Britain just gave back to France in the Treaty of Paris.  A tariff would actually end up putting most of the cost on the French planters, since merchants were generally unable to increase prices on luxury goods.  They would be forced to pressure the French planters into lower prices in order to maintain sales.

The Sugar Act
(from pbworks)

Sometimes called the American Duties Act or simply the Revenues Act of 1764, the law commonly known as the Sugar Act placed a tax on the importation of sugar, molasses, coffee, Madeira (which is a type of wine) as well as a range of other luxury goods such as silks and other textiles.  Grenville thought the law would be relatively palatable for several reasons.  The main one being that the law actually cut tariff rates. The Navigation Acts of 1733 (also called the Molasses Act) had implemented a tax of sixpence on a gallon of imported rum.  The new law cut that in half to threepence.  Who doesn’t like a tax cut?

Well, no one really saw it that way because no one actually paid the tax from the Molasses Act. Tariffs under that act only brought in about £1800/yr in all colonies combined. The rate was prohibitively high and intended to cut off trade with the French colonies.  Even at half the rate, the tax was high.  It cost about 14.5 pence to make a gallon of rum, which sold at wholesale for around 18 pence.  A threepence tax would mean the rum maker would essentially break even, unless rum prices increased or molasses costs decreased.  The existing sixpence tax meant a law abiding rum manufacturer would lose money.  That was why traders evaded the tax, paying off customs collectors at a lower rate to let the product into the colony.  The corruption had become routine, with customs collectors taking a twopence payment for each gallon.  Therefore, a threepence tax would be an effective 50% increase in the taxes.

To make sure colonists actually paid the tax, the new law also overhauled how it would be collected.  First, all disputes would be heard in British vice admiralty courts.  In other words, naval officers would judge smuggling or tax evasion accusations, not local juries. The admiralty courts had had jurisdiction over such cases since the last century.  However, it was easy and commonplace to remove the hearing to a local colonial court.  Therefore, merchants always did this, and with the help of popular and persuasive lawyers like James Otis, almost always won their cases in front of sympathetic juries.  This new law would force trials to go to admiralty courts in Halifax Canada, meaning difficulty of travel and almost certain prospects of the government winning the case.

The law also helped customs officials by limiting the damages they might have to pay if they seized a vessel in error. Under the old law, a ship owner could sue customs officials for any mistaken seizure and count on a friendly jury to find against the tax collector. Under the new law such cases would go to admiralty courts where the customs official would stand a much better chance of winning. The new law required merchant ships to post bonds, which could be forfeited if their cargo did not match their manifests, as well as a host of other costly and confusing paperwork.

Like the Molasses Act before it, the Sugar Act only applied to trade with non-British colonies.  Colonists in America were free to go to the West Indies and trade with other British colonies there.  The problem with that was that most of the sugar came from the French colonies.  It was better quality and cheaper.  The French colonies were also more eager to buy the products the North American colonists wanted to sell them, things like fish, lumber, and flour.  Therefore, trade only with the British West Indies was not a viable option.  Some in Parliament, however, thought that the competitive advantage for the British West Indies might eventually encourage some of the French islands to be more amenable to joining the British Empire in the future.

So for the politicians in London, the Sugar Act seemed like it would solve several problems. The new law would raise some revenue, end the institutional corruption that had developed in the colonies, and also encourage French colonies to be more disposed to join the British Empire.  They had gotten used to selling rum to British colonies in North America.  They no longer had French colonial markets in Canada.  France did not import much rum.  Therefore, the colonies would get stuck making less because of the tariff.  They would have greater desire to become British colonies again to enjoy free trade with North America.  It’s a win-win, what could go wrong?

Parliament passed the Sugar Act in April 1764 with relatively little debate or dissent.  If anything, the members thought Grenville should be more aggressive in increasing tariffs on the colonies. Politically though, Grenville wanted to ease into the issue of colonial taxation slowly, lest he set off colonial revolts which would only cost the government more money to put down.

