Stage-coach and Tavern Days

“Within the course of the year, before the meeting of Congress in 1774, on a journey to some of our circuit courts in Massachusetts, I stopped one night at a tavern in Shrewsbury about forty miles from Boston, and as I was cold and wet, I sat down at a good fire in the bar-room to dry my great-coat and saddle-bags, till a fire could be made in my chamber. There presently came in, one after another, half a dozen, or half a score substantial yeomen of the neighborhood, who, sitting down to the fire after lighting their pipes, began a lively conversation on politics. As I believed I was unknown to all of them, I sat in total silence to hear them. One said, ‘The people of Boston are distracted.’ Another answered, ‘No wonder the people of Boston are distracted. Oppression will make wise men mad.’ A third said, ‘What would you say if a fellow should come to your house and tell you he was come to take a list of your cattle, that Parliament might tax you for them at so much a head? And how should you feel if he was to go and break open your barn or take down your oxen, cows, horses, and sheep?’ ‘What should I say?’ replied the first, ‘I would knock him in the head.’ ‘Well,’ said a fourth, ‘if Parliament can take away Mr. Hancock’s wharf and Mr. Rowe’s wharf, they can take away your barn and my house.’ After much more reasoning in this style, a fifth, who had as yet been silent, broke out: ‘Well, it’s high time for us to rebel; we must rebel some time or other, and we had better rebel now than at any time to come. If we put it off for ten or twenty years, and let them go on as they have begun, they will get a strong party among us, and plague us a great deal more than they can now.’”

These discussions soon brought decisions, and by 1768 the Sons of Liberty were organized and were holding their meetings, explaining conditions, and advocating union and action. They adopted the name given by Colonel Barré to the enemies of passive obedience in America. Soon scores of towns in the colonies had their liberty trees or liberty poles.

These patriots grew amazingly bold in proclaiming their dissatisfaction with the Crown and their allegiance to their new nation. The landlord of the tavern at York, Maine, speedily set up a sign-board bearing a portrait of Pitt and the words, “Entertainment for the Sons of Liberty.” Young women formed into companies called Daughters of Liberty, pledged to wear homespun and drink no tea. I have told the story of feminine revolt at length in my book Colonial Dames and Goodwives. John Adams glowed with enthusiasm when he heard two Worcester girls sing the “New Liberty Song,” in a Worcester tavern. In 1768 a Liberty Tree was dedicated in Providence, Rhode Island. It was a vast elm which stood in the dooryard of the Olney Tavern on Constitution Hill. On a platform built in its branches about twenty feet from the ground, stood the orator of the day, and in an eloquent discourse dedicated the tree to the cause of Liberty. In the trying years that followed, the wise fathers and young enthusiasts of Providence gathered under its branches for counsel. The most famous of these trees of patriotism was the Liberty Tree of Boston. It stood near a tavern of the same name at the junction of Essex and Washington streets, then known as Hanover Square. The name was given in 1765 at a patriotic celebration in honor of the expected repeal of the Stamp Act. Even before that time effigies of Lord Oliver and a boot for Lord Bute, placards and mottoes had hung from its branches. A metal plate was soon attached to it, bearing this legend, “This tree was planted in 1646 and pruned by order of the Sons of Liberty February 14, 1766.” Under the tree and at the tavern met all patriot bands, until the tree was cut down by the roistering British soldiers and supplied them with fourteen cords of firewood. The tavern stood till 1833. A picture of the Boston Liberty Tree and Tavern of the same name is shown on the opposite page. It is from an old drawing.

The fourteenth of August, 1769, was a merry day in Boston and vicinity. The Sons of Liberty, after assembling at the Liberty Tree in Boston, all adjourned for dinner at the Liberty Tree Tavern, or Robinson’s Tavern in Dorchester. Tables were spread in an adjoining field under a tent, and over three hundred people sat down to an abundant feast, which included three barbecued pigs. Speeches and songs inspired and livened the diners. The last toast given was, “Strong halters, firm blocks, and sharp axes to all such as deserve them.” At five o’clock the Boston Sons, headed by John Hancock in his chariot, started for home. Although fourteen toasts were given in Boston and forty-five in Dorchester, John Adams says in his Diary that “to the honor of the Sons I did not see one person intoxicated or near it.”

