CHAPTER I
THE FIRST SEA FIGHT OF THE REVOLUTION
The Burning of the "Gaspee" in Narragansett Bay
DOES it not seem an odd fact that little Rhode Island, the smallest of all our states, should have two capital cities, while all the others, some of which would make more than a thousand Rhode Islands, have only one apiece? It is like the old story of the dwarf beating the giants.
The tale we have to tell has to do with these two cities, Providence and Newport, whose story goes back far into the days when Rhode Island and all the others were British colonies. They were capitals then and they are capitals still. That is, they were places where the legislature met and the laws were made.
I need not tell you anything about the British Stamp Act, the Boston Tea-party, the fight at Lexington, and the other things that led to the American Revolution and brought freedom to the colonies. All this you have learned at school. But I am sure you will be interested in what we may call the "salt-water Lexington," the first fight between the British and the bold sons of the colonies.
There was at that time a heavy tax on all goods brought into the country, and even on goods taken from one American town to another. It was what we now call a revenue duty, or tariff. This tax the Americans did not like to pay. They were so angry at the way they had been treated by England that they did not want that country to have a penny of their money. Nor did they intend to pay any tax.
Do you ask how they could help paying the tax? They had one way of doing so. Vessels laden with goods were brought to the coast at night, or to places where there was no officer of the revenue. Then in all haste they unloaded their cargoes and were away again like flitting birds. The British did not see half the goods that came ashore, and lost much in the way of taxes.
We call this kind of secret trade "smuggling." Providence and Newport were great smuggling places. Over the green waters of Narragansett Bay small craft sped to and fro, coming to shore by night or in secret places and landing their goods. It was against the law, but the bold mariners cared little for laws made in England. They said that they were quite able to govern themselves, and that no people across the seas should make laws for them.
The British did their best to stop this kind of trade. They sent armed vessels to the Bay, whose business it was to chase and search every craft that might have smuggled goods in its hold, and to punish in some way every smuggler they found.