| Citation |
BEP(F.775.014
13 Mar 1775:31 (2059)
Boston, March 13. The act of tarring & feathering not
repealed.
Last Thursday morning a countryman was tarr'd and
feather'd and carried thro' some of the streets in this town
by a party of soldiers, attended by some officers:--The
following is the man's own deposition, relative to that
affair, sworn to before a magistrate; upon which we shall
make no remarks, but leave the public to judge of the
conduct of some of those who are said to have been sent
among us to preserve peace and good order, and to prevent
mobs, tumults and their unlawful assemblies.----
I Thomas Ditson, jun. of Billerica, husbandman,. . . [was
set up by the 47th Regiment, ostensibly to buy two guns, for
which they took his money but did not give him the guns, and
instead tarred and feathered him, hanging the following sign
round his neck, printed below in italics:] American Liberty
or democracy exemplified in a villain who attempted to
intice one of the soldiers of his Majesty's 47th Regiment to
desert and take up arms with rebels against his King and
country.--I was then ordered to walk out and get into a
chair fastened upon trucks, which I did; when a number of
the King's soldiers, as I imagined, about 40 or 50, armed
with guns and fixed bayonets, surrounded the trucks, and
they marched with a number of officers before them, one of
whom I was told was the colonel of the 47th Regiment, who I
have since heard was named Nesbit, together with a number of
drums and fifes from the wharf up Kingstreet and down
Forestreet. . . [6 more lines + 1 para]
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