The New York Tea Party

The New York Tea Party
by Mary Tsaltas-Ottomanelli

Introduction

From the Stamp Act riots to the Battle of Golden Hill to Liberty Poles and a Tea Party, New York City was a hot spot for major revolutionary events. These incidents have one thing in common: the involvement of the Sons of Liberty. The Sons of Liberty were a patriotic group founded in 1765 in opposition to the Stamp Act, which often used extreme forms of protest against the loyalists and local Tory governments.  After the passage of the Stamp Act in 1765, they referred to Governor Cadwallader Colden as "the Chief Murderer of their Rights and Privileges." They later hung an effigy of the Governor alongside the devil.[i]

Of all their protests, the one most overlooked in New York City was the Tea Party in April 1774. The most famous in Boston on December 16, 1773. Tea Parties occurred throughout the colonies after the passing of the Tea Act in 1773. In order to understand why there were tea parties, you must understand why the colonists were frustrated enough to destroy the tea.

By the early 1770s, England's North American colony's economy was reeling from the Seven Years War.  The 1750s brought the colonies prosperity; merchants were selling goods and supplies to the British army. By the 1760s, the war moved into the Caribbean, and the colonies were left with a surplus of goods without anyone with purchasing power. In order to alleviate their national debt, the British government attempted to tax the colonies. The British government viewed the taxes as necessary in order to quarter the British army in the colonies for protection against the French and other enemies of the crown. This led to a series of taxes, including the Sugar Act (1764), Stamp Act (1765), and Townshend Acts (1767). After nearly a decade of taxes put upon them, the colonists viewed the Tea Act in 1773 as the last grievance they could tolerate. 

Colonial Reaction to the Tea Act

Approved on May 10, 1773, the Tea Act granted the East India Company a monopoly on tea in the colonies with the intention for the Company to repay their debt by selling a considerable amount of unsold tea stored in London. Parliament believed that the Company's tea would sell faster than the smuggled Dutch tea, and their debt would be repaid quickly. Often overlooked is that the monopoly given to the Company was not just for tea. They were also importing "vast quantities of silks, calicoes, and other fabrics, spices, drugs, and chinaware, all commodities of staple demand."[ii]

On September 6, 1773, the Tea Act was printed in the New-York Gazette, along with the news that 600 chests of Company tea were already en-route to the colonies. The city was outraged; the Tea Act was a flagrant extension of the Indemnity Act* because it granted the Company more power over the colonies' supply of goods. By building government-granted East India outposts, colonists must rely on their supply and price of goods of the Company.

By November, founding members Isaac Sears and Alexander McDougall formally reorganized the Sons of Liberty. They began dispatching the news to their allies in the colonies to reject the Tea Act. The Sons of Liberty's first opposition to the Tea Act was the formation of the Committee of Vigilance, which resolved to protect the city's harbor from any ship entering with East India Tea. Alexander McDougall began publishing a series of "alarms" under the pseudonym "Hampden." On October 28th, 1773, in the New York Journal, he wrote "if you receive the portion [of tea] designed for this city, you will in future have an India warehouse here; and the trade of all the commodities of that country will be lost to your merchants and be carried on by the Company, which will be an immense loss to the colony.[iii]

On December 15, 1773, two-hundred New York merchants, lawyers, artisans, and other businessmen signed a petition against the importation of any Company tea. The petition boldly proclaimed "execution of that Act, involves our slavery, and would sap the foundation of our freedom, whereby we should become slaves to our brethren...born to no greater stock of freedom than the Americans-the merchants and inhabitants of this city, in conjunction with the merchants and inhabitants of the ancient American colonies, entered into an agreement to decline a part of their commerce with Great Britain, until the above-mentioned Act should be totally repealed.”[iv]

At the bottom, five resolutions state anyone knowingly shipping, purchasing, selling, or even aiding to move goods off a ship in the harbor “shall be deemed an enemy to the liberties of America.”[v] Two days later, nearly three thousand New Yorkers gathered at City Hall protesting against the Tea Act, pledging to use force against the East India Company and elected a Committee of Correspondence, spearheaded by McDougall, Sears, and John Lamb.[vi]

The Boston Tea Party

The New York Sons of Liberty received news of the Boston Tea Party on December 20th by express rider Paul Revere. The letter informed other colonies of their Tea Party. The letter stated, "their conduct last night surprised the admiral and English gentlemen, who observed that these were not a mob of disorderly rabble, (as they have been reported), but men of sense, coolness and intrepidity.”[vii] They were also warned about the Nancy, a ship carrying tea that heading towards their harbor. Shortly after, New York Governor William Tryon wrote to the Earl of Dartmouth, fearing that "the landing, storing & safe keeping of the Tea when stored could be accomplished [only] under the Protection of the Point of the Bayonet and Muzzle of the Cannon…”[viii]

By the end of the year, Governor Tryon negotiated an agreement with the Sons, promising that he would not allow tea into the harbor. At the same time, the Sons agreed to assist ships carrying tea to procure provisions for their return voyage.