The tavern in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, known by the sign of Earl of Halifax, was regarded by Portsmouth patriots as a hotbed of Tories. It had always been the resort of Government officials; and in 1775, the meeting of these laced and ruffled gentlemen became most obnoxious to the Sons of Liberty, and soon a mob gathered in front of the tavern, and the irate landlord heard the blows of an axe cutting down his Earl of Halifax sign-post. Seizing an axe he thrust it into the hands of one of his powerful negro slaves, telling him to go and threaten the chopper of the sign-post. Excited by the riotous scene, the black man, without a word, at once dealt a powerful blow upon the head of a man named Noble, who was wielding the encroaching axe. Noble lived forty years after this blow, but never had his reason. This terrible assault of course enraged the mob, and a general assault was made on the tavern; windows and doors were broken; Landlord Stavers fled on horseback, and the terrified black man was found in a cistern in the tavern cellar, up to his chin in water. When Stavers returned, he was seized by the Committee of Safety and thrust into Exeter jail. He took the oath of allegiance and returned to his battered house. He would not reglaze the broken windows, but boarded them up, and it is said that many a distinguished group of officers feasted in rooms without a pane of glass in the windows.

Popular opinion was against the Earl of Halifax, however, and when the old sign-board was touched up, the name of William Pitt, the friend of America, appeared on the sign.

The portion of the old Earl of Halifax or Stavers Inn which is still standing is shown in its forlorn old age on the opposite page.

Mr. George Davenport, of Boston, a lineal descendant of old William Davenport, owns one of the most interesting tavern bills I have ever seen. It is of the old Wolfe Tavern at Newburyport. To those who can read between the lines it reveals means and methods which were calculated to arouse enthusiasm and create public sentiment during the exciting days of the Stamp Act. The bill and its items read thus: —

“Dr. Messrs. Joseph Stanwood & Others of the Town of Newburyport for Sunday expences at My House on Thirsday, Septr. 26th, A.D. 1765. At the Grate Uneasiness and Tumult on Occasion of the Stamp Act.

Newbury Port 28 Sept. 1765.

Errors excepted William Davenport.”

There was also a credit account of eleven pounds received in various sums from Captain Robud, Richard Farrow, and one Celeby.

It is impossible to do more than to name, almost at haphazard, a few of the taverns that had some share in scenes of Revolutionary struggle. Many served as court-rooms when court-martials were held; others were seized for military prisons; others were fired upon; others served as barracks; some as officers’ headquarters; others held secret meetings of patriots; many were used as hospitals.

Many an old tavern is still standing which saw these scenes in the Revolutionary War. A splendid group of these hale and hearty old veterans is found in the rural towns near Boston. At the Wright Tavern, in Concord (shown on page 417), lodged Major Pitcairn, the British commander, and in the parlor on the morning before the battle of Concord, he stirred his glass of brandy with his bloody finger, saying he would thus stir the rebel’s blood before night. The Monroe Tavern, of Lexington (facing page 406 (#Page_406)), was the headquarters of Lord Percy on the famous 19th of April, 1775. The Buckman Tavern, of the same town (page 23 (#Page_23)), was the rallying place of the Minute Men on April 18th, and contains many a bullet hole made by the shots of British soldiers. The Cooper Tavern (page 68) and the Russel Tavern (page 379 (#Page_380)), both of Arlington, were also scenes of activity and participation in the war. The Wayside Inn of Sudbury (page 372 (#Page_372)) and the Black Horse Tavern of Winchester were the scenes of the reassembling of the soldiers after the battle of Lexington.

On the south side of Faneuil Hall Square in Boston, a narrow passageway leads into the gloomy recesses of a yard or court of irregular shape; this is Corn Court, and in the middle of this court stands, overshadowed by tall modern neighbors, the oldest inn in Boston. It has been raised and added to, and disfigured with vast painted signs, and hideous fire escapes, but within still retains its taproom and ancient appearance. As early as 1634, Samuel Cole had an ordinary on this spot, and in 1636, Governor Vane entertained there Miantonomah and his twenty warriors. This building, built nearly two centuries ago, was given the name of Hancock in 1780, when he became governor. In 1794, Talleyrand was a guest at this old hostelry, and Louis Philippe in 1797. Washington, Franklin, and scores of other patriots have tarried within its walls; and in its taproom were held meetings of the historic Boston Tea-party.

