A fanatical and revolutionary demagogue, on the other hand, would have longed for a conviction, not only to compass his ends as a politician, but to glut his hate as a zealot.
Samuel Adams was a taciturn, secretive man, whose tortuous course would have been hard to follow a century ago; now the attempt is hopeless. Yet there is one inference it seems permissible to draw: his admirers have always boasted that he was the inspiration of the town meetings, presumably, therefore, the votes passed at them may be attributed to his manipulation. And starting from this point, with the help of Hutchinson and his own writings, it is still possible to discern the outlines of a policy well worthy of a theocratic statesman.
The March meeting began on the 12th. On the 13th it was resolved:—
“That —— He and they hereby are appointed a committee for and in behalf of the town to find out who those persons are that were the perpetrators of the horred murders and massacres done and committed in King Street on several of the inhabitants in the evening of the 5th instant and take such examinations and depositions as they can procure, and lay the whole thereof before the grand inquest in order that such perpetrators may be indicted and brought to tryal for the same, and upon indictments being found, said committee are desired to prepare matters for the king’s attorney, to attend at their tryals in the superior court, subpoena all the witnesses, and do everything necessary for bringing those murtherers to that punishment for such crimes, as the laws of God and man require.” [Footnote: Records of Boston, v. 232.]
A day or two afterward a number of Adams’s friends, among whom were some of the members of this committee, dined together, and Hutchinson tells what he persuaded them to do.
“The time for holding the superior court for the county of Suffolk was the next week after the tragical action in King Street. Although bills were found by the grand jury, yet the court, considering the disordered state of the town, had thought fit to continue the trials over to the next term, when the minds of people would be more free from prejudice.” “A considerable number of the most active persons in all publick measures of the town, having dined together, went in a body from table to the superior court then sitting, and Mr. Adams, at their head and in behalf of the town, pressed the bringing on the trial the same term with so much spirit, that the judges did not think it advisable to abide by their own order, but appointed a day for the trials, and adjourned the court for that purpose.” [Footnote: Hutch. Hist. iii. 285, 286 and note.]
The justices must afterward have grown ashamed of their cowardice, for Rex v. Preston did not come on until the autumn, and altogether very little was accomplished by these attempts to interfere with the due administration of the law. “A committee had been appointed by the town to assist in the prosecution of the soldiers ... but this was irregular. The courts, according to the practice in the province, required no prosecutors but the officers of the crown; much less would they have thought it proper for the principal town in the province to have brought all its weight, which was very great, into court against the prisoners.” [Footnote: Idem, iii. 286, note.]
Nevertheless, Adams had by no means exhausted his resources, for it was possible so to inflame the public mind that dispassionate juries could hardly be obtained.
At the same March meeting another committee was named, who were to obtain a “particular account of all proceedings relative to the massacre in King Street on Monday night last, that a full and just representation may be made thereof?” [Footnote: Kidder’s Massacre, p. 23.] The reason assigned for so unwonted a proceeding as the taking of ex parte testimony by a popular assembly concerning alleged murders, for which men were to be presently tried for their lives, was the necessity for controverting the aspersions of the British officials; but the probable truth of this explanation must be judged by the course actually pursued. On the 19th the report was made, consisting of “A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre in Boston,” together with a number of depositions; and though perhaps it was natural, under the circumstances, for such a pamphlet to have been highly partisan, it was unnatural for its authors to have assumed the burden of proving that a deliberately planned conspiracy had existed between the civilians and the military to murder the citizens; especially as this tremendous charge rested upon no better foundation than the fantastic falsehoods of “a French boy, whose evidence appeared to the justice so improbable, and whose character was so infamous, that the justice, who was one of the most zealous in the cause of liberty, refused to issue a warrant to apprehend his master, against whom he swore.” [Footnote: Hutch. Hist. iii. 279, 280.] “Then I went up to the custom-house door and knocked, ... I saw my master and Mr. Munroe come down-stairs, and go into a room; when four or five men went up stairs, pulling and hauling me after them.... When I was carried into the chamber, there was but one light in the room, and that in the corner of the chamber, when I saw a tall man loading a gun (then I saw two guns in the room) ... there was a number of gentlemen in the room. After the gun was loaded, the tall man gave it to me, and told me to fire, and said he would kill me if I did not; I told him I would not. He drawing a sword out of his cane, told me, if I did not fire it, he would run it through my guts. The man putting the gun out of the window, it being a little open, I fired it side way up the street; the tall man then loaded the gun again.... I told him I would not fire again; he told me again, he would run me through the guts if I did not. Upon which I fired the same way up the street. After I fired the second gun, I saw my master in the room; he took a gun and pointed it out of the window; I heard the gun go off. Then a tall man came and clapped me on the shoulders above and below stairs, and said, that’s my good boy, I’ll give you some money to-morrow.... And I ran home as fast as I could, and sat up all night in my master’s kitchen. And further say, that my master licked me the next night for telling Mrs. Waldron about his firing out of the custom-house. And for fear that I should be licked again, I did deny all that I said before Justice Quincy, which I am very sorry for. [Footnote: Kidder’s Massacre, p. 82. Deposition 58.]
“CHARLOTTE BOURGATE + (his mark).”