The Currency Act of 1764

Later that same year, Parliament took up another issue.  Some colonies had been printing their own paper money in order to make up for a lack of sufficient gold and silver available in North American markets.  Virginia in particular had financed much of its wartime expenses by issuing paper money, which could be returned to the colonial government for payment of taxes.  This provided an easy way to remove it from circulation once the need for currency fell.  In effect, the paper money acted as a loan to the government.  The government pays its bills now with paper, then gets it back and retires the notes instead of getting cash in later tax years.

Virginia 2 Pound Note, 1762
(from Williamsburg Foundation)

The problem for London merchants was that the colony ordered that the paper be legal tender for payment of all private debts as well.  The exchange rate was set at 125 Virginia pounds for 100 British pounds.  Although Virginia was fairly conservative in the way it issued the money, the Virginia pounds began to lose value, trading at around 160 Virginia pounds for 100 British pounds.  Virginia plantation owners had a great deal of debt with London merchants, who were facing their own credit crisis in 1764.  If Virginians could repay debt at the 1.25 to 1 ratio, London merchants would end up taking a serious loss on the repayment of colonial debts.

Grenville had been contemplating a currency plan of his own to unify all colonial currencies, but did not want to tackle that problem in 1764.  However, a member of Parliament, who also happened to be a London merchant trying to collect on a fair amount of colonial debt, proposed the Currency Act in order to protect his own interests as well as those of many of his colleagues.  The Currency Act restricted the use of colonial paper money.  It prohibited colonial legislatures from mandating that the paper be accepted for payment of private debts.  In other words, the London merchants could demand payment in British pounds.

Like the Sugar Act, the Currency Act raised little controversy in Parliament.  New England was already under similar restrictions, having to use notes that could be exchanged for gold or silver in order to maintain value.  The new law targeted Virginia’s currency law, which was seen as ripping off British merchants.  Getting paid back in money worth the same as what was lent seemed perfectly reasonable to everyone in London.

Conclusion

Clearly Grenville was proceeding cautiously and with great thought to his plans.  He deliberately withheld plans for a colonial Stamp Tax in 1764 because he wanted to start slowly with the less controversial tariff policies.  This would begin to pay money back to government coffers and would acclimate the colonists to the idea that they needed to contribute more to the Empire’s costs.  He also tried to avoid side controversies by shutting down attempts to establish Anglican Bishops in New England, at least for now.

If anything, Parliament seemed to be pushing Grenville to act more quickly and forcefully.  During the debate on the Sugar Act, Grenville commented that the colonies had to contribute toward paying for their costs.  The main response by some members was that the colonies should be paying all of their costs.  They needed to become self sufficient, not a drain on the budget.  The Currency Act was pushed on Grenville before he had been ready to act as well.  Parliament overall seemed more eager than the Prime Minister to shift into a peacetime economy and get colonial revenues headed in the right direction.

Yet as carefully and as slowly as they moved, it did not seem to occur to anyone in Parliament to involve the colonies in any of the plans.  Many of the colonies had agents in London who essentially acted as lobbyists.  Colonial Governors also could have performed an ambassadorial role, providing feedback from the colonial legislatures and popular opinion to help shape policy.  Governors certainly provided intelligence on reactions to policies already in place, but did not work on shaping future policy.  Parliament considered tax and trade policy to be well within its authority for the entire empire.  There seemed to be little dispute on that in London.  The colonies, however, had an extremely different view, which would soon become evident.

Next week: the colonists express their opinions on the new acts of Parliament.

Next Episode 21: Colonies React to Taxes

Previous Episode 19: Suppressing the Indians

Visit the American Revolution Podcast (https://amrev.podbean.com).

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American Revolution Podcast is distributed 100% free of charge. If you can chip in to help defray my costs, I'd appreciate whatever you can give.  Make a one time donation through my PayPal account.

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Further Reading

Websites

George Grenville: https://history.blog.gov.uk/2015/02/11/george-grenville-whig-1763-1765

A study on historical wages in the UK for the last millennium:
https://www.measuringworth.com/datasets/ukearncpi/earnstudynew.pdf

18th Century Taxes in the UK, by Sarah Murden (2015):
https://georgianera.wordpress.com/2015/03/10/18th-century-taxes

American Duties Act of 1764 (aka The Sugar Act):
http://www.stamp-act-history.com/category/sugar-act

The Currency Acts of 1751 and 1764:
http://www.stamp-act-history.com/category/currency-act

The Currency Act, a Problem and a Solution:
https://allthingsliberty.com/2014/09/the-currency-act-a-problem-and-a-solution

James Otis The Rights of the British Colonies Asserted and Proved:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/the-rights-of-the-british-colonies-asserted-and-proved

Free Books
(from archive.org unless noted)

Anecdotes of the Life of the Right Honourable William Pitt, Earl of Chatham, Vol 2, by John Almon (1810).

