"A Lawyer Acquitted: John Adams and the Boston Massacre". American Journal of Legal History. 18 (3): 189–207. doi: 10.2307/845085.
Witnesses recalled how the mob had repeatedly called for the British soldiers to be killed. Particularly effective testimony for the defense came from Dr. John Jeffries, who had tended to one of the colonists killed on the night of March 5, 1770.
Adams defended the British officer Thomas Preston and his soldiers in two separate trials. Can you talk about the balancing act Adams undertook to defend all his clients without alienating his fellow Bostonians, many of whom fervently supported the broader patriot cause?
Boston Massacre Trial. A defense lawyer to the last, Adams negotiated the sentences of Montgomery and Kilroy using and ancient precedent of English law. The “Plea of Clergy” meant that instead of death, the two men would be branded on the thumbs as first offenders, never to be permitted to violate the law again.
The Boston Massacre was a confrontation on March 5, 1770, in which British soldiers shot and killed several people while being harassed by a mob in Boston. The event was heavily publicized by leading Patriots such as Paul Revere and Samuel Adams. British troops had been stationed in the Province of Massachusetts Bay since 1768 in order ...
The Boston Massacre is considered one of the most significant events that turned colonial sentiment against King George III and British Parliamentary authority. John Adams wrote that the "foundation of American independence was laid" on March 5, 1770, and Samuel Adams and other Patriots used annual commemorations ( Massacre Day) to encourage public sentiment toward independence. Christopher Monk was the boy who was wounded in the attack and died in 1780, and his memory was honored as a reminder of British hostility.
British troops had been stationed in the Province of Massachusetts Bay since 1768 in order to support crown-appointed officials and to enforce unpopular Parliamentary legislation. Amid tense relations between the civilians and the soldiers, a mob formed around a British sentry and verbally abused him.
Howard Zinn argues that Boston was full of "class anger". He reports that the Boston Gazette published in 1763 that "a few persons in power" were promoting political projects "for keeping the people poor in order to make them humble.".
Seider's death was covered in the Boston Gazette, and his funeral was described as one of the largest of the time in Boston. The killing and subsequent media coverage inflamed tensions, with groups of colonists looking for soldiers to harass, and soldiers also looking for confrontation.
Boston was the capital of the Province of Massachusetts Bay and an important shipping town, and it was also a center of resistance to unpopular acts of taxation by the British Parliament in the 1760s .
For the 2013 bombing, see Boston Marathon bombing. The Boston Massacre was a confrontation on March 5, 1770, in which British soldiers shot and killed several people while being harassed by a mob in Boston. The event was heavily publicized by leading Patriots such as Paul Revere and Samuel Adams. British troops had been stationed in the Province ...
The impact on today’s legal system. The Boston Massacre trials served as a landmark case for the new justice system in the colonies. This trial was the first time that a jury was sequestered, which is now typical practice in high profile cases. The standard of reasonable doubt was also introduced during this trial.
Before the trial, Loyalists and Patriots engaged in a propaganda war. Patriot cartoons and articles painted the riot as an all-out attack by aggressive British soldiers. Paul Revere even published a cartoon which he named The Bloody Massacre, leading the riot to be known as the Boston Massacre.
The jury found Preston not guilty after a six-day hearing. Boston Massacre lithograph, Henry Pelham Wikimedia Commons. Next on trial were the eight soldiers under Preston’s command on the night of the Boston Massacre. There was a different jury for this trial and they were, once again, sequestered.
Boston was a major port for trade as well as a hotbed for Patriot activity and organization. Britain stationed a large garrison of troops in the city with the aim of controlling unruly colonists who were resisting customs officials. On March 5, 1770, a crowd gathered outside the Customs House that was being guarded by the British.
Adams and the defense argued that the crowd was endangering the soldiers’ lives and they acted in self-defense. He called witnesses that described how the crowd verbally threatened the soldiers and threw objects at them. Witnesses recalled how the mob had repeatedly called for the British soldiers to be killed.
After deliberating for three hours, the jury found all eight soldiers not guilty of murder. Two of the men were found guilty of the lesser charge of manslaughter and their penalty was reduced to branding on the thumb. The other six soldiers were completely cleared of all charges.
American colonists wanted more independence and control over their economy. The Americans were prospering on their own and desired to break free of colonial control.