By 1774, most of the smuggled tea entered through the ports in New York, Philadelphia, and Boston. In Samuel Seabury's 1774 Essay Free Thoughts on the Proceedings of the Continental Congress, he states that in New York, "it is well known that little or no tea has been entered at the Customs House for several years. All that is imported is smuggled from Holland, and the Dutch Islands in the West Indies.”[ix]

It was complicated to police the amount of imported smuggled tea. In New York alone, there were miles of unmonitored coastline by custom officials, who often accepted bribes themselves. From December 1770 until 1775, there were only 874 pounds of reported dutied tea that entered New York.[x]

The Nancy Archives

As the weeks turned into months waiting for the Nancy, the Sons became more and more impatient with its impending arrival. Finally, on April 18th, 1774, the Nancy arrived in Sandy Hook, Long Island, carrying 698 chests of tea. For reference, this was double the amount destroyed in Boston. A letter by the Sons of Liberty was sent to Captain Lockyer warning “him of the determined Revolution of the Citizens not to suffer the Tea on board of his Ship to be landed.”[xi] The Pilot refused to take the ship further into the harbor, and the smaller boats were chained and padlocked by the Sons to make sure the crew did not desert. Under threat, Lockyer was escorted into the city to gather supplies for his ship and crew to make the voyage back to London. Lockyer’s consignee, Henry White, Esq, refused to receive the tea and advised it to be returned to London. Chambers was quartered at the Coffee House on Wall Street.

On the 21st the Vigilance Committee distributed a handbill to the city:

The London Arrives April 21, 1774

As the Vigilance Committee was managing the departure of the Nancy, they received information from Philadelphia that “the Capt. Chambers of the Ship London, of this Port, had taken on Board at the Port of London, 18 Boxes of fine Tea.”[xii] Chambers, who frequently sailed from New York to London, was reported in the Gazette as “one of the First who refused to take the India Company Tea on Freight the last summer, for which he received the Thanks of the Citizens.”[xiii]

A notice published by the Committee on April 21, 1774 states:
Friday at Noon Capt. Chambers came into the Hook, the Pilot asked him if he had any Tea on board.  He declared he had none… He was then told it was vain to deny it, for there was good Proof of its being on board, for it would be found, as there were Committees appointed to open every Package ad that he had better be open and candid about it; and demanded the Cocket for the Tea; upon which he confessed it was on board.[xiv]

While the Committee deliberated on how to proceed with Chambers and his tea, New Yorkers became restless and were determined to remove the tea from the ship themselves. On the night of April 22nd, an angry mob formed on the wharf and boarded the ship broke open eighteen chests and dumped the contents into the river. Unlike Boston, the mob, openly defiant of local government, did not disguise themselves and could be easily identified by hundreds of witnesses.

At 9 am the next morning, one of the largest mobs congregated in front of Fraunces Tavern for Lockyer's apology before being escorted to the ship at Murray's Wharf. When Lockyer addressed the crowd, he "thanked the citizens and the Sons of Liberty for the consideration shown him throughout the unfortunate circumstances in which he had found himself in.”[xv] In addition, Captain Chambers was to return to London on the Nancy as a passenger and also escorted onto the ship. As the ship left the harbor, "every bell in the city rang…the ships in the harbor raised their colors in triumph, the Liberty Pole was dressed in colors' and a royal salute of artillery…concluded the ceremony.”[xvi] The farewell celebration for Lockyer was so nonsensical; had you not known the circumstances around his departure, one could have thought the cannon fire and festivities were fit for a king.

The Aftermath

These tea parties were just a sliver of growing animosity against the Crown and Parliament. These events pushed the city into an even greater divide of Whig against Tory. Although many historians often look towards John Adams' Rule of Thirds, it is entirely impossible to quantify the political division in the colonies at this time. The political climate in New York City, however, was proven to be very turbulent. 

Immediately after the Tea Party, newspapers reported the incident in very different ways. On April 28th, 1774, James Rivington's The New York Gazetteer loyalist-leaning newspaper printed:What is the Committee of Observation? By whom were they appointed? and what authority had they to order Capt. Chambers, or any body else, to attend them at Mr. Francis’s, or any other place whatsoever? Who says, and upon what authority does he say, that the sense of the city was asked, relatively, either to the sending away Capt. Lockyer, or the destruction of the tea on board the London? Has not every London Captain brought tea, under the same circumstances? And, if so, what were the Apostates that informed against the unfortunate man, who was threatened with DEATH for obeying the laws of his country?[xvii]

This was the beginning of Rivington's dangerous relationship with the Sons of Liberty. In May 1775, the Sons burned down Rivington's home and printing office (converting his lead into bullets) and hanged an effigy of him.  