The Green Dragon Inn was one of the most famous of historic taverns. A representation of it from an old print is shown on page 187 (#Page_187). The metal dragon which gave the name projected from the wall on an iron rod.

Warren was the first Grand Master of the first Grand Lodge of Masons that held its meetings at this inn; and other patriots came to the inn to confer with him on the troublous times. The inn was a famous resort for the sturdy mechanics of the North End. Paul Revere wrote: —

“In the fall of 1774 and winter of 1775, I was one of upwards of thirty men, chiefly mechanics, who formed ourselves with a Committee for the purpose of watching the movements of the British soldiers and gaining every intelligence of the movements of the Tories. We held our meetings at the Green Dragon Tavern. This committee were astonished to find all their secrets known to General Gage, although every time they met every member swore not to reveal their transactions even to Hancock, Adams, Otis, Warren or Church.”

The latter, Dr. Church, proved to be the traitor. The mass meeting of these mechanics and their friends held in this inn when the question of the adoption of the Federal Constitution was being considered was deemed by Samuel Adams one of the most important factors of its acceptance. Daniel Webster styled the Green Dragon the Headquarters of the Revolution. During the war it was used as a hospital.

It is pleasant to note how many old taverns in New England, though no longer public hostelries, still are occupied by descendants of the original owners. Such is the home of Hon. John Winn in Burlington, Massachusetts. It stands on the road to Lowell by way of Woburn, about eleven miles out of Boston. The house was used at the time of the battle of Bunker Hill as a storage-place for the valuables of Boston and Charlestown families. The present home of the Winns was built in 1734 upon the exact site of the house built in 1640 by the first Edward Winn, the emigrant. In it the first white child was born in the town of Woburn, December 5, 1641.

The tavern was kept in Revolutionary days by Lieutenant Joseph Winn, who marched off to join the Lexington farmers on April 19, 1775, at two o’clock in the morning, when the alarm came “to every Middlesex village and farm” to gather against the redcoats. He came home late that night, and fought again at Bunker Hill.

The tavern sign bore the coat of arms of the Winns; it was – not to use strict heraldic terms – three spread eagles on a shield. As it was not painted with any too strict obedience to the rules of heraldry or art, nor was it hung in a community that had any very profound knowledge or reverence on either subject, the three noble birds soon received a comparatively degraded title, and the sign-board and tavern were known as the Three Broiled Chickens.

A building in New York which was owned by the De Lanceys before it became a public house is still standing on the southeast corner of Broad and Pearl streets; its name is well known to-day, Fraunces’ Tavern. This name came from the stewardship of Samuel Fraunces, “Black Sam,” a soldier of the American Revolution. The tavern originally bore a sign with the device of the head of Queen Charlotte, and was known as the Queen’s Head, but in Revolutionary times Black Sam was a patriot, and in his house were held many patriotic and public meetings. The most famous of these meetings, one which has given the name of Washington’s Headquarters to the tavern, was held in the Long Room on December 4, 1783: whereat Washington sadly bade farewell to his fellow-officers who had fought with him in the War for Independence. In this room, ten days previously, had been celebrated the evacuation of the city of New York by the British, by a dinner given to General Washington by Governor Clinton, at which the significant thirteen toasts were drunk to the new nation. Black Sam was a public benefactor as well as a patriot. He established a course of lectures on natural philosophy, and opened an exhibition of wax figures, seventy in all, for the amusement of New Yorkers. His story, and that of the tavern bearing his name, have been told at length many times in print.

Another interesting Revolutionary inn in New York was the Golden Hill Inn. The general estimate of the date of its building is 1694; then 122 William Street was a golden grainfield, on one corner of the Damon Farm. After three-quarters of a century of good hospitality it was chosen as the headquarters of the Sons of Liberty in New York, and within its walls gathered the committee in 1769, to protest against Lieutenant-governor Colden’s dictum that the colonists must pay for supplies for the British soldiers. The result was a call for a meeting of the citizens and the governor’s angry offer of a reward for knowledge of the place of meeting. The cutting down of the liberty pole on the night of January 17, 1770, and the seizure of four red-coats by the patriots ended in a fight in the inn garden and the death of one patriot. A century of stirring life followed until 1896, when the old tavern sadly closed its doors under the pressure of the Raines Law.

