Of course all was confusion; for the people came, some with arms in their hands, and some having none, with the inquiry marked on every countenance, What can I do? A partial organization was effected, and preparations were made to besiege Boston. Among those who hastened thither was the veteran Putnam, then an old man of sixty years, who, it is said, left his plow in the furrow, and in his working dress, mounted one of his horses, and hastened toward Cambridge at the head of a large body of Connecticut volunteers. Colonel (afterward general) John Stark was also there, with a crowd of New Hampshire volunteers, and all were active and ardent. In the course of a few days the troops were tolerably well officered, their pay was agreed upon, and thirty thousand were enrolled. But great numbers returned home; some to attend to pressing private affairs, and others to make permanent arrangements to join the army. The number was thus suddenly much reduced, and the important pass of Boston Neck was defended for nine consecutive days and nights by only six or seven hundred men under Colonel Robinson, of Dorchester. The ranks were soon afterward well filled, and preparations for a regular siege of the city commenced.
Cambridge was made the head-quarters, and a line of cantonments was formed nearly twenty miles in extent, the left leaning upon the River Mystic and the right upon Roxbury, thus completely inclosing the town.
On the 5th of May, the Provincial Congress resolved "that General Gage has, by the late transactions and many other means, utterly disqualified himself from serving this colony as governor, or in any other capacity; and that, therefore, no obedience is in future due to him; but that, on the contrary, he ought to be considered and guarded against as an unnatural and inveterate enemy to the country." Previous to this renunciation of allegiance, they had prepared for the payment of the army, by authorizing the issue of bills of credit, or paper money, to the amount of three hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, in sums small enough to be used as a circulating currency, and directed the receiver general to borrow that amount, upon those notes,
* The officers who composed the council were Generals Ward, Heath, and Whitcombe; Colonels Bridge,
Frye, James Prescott, William Prescott, Bullard, and Barrett; and Lieutenant-colonels Spaulding, Nixon, Whitney, Mansfield and Wheelock. Colonels Learned and Warner arrived the next day.
** This is a fac simile of the device on the back of one of the first of the Massachusetts treasury notes or bills of credit. The literal translation of the Latin inscription is "He seeks by the Sword calm repose under the auspices of Freedom." In other words, to use a phrase of the present time, they were determined "to conquer a peace." The face of the bill has a neatly-engraved border of scroll-work; and on the left of the brace where the names of the committee are signed, is a circle with a ship within it. The following is a copy of one of the notes:
August 18,1775.
"Colony of the Massachusetts Bay,