Hello and welcome to a history of the United States. Episode 136, the Boston Massacre. Last time out,

we looked at the Townsend crisis. In response to the highly unpopular Townsend duties, a non-importation

movement had spread around America. It was even supported by noted Virginia gentlemen George

Washington. But its heart and soul was in Boston, where the customs commissioners had been

forced out of the city and the army was brought in to keep them safe. The British decided that

the towns and duties were not worth it, and Prime Minister Lord North announced

his intention to repeal them on March 5th, 1770. I left the episode on a bit of a cliffhanger,

but when we dive into events in Boston, the SS narrative will eventually take us straight

to the revolution, so I want to take a quick moment to look at the

changing nature of the frontier. Since Pontiac's bore, our attention has been glued to the

cities of the Atlantic coast, particularly Boston, but the area of British influence had

dramatically expanded.

Not only were the British pulled deep into the American interior,

but they also had a new set of Canadian colonies in the north and the two Florida's in the south.

The British discouraged settlement of the interior, and encouraged people to migrate to Canada and Florida.

This had a lot of logic to it.

Pontiac's War had shown the British the dangers and the costs of hostilities with the Native American tribes. That was trouble they could do without.

They had brand new colonies that were on the Atlantic coast, which meant much better communication

and supply lines with Brisbane. While making sense on paper, in practice it was bound to fail.

There were still Native Americans living in Ontario, and further north, Canada, was, well, cold.

It was very cold. There were long winters and it wasn't a particularly appealing option. There were ideas of creating

settlements on Cape Breton Island and Prince Edward Island, but these weren't actually carried out.

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