British colonial policy, 1754-1765, by George Louis Beer (1907).

History of Wages in the United States from Colonial Times to 1928, by Estelle May Stewart & Jesse Chester Bowen (1934) (Google Books).

The Grenville Papers, Vol. II, William J. Smith (ed) (1852).

Correspondence of William Pitt, Vol. 2, by William Taylor & John Pringle (eds) (1838).

Books Worth Buying
(links to Amazon.com unless otherwise noted)*

Anderson, Fred Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, Alfred A. Knopf, 2000.

Brumwell, Stephen Redcoats: The British Soldier and War in the Americas 1755-1763, Cambridge Univ. Press, 2002.

Dickerson, Oliver M. The Navigation Acts and the American Revolution, New York A.S. Barnes & Company, 1951.

Fowler, William M. Empires at War, Walker Books, 2005.

Hawke, David The Colonial Experience, Prentice-Hall, 1966.

Jennings, Francis Empire Of Fortune: Crowns, Colonies & Tribes in the Seven Years War in America, W.W. Norton & Co. 1988.

Knollenberg, Bernard Growth of the American Revolution 1766-1775, Liberty Fund, 1975.

Miller, John Origins of the American Revolution, Little Brown & Co. 1943.

Nye, John War, Wine, and Taxes: The Political Economy of Anglo-French Trade, 1689-1900,  Princeton Univ. Press, 2007. (If you are burning to learn more about the exciting world of British tax policies in the 18th century, this is the book for you!)

* As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Episode 019: Suppressing the Indians

Throughout the summer of 1763, in what became known as Pontiac’s War, Indian tribes all across the northwest rose up to destroy British forts and settlements.  Warriors launched attacks all across western New York, Pennsylvania, Maryland, and what is today Ohio, Michigan, and Indiana. The British were ignoring promises to keep settlers east of the Allegheny mountains.  Without the French to act as a counterweight, the Indians realized they needed to go to war if they wanted to protect their lands.  Last week, I went over all the major attacks over the course of the summer, often killing and mutilating without mercy, taking no prisoners, and wiping out soldiers and civilians alike.

While their ferocity destroyed settlements and spread fear, Indians never seemed to be able to maintain a sustained war over time.  Warriors needed to return home to feed their families. Pontiac and his allies had hoped to encourage the French to rejoin the fight once they saw the Indians in full scale war against the British.  But the few French garrisons still along the Mississippi were already planning to leave.

Alone and without a European power to provide arms and ammunition, even united tribes could not sustain a war footing.  They could not remain in battle for more than a few months.  As summer turned to fall, and the fighting season ended, many warriors simply returned home.

Paxton Boys

By winter 1763, the Indian threat in Pennsylvania had been neutralized, yet anti-Indian sentiment flourished.  In December, a mob from Paxton, Pennsylvania raided a nearby village of Christianized Indians who has played no role in the uprising.  Some from Paxton accused them of providing aid to Indians who had participated in earlier raids.  It seems more likely though that their fears had given rise to the attitude that the only good Indian was a dead Indian.  They massacred and scalped six Indians who they found sitting in their cabins.

Paxton Massacre (artist's conception from 1841)
(from Indian Country Today)

Amid further threats, officials took 16 Susquehannock men, women, and children into protective custody to prevent their massacre.  The Paxton vigilantes were undeterred.  Two weeks later, they attacked the Lancaster jail where the Indians were being held in protective custody.  The  killed, scalped, and dismembered the bodies of the Indian men, women, and children.

In January 1764, 250 Paxton vigilantes marched on Philadelphia to demand further government action against the Indians.  Instead, they found that most Philadelphians were shocked and appalled by their actions.  They ended up providing the legislature with a list of grievances and returning home.  Although the violence ended, no one was ever prosecuted for the murder of the Indians, despite some attempts by the Governor to find the perpetrators.