Photo Courtesy of Independence National Historical Park. The crowd strained forward in the Queen Street courtroom on October 17, 1770. Murmurs and rumblings of anger filled the air. Captain Thomas Preston, a British grenadier, shifted his feet nervously and felt the sweat rising to his brow.
That is what these Bostonians wanted! The only hope for Preston and his men lay with this short, stocky country lawyer—a colonial American after all—John Adams, and his too young assistant Josiah Quincy. Seven months had passed since the “horrid, bloody massacre” took place on the 5thof March.
The “Plea of Clergy” meant that instead of death, the two men would be branded on the thumbs as first offenders, never to be permitted to violate the law again.
John Adams was born on October 30, 1735, to his father, John Adams Sr., and his mother, Susanna Boylston, and had two younger brothers, Peter and Elihu.
The Boston Massacre was a conflict in Boston on March 5, 1770. British soldiers shot and killed many people, perceiving them as a mob, and leading patriots including Paul Revere and Samuel Adams heavily publicized the event.
Following the Boston Massacre, Captain Thomas Preston, eight British soldiers, and five British civilians were charged for murder. They were exposed to the possibility of execution and could not find a defense team as they would have to defend them in the anti-British city of Boston.
These days, criminal defense lawyers regularly take John Adams’s defense of the British soldiers to to represent specific clients. He did not blame the city for initiating the riot and focused on facts.
It is generally unsatisfying to get a mixed verdict in a case involving so much passion and emotion. However, these cases serve as a compelling example, and the Boston Massacre trial was among these trials.
Eight British soldiers and their officer in charge, Captain Thomas Preston, faced charges for murdering five colonists. Not far from the Custom House, a 34-year-old Boston attorney sat in his office ...
Not far from the Custom House, a 34-year-old Boston attorney sat in his office and made a difficult decision. Although a devout patriot, John Adams agreed to risk his family’s livelihood and defend the British soldiers and their commander in a Boston courtroom. At stake was not just the fate of nine men, but the relationship between ...
The blood remained fresh on the snow outside Boston’s Custom House on the morning of March 6 , 1770. Hours earlier, rising tensions between British troops and colonists had exploded into violence when a band of Redcoats opened fire on a crowd that had pelted them with not just taunts, but ice, oyster shells and broken glass. Although the soldiers claimed to have acted in self-defense, patriot propaganda referred to the incident as the Boston Massacre. Eight British soldiers and their officer in charge, Captain Thomas Preston, faced charges for murdering five colonists.
In the new book John Adams Under Fire: The Founding Father’s Fight for Justice in the Boston Massacre Murder Trial, Dan Abrams and coauthor David Fisher detail what they call the “most important case in colonial American history” and an important landmark in the development of American jurisprudence. Abrams, who is also the chief legal affairs ...
Stunningly so. I think the verdicts are almost exactly what we would see today. It’s obvious to me that Captain Preston didn’t order his men to fire, and he was acquitted. They could have convicted all the soldiers for the actions of one or two of them, but they didn’t—because there simply wasn’t evidence that the others were involved in the shooting. And I think that’s an amazing testament to the jurors of the day.
Adams didn’t blame the city for initiating the skirmish. He kept it very, very focused on the facts of this particular instance—what happened, who was there, the specific individuals—and did not make it a broader indictment of the Sons of Liberty and others who had supported violence against the British soldiers.
The Boston Massacre (known in Great Britain as the Incident on King Street ) was a confrontation in Boston on March 5, 1770, in which a group of nine British soldiers shot five people out of a crowd of three or four hundred who were abusing them verbally and throwing various missiles. The event was heavily publicized as "a massacre" by leading Patriots such as Paul Revere and Samuel …
• List of massacres in the United States
• Timeline of United States revolutionary history (1760–1789)
• A Fair Account of the Late Unhappy Disturbance at Boston. London: B. White. 1770. p. 3. OCLC 535966548. Original printing of a reply to "A Short Narrative…", supplying several depositions, including that of Lieutenant-Governor Hutchinson, which were left out of the Narrative.
• A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre. London: W. Bingley. 1770. OCLC 510892519. Original printing of the report of a committee of the town of Boston.
• Hinderaker, Eric (2017). Boston's Massacre. Belknap Press: An Imprint of Harvard University Press. ISBN 978-0674048331.
• Reid, John Phillip (1974). "A Lawyer Acquitted: John Adams and the Boston Massacre". American Journal of Legal History. 18 (3): 189–207. doi:10.2307/845085. ISSN 0002-9319. JSTOR 845085.