The Keeler Tavern was a famous hostelry for travellers between New York and Boston. Its old sign-board is shown on page 205 (#Page_205). During the Revolution, landlord Keeler was well known to be a patriot, and was suspected of manufacturing cartridges in his tavern. The British poured a special fire upon the building, and one cannon ball lodged in a timber on the north side of the house still is to be seen by drawing aside the shingle that usually conceals it. A companion cannon ball whistled so close to a man who was climbing the stairs of the house that he tumbled down backward screaming, “I’m a dead man,” until his friends with difficulty silenced him, and assured him he was living. A son of the landlord, Jeremiah Keeler, enlisted in the Continental army when but seventeen; he became a sergeant, and was the first man to scale the English breastworks at Yorktown. He was presented with a sword by his commanding officer, Lafayette, and it is still preserved.

When Lafayette made his triumphal progress through the United States in 1824, he visited Ridgefield and the tavern to see Jeremiah Keeler, and a big ball was given in the tavern in his honor. Jerome Bonaparte and his beautiful Baltimore bride stopped there in 1804. Oliver Wolcott and Timothy Pickering were other sojourners under its roof. Peter Parley gave to the Keeler Tavern the palm for good cooking.

The old Conkey Tavern at Prescott, Massachusetts, saw the gathering of a very futile but picturesque windstorm of Revolutionary grievance. It was built in 1758 by William Conkey, on a lovely but lonely valley midway between the east and west hills of Pelham. The Swift River running through this valley was made the boundary in the town division in 1822, which made eastern Pelham into Prescott. Captain Daniel Shays, the leader of Shays’ Rebellion, lived half a mile from the tavern on the Centre Range Road. In the cheerful rooms of this tavern, Shays, aided by the well-stocked tavern-bar, incited the debt-burdened farmers to rebel against their state government. Here he drilled his “flood-wood,” and from hence he led them forth to Springfield, and on January 25, 1787, was promptly repulsed by the state militia under General Lincoln. Eleven hundred men trooped back to Pelham, and after four days of what must have proved scant and cold fare in those barren winter hilltops, again sallied out to Petersham. Here he was again routed by Lincoln, who, with his men, had marched thirty miles without halt, from eight o’clock at night to nine the following morning through a blinding, northeast New England snowstorm. A hundred and fifty of Shays’ men were captured, but their valiant and wordy leader escaped.

When the photograph (shown opposite page 188 (#Page_189)) was taken, in 1883, the old timbers within the house were sound and firm, and the beams overhead still bore the marks of the muskets of Shays’ impatient men. It was a characteristic “deserted home” of New England.

Nothing could more fully picture Whittier’s lines: —

“Against the wooded hills it stands,
Ghost of a dead house; staring through
Its broken lights on wasted lands
Where old-time harvests grew.

“Unploughed, unsown, by scythe unshorn,
The poor forsaken farm-fields lie,
Once rich and rife with golden corn
And pale-green breadths of rye.

“So sad, so drear; it seems almost
Some haunting Presence makes its sign,
That down some shadowy lane some ghost
Might drive his spectral kine.”

Since then the old tavern has fallen down, a sad ruin, like many another on New England hills, in a country as wild and lonely, probably far lonelier, than in the days of the Revolution and Shays’ Rebellion. The sign-board (page 190 (#Page_190)) is still preserved.

Eighteenth-century taverns had a special function which had a bearing on their war relations; they were “improved” as recruiting offices. During the years 1742 to 1748, and from 1756 to 1763, while England was at war with France, the “listing” was brisk. Here is a typical advertisement dated 1759: —

“All able-bodied fit Men that have an Inclination to serve his Majesty King George the Second, in the First Independent Company of Rangers, now in the Province of Nova Scotia commanded by Joseph Gorham, Esq.; shall, on enlisting, receive good Pay and Cloathing, a large Bounty, with a Crown to drink the King’s Health. And by repairing to the Sign of the Bear in King-Street, Boston, and to Mr. Cornelius Crocker, Innholder in Barnstable, may hear the particular Encouragement, and many Advantages accruing to a Soldier, in the Course of the Duty of that Company, too long to insert here; and further may depend on being discharged at the expiration of the Time entertain’d for, and to have every other Encouragement punctually compli’d with.”