Amherst Responds to the Uprising

It took months for Gen. Amherst to receive intelligence on the attacks on distant outposts and to appreciate its enormity.  Once he did, he had no intention of working out a diplomatic solution.  These attacks required a harsh response.  As he assembled armies to counter the uprising, Amherst issued orders that no Indians be taken prisoner.  As with the Cherokee uprising a few years earlier, he ordered any captured Indians from tribes involved in the uprising to be executed on the spot.

Gen. Jeffery Amherst
(from Dictionary Canadian Biography)

When Amherst heard about Fort Pitt’s use of biological warfare in spreading smallpox to the warriors, he approved reimbursement costs for the smallpox infested blankets and recommended that same plan to other officers.  As one officer writing to Amherst put it, he wished “to extirpate that Vermine from a Country they have forfeited, and with it all Claim to the Rights of Humanity.”  The Biological Weapons Convention of 1972 was still more than two centuries in the future.  In the 1760’s use of smallpox as a weapon did not seem to be an issue for much of anyone.

I should also add that many have considered it racist that the British used smallpox as a weapon against the Native American tribes.  However, as we will see in future episodes, they seemed equally willing to use it against the rebels during the Revolution.  It just was not quite as effective as many Patriots got inoculations.

Although many tribes rose up in this fight, the Iroquois remained loyal British allies, with the exception of some Seneca who had been involved in the Devil’s Hole Massacre.  William Johnson, who lived among the Iroquois, was able to maintain the loyalty of most of the Six Nations throughout the uprising.  Johnson attempted to get Amherst to make use of the loyal Iroquois, who believed they had the power to suppress the Indian uprising in the Ohio Valley, at least enough to bring them to the bargaining table.

Even though Johnson and these same Iroquois had proven their value to Amherst during his Montreal Campaign in 1760, he refused to make use of them.  Instead, he continued his policy of destruction, killing all enemy Indians, burning their villages, destroying their food supplies and spreading smallpox among them. Once the Indian forces had used up their ammunition and supplies, unable to obtain more, Amherst believed he could defeat the warriors in a war of attrition.

Amherst was not the first commander to earn the scorn of Sir William Johnson.  Like others before him, he would pay the price as Johnson contacted his friends in London to criticize the commander’s policies that were only exacerbating and extending the war.  In August, Amherst was recalled back to London and Gen. Thomas Gage took command.

Amherst had been requesting for years to be relieved of command.  With the war over, there was little glory in commanding North America.  He wanted to return to Britain.  Now overseeing an all out Indian war, officials in London decided that maybe it was time for new leadership.  Again, like most Generals brought home in defeat, Amherst would move on to better things. He had been appointed Governor of Virginia in 1759 and continued to hold that post until 1768.  He only lost that job after officials decided that having been Governor for nine years, it might be nice if he actually visited the colony.  When he declined, London appointed a new Governor. Amherst would eventually be promoted to full General and later Field Marshall.  He would also join the King’s Privy Council and become a Baron.  But in 1763, Amherst left America, never to return.

Gen. Thomas Gage

I’ve mentioned the new North American Commander, Thomas Gage, a few times before.  But now with his first command, and given his future importance to the story, I should probably give a little more background. Gage was the son a Viscount, but as the second son, he likely would never inherit a title or property.  Instead, Gage had joined the army at the age of 20 to fight in the War of Austrian Succession.  He returned to Britain to help put down the Jacobite Rebellion, participating in the slaughter of Scottish rebels at the infamous Battle of Culloden in 1746.

Thomas Gage
(from Wikimedia)

A few years later he shipped off for North America, serving under Braddock and alongside George Washington in 1755.  For most of the French and Indian War, Gage could not get in a position to prove himself in battle.  He was part of the relief force to Fort Oswego, that arrived too late.  He was part of Gen. Loudoun’s mission to take Louisbourg, which simply turned around and did not fight a battle.  Gage did finally see battle again at the first failed attempt to take Fort Carillon, in which he was wounded in 1758.  While recuperating, he went to New Jersey to recruit a new regiment of colonists.  There, he found time to marry a local Jersey Girl, Margaret Kemble, and start a family in America.

