The Mob of 1770

Snowball fights can be fun. However, the snowball fight outside the Boston Custom House on March 5, 1770, turned deadly.

Eight British soldiers under the command of British Captain Thomas Preston were besieged by a mob of colonial dock workers, pelting them with snowballs in an unfriendly fight.

The soldiers fired into the mob and killed five of them.

Samuel Adams published the story, and it was known as the Boston Massacre. Bostonians loudly demanded justice.

If the captain had been found guilty, all the blame would be on him. But if found not guilty, the blame would be put on the soldiers. The captain was found to be not guilty. So the British authorities made the eight Redcoats scapegoats.

The men knew they needed a good lawyer. John Adams, an ardent anti-British patriot, felt it was his duty and took on their case.

The soldiers and Mr. Adams were ridiculed in court, and Adams faced cold stares and hostility on the streets. 

The defense attorney, John Adams, argued the mob was an unlawful assembly. The soldiers had no choice but to defend themselves. His argument persuaded the jury to declare six of the Redcoats not guilty and two guilty of manslaughter. The two men found guilty chose to be branded rather than go to prison, which was part of the common law at the time. No one went to prison.

John Adams later became the second President of the United States.