Overview
The Boston Tea Party was led by Samuel Adams. He was the leader of the Sons of Liberty, a group that opposed British rule in the colonies.
About the Sons of Liberty
The Sons of Liberty was a well-organized Patriot organization that operated in secret, with private passwords to protect them from Tory spies. The main purpose of this organization was to undermine British rule in the Americas. The Sons of Liberty were first publicly acknowledged as the "Sons of Liberty" in 1765 in a Boston Gazette article. It stated, “The Sons of Liberty on the 14th of August 1765, a Day which ought to be for ever remembered in America, animated with a zeal for their country then upon the brink of destruction, and resolved, at once to save her…” In this, Samuel Adams referred to the anti-Stamp Act activists for the first time in print as the Sons of Liberty. Of all of their actions, The Boston Tea Party was by far their most popular/well known. Another act the Sons of Liberty preformed was to fight the Stamp Act. Thomas Hutchinson, the Lieutenant Governor and Chief Justice of Massachusetts, was a loyalist and had affiliations with the British rule. On the evening of August 15, 1765, the Sons of Liberty blockaded Hutchinson's house and demanded he denounce the Stamp Act. Hutchinson refused, and on August 26, a mob organized by the Sons of Liberty attacked Hutchinson’s mansion. |