He continued to serve throughout the French and Indian War, serving under Gen. Amherst when he defeated the French in Canada in 1760.  Yet when Amherst decided that Gage acted with too much caution in failing to attack a small French outpost, he gave Gage a position in the rear during the final assault on Montreal.  After the city fell, Amherst gave him an administrative job as the military governor of Montreal.

When officials recalled Amherst in 1763, Gage became the new North American Commander. Because Amherst had only been “recalled for consultation” and Gage made temporary commander, Gage may not have felt confident significantly altering Amherst’s plans for 1764.  Gage, therefore, went forward with Amherst’s plans to defeat all the tribes militarily with only about 8000 regulars left in America.

Treaty of Fort Niagara

Gage did allow Johnson to negotiate a treaty between the loyal Iroquois and the renegade Seneca who has taken part in the uprising.  The Seneca signed the Treaty of Fort Niagara bringing them back into the British fold.

Sketch of Ft. Niagara by Wm. Johnson in 1758
(from Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada)

The Treaty negotiations at Fort Niagara, made clear that most of the Ohio Valley tribes were also ready to settle. By the summer of 1764, it was clear to all tribes that the French had no intention of re-engaging in North America.  The natives were on their own, and would remain dependent on the British for trade.  Smallpox had also decimated many tribes throughout the winter of 1763-64.  This may have been in part the result of British attempts to start such an epidemic, or more likely the inevitable result when Indians came into increased contact with Europeans and each other.  Although the meeting at Fort Niagara was primarily for the purpose of bringing the Seneca back under the Iroquois fold, representatives from 24 different tribes attended.  They received gifts from the British and expressed a desire to end hostilities.

The Seneca did agree in the final treaty signed on August 1, 1764, to pledge loyalty to the British.  They were also forced to give up their monopoly over the Niagara portage as the price for their attacks.

Bradstreet Expedition

At the same time Johnson was negotiating the Fort Niagara Treaty, Gen. Gage was executing Amherst’s orders to strike at the heart of the Indian rebellion militarily.  By this time though, everyone seemed to have lost their thirst for blood.

John Bradstreet
(from Wikimedia)

The first prong of this now half-hearted invasion called for Col. John Bradstreet to leave Fort Schlosser in Western New York, sail across Lake Erie with a force of 1200 men, subdue all the Indians along the way, and eventually reinforce Fort Detroit.  This is the same Col. Bradstreet who led the raid on Fort Frontenac back in 1758. Ever since then, he had been sitting in a cushy quartermaster job in New York.  It is not clear if he wanted this new combat role, but it is clear he did not see any good way to use 1200 men to lead a path of destruction through thousands of angry warriors across hundreds of miles.  Fortunately for Bradstreet, the Indians did not see much point in fighting any more either.

When he landed near Fort Presque, ten Indians representing Wyandot, Delaware, Shawnee, Mingo, and Munsee tribes approached under a flag of truce.  He provided terms requiring they cease all hostility, return all prisoners, and agree to send Fort Pitt any Indians who continued to attack soldiers or civilians

As he continued along the way, he offered similar terms to the tribes he encountered, directing them to attend a summit that he would hold in Detroit in September.  Bradstreet, though, was not authorized to enter into treaties on behalf of Britain.  His orders were to suppress any opposition and perhaps arrange for a temporary ceasefire.  It was not until late September, after Bradstreet had relieved the garrison at Fort Detroit and held his summit with the tribes that Gen. Gage’s letters finally caught up with him telling him he had far exceeded his authorization and to stop making peace terms with the tribes.

In any event, the Detroit meeting was a disaster even before Gage’s letters arrived.  Pontiac refused to attend.  Bradstreet insulted the rest of the Indians by using a hatchet to chop up the peace belt that Pontiac had sent.  Ignoring Gage’s orders to march inland and attack various tribes (which would have been suicide), Bradstreet tried to return via Lake Erie, only to be run ashore by storms.  Without enough boats, much of his contingent, including all the Indian auxiliaries he had with him, had to travel by foot overland back to Fort Niagara without proper supplies. Many of them died from from exposure or starvation along the way.  Even worse, the tribes which had agreed to end the war and to return prisoners neither stopped their attacks nor actually returned any prisoners.

