Editing Boston Massacre (section)

==Background==
{{main|American Revolution}}
[[File:2009 BostonMassacre site 3658174192.jpg|thumb|[[Old State House (Boston)|Old State House]] in [[Boston]], the capital of the [[Province of Massachusetts]] during the [[Colonial history of the United States|colonial era]] from 1713 to 1776; the cobblestone circle is labeled "Site of the Boston Massacre", but the Boston Massacre occurred nearby on what now is a busy Boston street.]]
In the 18th century, [[Boston]] was the capital of the [[Province of Massachusetts Bay]], an important shipping town, and along with [[Philadelphia]] and present-day [[New York City]], one of the most influential political, economic, and cultural cities in the [[Thirteen Colonies]] of pre-Revolutionary [[British America]]. Boston also was a center of resistance to unpopular acts of taxation by the [[Parliament of Great Britain|British Parliament]] in the 1760s.<ref name=K54/>

In 1768, the [[Townshend Acts]] were enacted in the Thirteen Colonies, placing tariffs on a variety of common items that were manufactured in [[Kingdom of Great Britain|Britain]] and imported in the colonies. Colonists objected that the Acts were a violation of the natural, charter, and constitutional [[Rights of Englishmen|rights of British subjects]] in the colonies.<ref name=K54/> The Massachusetts House of Representatives began a campaign against the Acts by sending a petition to [[George III of the United Kingdom#American War of Independence|King George III]] asking for the repeal of the Townshend Revenue Act. The House also sent the [[Massachusetts Circular Letter]] to other colonial assemblies, asking them to join the resistance movement,<ref name=K54>Knollenberg, ''Growth'', p. 54.</ref> and called for a boycott of merchants importing the affected goods.<ref>Ross and McCaughey, ''From Loyalist to Founding Father'', p. 94.</ref>

[[Wills Hill, 1st Marquess of Downshire|Lord Hillsborough]] had recently been appointed to the newly created office of [[Secretary of State for the Colonies|Colonial Secretary]], and he was alarmed by the actions of the Massachusetts House. In April 1768, he sent a letter to the colonial governors in America instructing them to dissolve any colonial assemblies that responded to the Massachusetts Circular Letter. He also ordered Massachusetts Governor [[Sir Francis Bernard, 1st Baronet|Francis Bernard]] to direct the Massachusetts House to rescind the letter. The house refused to comply.<ref>Knollenberg, ''Growth'', p. 56.</ref>

Boston's chief customs officer Charles Paxton wrote to Hillsborough for military support because "the Government is as much in the hands of the people as it was in the time of the [[Stamp Act 1765|Stamp Act]]."<ref>Triber, ''A True Republican'', p. 66.</ref> Commodore [[Samuel Hood, 1st Viscount Hood|Samuel Hood]] responded by sending the 50-gun warship {{HMS|Romney|1762|6}}, which arrived in [[Boston Harbor]] in May 1768.<ref>Knollenberg, ''Growth'', p. 63.</ref> On June 10, 1768, customs officials seized ''[[HMS Liberty (1768)|Liberty]]'', a sloop owned by leading Boston merchant [[John Hancock]], on allegations that the ship had been involved in smuggling. Bostonians were already angry because the captain of ''Romney'' had been [[impressment|impressing]] local sailors; they began to riot,<ref>Triber, ''A True Republican'', p. 63.</ref> and customs officials fled to [[Fort Independence (Massachusetts)|Castle William]] for protection.<ref>Ross and McCaughey, ''From Loyalist to Founding Father'', p. 93.</ref>

{{quote box|width=35%|align=right|quote=Daniel Calfe declares, that on Saturday evening the 3rd of March, a camp-woman, wife to James McDeed, a grenadier of the 29th, came into his father's shop, and the people talking about the affrays at the ropewalks, and blaming the soldiers for the part they had acted in it, the woman said, "the soldiers were in the right;" adding, "that before Tuesday or Wednesday night they would wet their swords or bayonets in New England people's blood."|source=—Excerpt from ''A Short Narrative'', suggesting that the soldiers were contemplating violence against the colonists<ref>''A Short Narrative'', p. 17.</ref>}}

Given the unstable state of affairs in Massachusetts, Hillsborough instructed General [[Thomas Gage]], [[Commander-in-Chief, North America]], to send "such Force as You shall think necessary to Boston",<ref>Knollenberg, ''Growth'', 75.</ref> and the first of four British Army regiments began disembarking in Boston on October 1, 1768.<ref>Knollenberg, ''Growth'', p. 76.</ref> Two regiments were removed from Boston in 1769, but the [[West Yorkshire Regiment|14th]] and the [[29th (Worcestershire) Regiment of Foot|29th]] Regiments of Foot remained.<ref name=K76_8/>

The ''[[Journal of Occurrences]]'' were an anonymous series of newspaper articles which chronicled the clashes between civilians and soldiers in Boston, feeding tensions with its sometimes exaggerated accounts, but those tensions rose markedly after [[Christopher Seider]], "a young lad about eleven Years of Age", was killed by a customs employee on February 22, 1770.<ref name=K76_8>Knollenberg, ''Growth'', pp. 76–78.</ref> Seider's death was covered in the ''[[Boston Gazette]]'', and his funeral was described as one of the largest of the time in Boston. The killing and subsequent media coverage inflamed tensions, with groups of colonists looking for soldiers to harass, and soldiers also looking for confrontation.<ref>Middlekauff, ''Glorious Cause'', pp. 208–210.</ref>