BOSTON TEA PARTY – The Boston-Gazette and Country Journal. Boston: Edes & Gill, 20 December 1773. No. 976. [With:] The two following issues, 27 December 1773 and 3 January 1774. Nos. 976-977.

“BEHOLD what followed! A number of brave & resolute men, determined to do all in their power to save their country from the ruin which their enemies had plotted, in less than four hours, emptied every chest of tea on board the three ships commanded by the captains Hall, Bruce, and Coffin, amounting to 342 chests, into the sea!!”

Exceptional, contemporary reporting of the destruction of tea in Boston Harbor. On the day the tea was thrown overboard, Thursday 16 December 1773, there appeared a brief notice that the event had happened in The Massachusetts Spy. However, the first printed account with any detail is thought to be this one, printed by the patriots Edes & Gill on the following Monday, 20 December.

This issue includes two accounts of the party. One was written by the editors (quoted above) and characterized the destruction as largely peaceable: “The masters and owners are well pleas’d that their ships are thus clear’d; and the people are almost universally congratulating each other on this happy event.” The other, lengthier account, is in even more dramatic language and signed “An Impartial Observer.” It includes the famous disguise of the patriots as Natives. In part, “Previous to the dissolution, a number of persons, supposed to be the Aboriginal Natives from their complexion, approaching near the door of the assembly, gave the War Whoop, which was answered by a few in the galleries of the house where the assembly was convened; silence was commanded, and a prudent and peaceable deportment again enjoined.

The Savages repaired to the ships which entertained the pestilential Teas, and had began their ravage previous to the dissolution of the meeting—They applied themselves to the destruction of this commodity in earnest, and in the space of about two hours broke up 342 chests, and discharged their contents into the sea .. I cannot but express my admiration of the conduct of this people! … The landing the tea would have been fatal, as it would have saddled the colonies with a duty imposed without their consent, and which no power on earth can affect.”

Other articles include accounts from sympathetic patriots in Lexington, Philadelphia, Medford, Portsmouth, and Newport pertaining to the tea crisis. There is also a report of a follow-up Boston meeting on December 18 and a letter to the editor signed “Tiewaghnodago” (presumably a disguised patriot) suggesting that coffee merchants who have raised their prices in response to the absence of tea deserve tarring and feathering.

RARE: No copies recorded in the auction records of RBH for the past century.

The two following issues of The Boston-Gazette include continued coverage of the tea crisis, such as the petition for protection by Boston tea consignees facing mob opposition in 1773 and the response the to Tea Party “riot.”

Three issues. Four pages each, folio (390 x 245mm). (some mild spotting, 20 December issue with two small holes at backfold, front page toned above the fold.)

Matthew Nicholson, by descent to:
Albert Nicholson (housed in a paper folder labeled "News Papers. American Rebellion. Sent to my grandfather.)