In the “French War of 1744,” the Governor of Jamaica sent his “leftenants” to Philadelphia to fill up his regiments. It was worth “listing” at the Widow Roberts’ Coffee-house in those days, when every “sojer” got six shillings a week extra, and his family carried free to Antigua if he wished it, and land to settle on in that glorious country when war was over. Brisk and cheerful was the enrolment, and I trust all lived happy ever after in the tropic land, so far away in miles and environment from the Quaker town of their youth.

It was pleasant work, also, for “gentlemen sailors” in 1744. The colonies whisked out on the high seas that year a hundred and thirteen full-manned privateers. Wealthy merchants gathered around the inn tables to join fortunes in these ventures; plans were quickly matured; and the articles of agreement signed by these rich ship-owners were quickly followed by articles of agreement to be signed by the seamen. Oh, what prizes these cruisers brought into port! There are no items in the newspapers of that day under the head of Philadelphia and New York news save lists of prizes. When these half-pirates came in, cannon were fired, the whole town turned out, and the taverns were filled with rejoicings. The names of the ships and their captains were household words. The captured cargoes were carried ashore; inventories were posted in the taprooms, and often the goods were sold within the welcoming tavern doors.

It has been said that taverns bearing names of ships, maritime phrases, and seafaring titles were usually chosen as shipping offices for the enlistment of privateersmen and marines on men-of-war. It is more probable that the most popular tavern in any locality frequented by sailors and seamen was the one chosen, whatever its name. In the Boston Post Boy of June, 1762, is the following notice: —

“NOW BOUND ON A CRUIZE OF SIX MONTHS

Against His Majesties enemies, The Brigantine Tartar, a Prime Sailor mounting Fourteen Six Pounders, Twenty Culverines, and will carry One Hundred and Twenty Men. Commanded by William Augustus Peck. All

Gentlemen Seamen

and able bodied Landsmen who have a mind to make their Fortunes, and are inclined to take a Cruize in this said Vessel, by applying at this King’s Head Tavern at the North End, may view the Articles which are more advantageous to the Ship’s Company than were ever before offered in this Place.”

To those who know the condition of Jack Tar aboard ship a century ago, and the attitude which Captain Peck doubtless assumed to his seamen the moment the Tartar was started on this “Cruize,” there is a sarcastic pleasantry in the term Gentlemen Seamen used by him in common with other captains ashore, that might be swallowed in a taproom with bowls of grog and flip, but would never go down smoothly on shipboard.

Gentlemen sailors were frequently impressed in a very different manner. The press-gang was one of the peculiar institutions of Great Britain, and its aggressive outrages formed one of the causes of “Madison’s War,” as old people liked to term the War of 1812. The Virginia Gazette of the first of October, 1767, tells of a far different scene from that indicated by the plausible words of Captain Peck; one in which a Norfolk tavern took a part: —

“It appears that Captain Morgan of the Hornet, Sloop of War, concerted a bloody riotous Plan, to impress Seamen, at Norfolk, Virginia, for which Purpose his Tender was equipped with Guns and Men, and under cover of the Night, said Morgan landed at a public wharff, having first made proper Dispositions either for an Attack or Retreat; then went to a Tavern, and took a chearful Glass, after which they went to work and took every Person they met with and knock’d all down that resisted; and dragg’d them on board the Tender but the Town soon took the Alarm, and being headed by Paul Loyal, Esq., a Magistrate, they endeavor’d to convince Captain Morgan of his Error; but being deaf to all they said he ordered the People in the Tender to fire on the Inhabitants, but they refused to obey their Commander’s orders and he was soon oblig’d to fly, leaving some of his Hornets behind, who were sent to Gaol.”

It is astonishing to read of such ruffianly kidnappings under the protection of the British Government, and to know that seamen and sailors who had been so treated would assist in such outrages on others. It is only one of the many proofs that we meet everywhere in history of the thick-skinned indifference and cruelty of nearly all of the human race a century ago.