Bouquet Expedition

As Bradstreet was returning in October, Col. Bouquet was setting out from Fort Pitt on his own expedition into the Ohio Valley.

Henry Bouquet
(from Bushy Run Battlefield)

Bouquet had started late and moved slowly.  His experience at Bushy Run the year earlier made him cautious of ambush.

After setting up a defensive stockade, Bouquet met with area chiefs and offered terms similar to Bradstreet’s.  He made clear, however, that any final treaty would have to be made with William Johnson back in New York.  Several tribes actually brought them about 200 British prisoners with promises to return more to Fort Pitt in the spring.

By the end of November, Bouquet arrived back at Fort Pitt convinced that hostilities were coming to an end, at least in the Ohio Valley.  Further west, in the Illinois territory, Pontiac and another more hawkish Chief named Kaské continued to make war on any British they could find.  They captured several small diplomatic parties. Kaské wanted to torture and kill them, while Pontiac decided to allow them to return, indicating he was at least ready to talk peace.

Treaty with Pontiac

Facing a new, expensive and difficult offensive in Illinois in 1765, Gage reached out to Pontiac hoping to find a diplomatic solution.  He sent George Croghan, the Indian trader from Pennsylvania who had worked with Washington’s first incursion into Ohio back in 1754 and who had continued to trade with the Indians and establish British settlements through the intervening years.

Negotiations with Henry Bouquet
(from Wikimedia)

In Illinois, Kaské attempted to burn Croghan at the stake.  Pontiac, however, saw continuing war as pointless, spared Croghan and agreed to travel to New York.  He and Johnson signed a treaty at Fort Ontario on July 25, 1766.  The Treaty only announced a general acceptance of British sovereignty.  It did not cede any land to the British nor even return prisoners.  Even that was too much for Kaské, who crossed the Mississippi with other refugees who refused to live under British rule.

Conclusion of the War

Pontiac is sometimes credited with leading this entire effort.   It seems clear though that he was among a group of many chiefs representing many tribes coordinating this effort against the British.  Pontiac was merely the first to act.  Pontiac’s War, sometimes called a rebellion, uprising, or conspiracy, was the first concerted effort by almost all tribes to halt the advancement of Europeans across North America.  At best, it slowed things for a few years.  It did convince the British that the native tribes were a force to be reckoned with and could not be taken for granted.

If anything, Pontiac’s decision to end the fighting humiliated him among tribes who still wanted to fight.  He lived in relative isolation for the next few years, before a Peoria Indian murdered him for unknown reasons.

Following the end of the fighting, Britain decided to renew its tradition of providing annual gifts to the various tribes, and making more of an effort to keep settlers out of western Indian lands.  The British also eliminated many of the smaller western forts, and only kept a few of the larger ones, like Fort Detroit and Fort Pitt.

Royal Proclamation of 1763

The same year the uprising began, King George III issued the Royal Proclamation of 1763, which largely forbade any British settlements west of the Allegheny Mountains, providing a reserve stretching the length of the Continent from the Alleghenies to the Mississippi River for use of the Indians.

Royal Proclamation of 1763
(from Indigenous and Northern Affairs Canada)

The Proclamation which was based largely on the agreements of the 1758 Treaty of Easton, was under preparation even before the news of Pontiac’s War reached London.  The news probably did speed up its release and distribution.

The Proclamation by itself, however, did little.  The Indians had no reason to believe yet another piece of paper with promises on it.  It probably added something to those already predisposed to end the violence.  However, few tribes seemed to put much faith in it.

On the other side, the colonies were outraged that they would be barred from the land over which they had just fought a whole war to obtain.  Why exactly did we just spend millions of pounds and sacrifice thousands of lives to give the Indians a private reserve? It helped stoke the frustration colonists felt over having virtually no say over major policy questions.  The war ended up for many being another one where the colonists sacrificed greatly only to see London give away any gains they had made.