The Road to Revolution

After the tea parties, colonists quickly associated drinking tea with being unpatriotic. Shortly after the Boston Tea Party, John Adams wrote to his wife, Abigail, “Tea must be universally renounced, and I must be weaned, and the sooner the better.” [xviii] The push to reject the East India Tea also came from prominent merchants. John Hancock, a known tea smuggler, had his inventory seized by customs officials. With the implementation of the Coercive Acts in 1774, the occupation in Boston was described as “so palpably cruel, barbarous, and inhumane, that even those who we called the friends complain bitterly of it.”[xix] Colonies quickly pledged their support to Boston and encouraged radicalism within their cities. In 1774, New York merchants “refused letting their vessels to the tools of the government” to transport any supplies for military use to Boston.[xx]

Colonists began disobeying the local governments in favor of asserting their self-authority by ignoring parliamentary statutes and refusing trade with Britain. In 1775, Lord North wrote to his brother about seeking punishment in Boston, stating, “if they deny authority in one instance, it goes to all. We must control them or submit to them.”[xxi] There was no going back after this – the colonies were to submit or be suppressed.

By the end of May 1774, New Yorkers formed the General Committee of the Fifty-One “to correspond with our sister Colonies upon all matters of moment.”[xxii] Isaac Low lead the Committee’s first meeting at Fraunces Tavern on May 16, 1774. The Committee’s member was filled with names we know today: Philip Livingston, John Jay, and James Duane. By November, the Committee of Fifty-One was nominating delegates to send to the First Continental Congress, where twelve of the thirteen colonies drafted a declaration of rights and grievances against the British government. On October 20, 1774, the First Continental Congress passed “a sweeping nonimportation, nonexportation, and nonconsumption proclamation.[xxiii]” As time went, radical colonists began disobeying the local governments in favor of asserting their own authority by ignoring parliamentary statutes and refusing trade with Britain.

The formation of the Sons of Liberty was a powerhouse for major political change in the colonies. Their provocations of liberty poles, tar and featherings, and tea parties were messages that were well received by the British government. The execution of ten successful tea parties demonstrates their ability to radicalize and gain support from wealthy merchants to struggling artisans in the name of liberty against tyranny. These Sons of Liberty protested for nearly a decade against authoritative rule and continued to lead the fight for independence for nearly another decade.

*Before the Tea Act, colonists had a tax on tea under the Indemnity Act of 1767. Part of the Townshend Acts, it reduced the Company’s taxes when importing tea into England, simultaneously allowing them to lower the costs of tea imported into the colonies. The intent was by not taxing the Company’s tea, it would be cheaper to purchase than the highly popular and extremely smuggled Dutch tea. Even with this price reduction, colonists still consumed more Dutch tea. This blunder costed the East India Company an estimated £40,000 loss in annual revenue by the early 1770s (with the conversion rate, this totals $4,325,140.51 in 2020).

Bibliography

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Irvin, Benjamin H. "Tar, Feathers, and the Enemies of American Liberties, 1768-1776." The New England Quarterly 76, no. 2 (2003): 197-238. 

Ketchum, Richard M. Divided Loyalties, How the American Revolution Came to New York. New York, NY: Macmillan, 2003.

Ramsbey, Thomas W. "The Sons of Liberty: The Early Inter-Colonial Organization.” International Review of Modern Sociology 17, no. 2 (1987): 313-35.

Schlesinger, Arthur Meier. "The Uprising Against the East India Company." Political Science Quarterly 32, no. 1 (1917): 60-79.

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Ulkers, William H. All About Tea. Vol. 1. New York, NY: The Tea and Coffee Trade Journal Company, 1935.

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[i] "Cadwallader Colden and the New York Stamp Act Riots." Pg. 561
[ii] "The Uprising Against the East India Company." Pg. 72
[iii] Hampden Pseud. The alarm. Number V. New York. October 27th. New York Journal, 1773.
[iv] The Association of the Sons of Liberty; Declaration December 15, 1773. Access from Yale Law School The Avalon Project,
[v] Ibid.
[vi] Gotham, Pg. 215
[vii] The Life of Colonel Paul Revere, Pg. 131
[viii] Divided Loyalties, pg. 335
[ix] Samuel Seabury, Free Thoughts on the Proceedings of the Congress at Philadelphia. November 16, 1774
[x] The Uprising Against the East India Company, Pg. 64|
[xi] “New York Tea Party.” New-York Gazette. April 25, 1774.
[xii] New York Tea Party, New-York Gazette
[xiii] New York Tea Party, New-York Gazette
[xiv] New York Tea Party, New-York Gazette
[xv] All About the Tea, Pg. 63.
[xvi] Reminiscences of the City of New York. Pg. 31
[xvii] American Archives, Pg. 251
[xviii] Drinking History, Pg. 50.
[xix] Sons of Liberty, Sons of Licentiousness, Pg. 194.
[xx] To the Public (Merchants of this City). New-York Gazette, September 14, 1774.
[xxi] Divided Loyalties, Pg. 351.
[xxii] Reminiscences of the City of New York. Pg. 31
[xxiii] Sons of Liberty, Sons of Licentiousness. Pg. 197