Samuel Adams Brews Rebellion

HISTORY This Week

The HISTORY® Channel

History, Education, Society & Culture

4.6 • 3.9K Ratings

🗓️ 12 December 2022

⏱️ 35 minutes

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Summary

December 16, 1773. Samuel Adams sits in a crowded meeting of American colonists at Boston’s Old South Meeting House. He’s watching small groups of men slip quietly out the door. Once outside, the men don disguises and make their way toward three ships moored in the harbor – each weighted down with chests of valuable British East India tea. The men climb aboard, tear open the chests and dump the tea in the water. Cheers fill the winter night. Back at the meeting, Samuel Adams waits. There’s nothing directly tying him to this radical act of rebellion … but few doubt he’s behind it. How did a chronic underachiever help light the fuse of the American revolution? And why has this important Founding Father largely been forgotten?

Special thanks to our guest, Stacy Schiff, author of The Revolutionary: Samuel Adams.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	The History Channel, original podcast.
0:04.8	History this week, December 16, 1773.
0:10.8	I'm Sally Helm.
0:13.8	The men had just a few hours notice.
0:16.8	It'll happen tonight.
0:19.4	Gather your disguises, gather your resolve,
0:22.6	wait for the signal to strike.
0:26.2	Three British ships are anchored in Boston Harbor.
0:29.4	Unable to unload their store of tea.
0:33.4	Because the American colonists have been protesting a tariff on that tea,
0:37.4	negotiating to keep the British from importing more of it.
0:40.8	As of today, those negotiations have failed.
0:45.2	Nothing to do now, the colonists think,
0:47.8	but throw that tea into the harbor.
0:54.8	Sounds disorderly, even chaotic.
0:57.2	But it all unfolds with great precision and secrecy.
1:03.4	On this night, December 16,
1:05.2	there's a big gathering at Boston's old South Meeting House,
1:08.8	American colonial leaders talking about this tariff business.
1:12.0	And at the appointed moment,
1:15.0	a group of men rise from their pews in the meeting house.
1:19.2	They slip into the streets, walking together towards Griffin's Wharf.
	...

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