One reason the colonists did not get too outraged about it is that most of them figured it would be treated much like most other edicts from London.  The colonists would largely ignore it and eventually it would go away entirely.  As Washington wrote in a letter to a friend also involved in land speculation, “I can never look upon that Proclamation in any other light (but this I say between ourselves) than as a temporary expedient to quiet the Minds of the Indians and must fail of course in a few years…”  In other words, whatever the King said, western colonial expansion could not be stopped.

Once it became clear that British policy would not permit a settlement boom in the west, Gage decided to reduce the military presence as well.  He abandoned several of the smaller outpost that had been easily overrun.  Troops in larger forts such as Fort Pitt or Fort Detroit were reduced to a few dozen soldiers, not even enough to maintain upkeep on the Fort, let alone defend it if ever attacked again.  The main purpose of maintaining any soldiers at all was simply to keep guard on the valuable canon left in the forts.  The military presence throughout the Ohio Valley, the Illinois valley and the Great Lakes region fell to around 350 Regulars.  With the region at peace, more soldiers only incurred unnecessary costs for the government.  The military essentially pulled out and went home.  I’m sure that won’t cause any future problems.

Next week: Britain starts looking for way to pay back its war debts, and looks to the colonies to help pay the bill.  It passes the Sugar Act and the Currency Act of 1764.

Next Episode 20: Sugar Act and Currency Act of 1764

Previous Episode 18: Pontiac's War

Visit the American Revolution Podcast (https://amrev.podbean.com).

Click here to donate

American Revolution Podcast is distributed 100% free of charge. If you can chip in to help defray my costs, I'd appreciate whatever you can give.  Make a one time donation through my PayPal account.

You may also donate via Venmo, Zelle, or popmoney (send to mtroy1@yahoo.com)

Click here to see my Patreon Page

You can support the American Revolution Podcast as a Patreon subscriber.  This is an option for people who want to make monthly pledges.  Patreon support will give you access to Podcast extras and help make the podcast a sustainable project.

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Further Reading

Websites

Pontiac’s Rebellion http://www.warpaths2peacepipes.com/the-indian-wars/pontiacs-rebellion.htm

Benjamin Franklin’s account of the Paxton massacres: http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Franklin/01-11-02-0012

Sir Jeffrey Amherst: https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Amherst_Sir_Jeffery_1717-1797

Thomas Gage: http://www.biographi.ca/en/bio/gage_thomas_4E.html

Henry Bouquet: https://bushyrunbattlefield.com/history/henry-bouquet

George Croghan: http://www.academia.edu/22252682/George_Croghan_1710-1782_-_a_miscellany

Treaty of Fort Niagara http://www.chiefs-of-ontario.org/node/920

Royal Proclamation of 1763: http://indigenousfoundations.arts.ubc.ca/home/government-policy/royal-proclamation-1763.html

Royal Proclamation of 1763 (full text): http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/proc1763.asp

Free eBooks
(from archive.org unless noted)

The Ohio Company of Virginia and the Westward Movement, 1748-1792, by Kenneth Bailey (1939).

The Orderly Book of Colonel Henry Bouquet's Expedition Against the Ohio Indians 1764, by Henry Bouquet (published 1960).

The Journal of Jeffery Amherst, Recording the military career of General Amherst in America from 1758 to 1763, by Jeffery Amherst (John Clarence, ed.)

The History of Canada, Vol. 5, by William Kingsford (1887)

Jeffery Amherst; a Biography, by Lawrence Shaw Mayo, (1916)

The War Chief of the Ottawas; a Chronicle of the Pontiac War, by Thomas Guthrie Marquis, (1915)

The Indian wars of Pennsylvania, by C. Hale Sipe (1929)

Books Worth Buying
(links to Amazon.com unless otherwise noted)*

Anderson, Fred Crucible of War: The Seven Years' War and the Fate of Empire in British North America, 1754-1766, Alfred A. Knopf, 2000.

Dowd, Gregory Evens War Under Heaven: Pontiac, the Indian Nations, and the British Empire, Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 2004.

Middleton, Richad Pontiac's War: Its Causes, Course and Consequences, Routledge, 2007.

Nester, William Haughty Conquerors: Amherst and the Great Indian Uprising of 1763, Praeger, 2000.

* As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.