Days 28 and 29: Boston

Days 28 and 29: Boston

The drive through from Montreal was, as we had anticipated, through picturesque, hilly forested areas.  Higher areas were capped with a light dusting of snow.

    Best I could do snapping from the coach. 

    

We arrived in Boston and settled into yet another luxurious hotel, right in the centre of the city. This one was Omni Parker House, the hotel favoured by many famous names such as Charles Dickens, the poet Longfellow, Louise May Alcott, Graham Alexander Bell and the Kennedy family. Apparently it was in the dining room where we breakfasted, that JFK proposed to Jacqueline Bouvier, later to become the famous Jacqueline Kennedy.

The hotel is sumptuous, with ornate fittings belonging to days gone by.  In one section of the lobby are three large photographs of notable documents: a telegram from the hotel written by Graham Alexander Bell, a diagram of a meeting table layout that had Longfellow at the head of the table and thirdly an invitation sent to Abraham Lincoln, inviting him to speak at a meeting held at the hotel.  

In the same section is a cabinet of Kennedy memorabilia, including notification of what the hotel meant to JFK and that it will soon be 100 years since his birth (May 29^th).

 After a refreshing night’s sleep in yet another deliciously soft bed, we set out on an orientation tour of the city.  Boston is Ben’s home city and so he was in information overload form.  Again, his extraordinary knowledge of the War of Independence shone through.

I then went for a walk around the magnificent public gardens, which, in the spring sunshine were just beautiful.

A lovely little feature of the park is an installation of Mother Duck and her little ducklings.  This is in honour of author Robert McCloskey, whose book ‘Make way for ducklings’ has made these gardens known world wide.  I was told that each season and celebrations such as  Christmas and  Easter, people make hats for Mother Duck and her ducklings.  At the moment, most of them are sporting spring bonnets

I wandered the Granary cemetery, full of 18^th century graves, including that of Paul Revere.  The very first gravestones I stopped to read happened to be three with the surname Peck!  One was Elizabeth, wife of Moses, while the others were of children, Samuel and a Abigail, both aged 6. 

I found the little boy’s tombstone very touching:

Samuel Peck

Son of Moses and Elizabeth Peck

Died 7^th August 1775

Aged 6 years, 10 months & 14 days

How indicative of the love of the parents for little Samuel, that they even counted the days that he lived. 

The skull, crossbones and wings hand-engraved on most tombstones gave a macabre tone.  From a very helpful booklet prepared by someone who has researched the graves in this particular cemetery:

‘….This was a the time a reminder to the living, god-fearing Puritans of the mortality of the body (death heads, cross bones) and the immortality of the soul (wings).’

From the same booklet we learned that Paul Revere’s headstone is honoured each Patriot’s Day with a military colour party.

We found this tombstone’s inscription rather unusual:

This tomb

is the

Property

of

Elizabeth Hickling

&

Mary Hooten

Heirs of

Deac. John Lee

By arrangement, we met up with James for a cuppa at the hotel.  It was great to see him in his home turf of Boston. He was on his way to a gig and we were going out to our Trafalgar tour’s farewell dinner, but we arranged to get to one of his three gigs the next day.

This we enjoyed immensely, despite the cold conditions.  He was playing jazz with three fellow musicians: a pianist, a trumpeter and a percussionist, all students of Berklee College of Music.  (James was also a Berklee College student but has now moved on to New England University where he is doing his Masters.) It was a public performance in the famous Boston Common.  With the distinctive 24ct gold dome of the Massachusetts State House (parliament) in the background, it was a great setting.  James said that they often do that gig and in summer, several hundreds of people gather to listen, rather than the small handful who stopped to listen today.

The day after our tour had finished, we spent the day exploring Boston on our own while we awaited the 9:30 pm departure of the 24 hour train journey right down to Savannah.

It was then that we visited the Boston Tea Party museum, an excellent recreation and pageant of the events leading up to this famous event that sparked the American War of Independence.  The small ship moored in the harbour for this purpose is a faithful reproduction of one of the actual ships involved in the incident.

Among the names of those who were involved in the Boston Tea Party, we found ‘Samuel Peck’.   He is obviously not the 6 year old Samuel whose tombstone we had seen earlier, but was it maybe an uncle or grandfather of this little Samuel?

The museum records tell us that this Samuel Peck (DoB unknown), was a cooper (barrel maker) at Hallowell’s shipyard.  He had red paint on his ears on the night of the rebellion, 16^th December 1773,  and was rumoured to be one of its leaders. He died in 1777. 

We have loved Boston, which teems with history. We did not follow the ‘Freedom Trail’ a walk that visits all the historic sites.  However, between our own wanderings and the places Ben took us on the coach, we felt that we had seen most of them.  I will finish the blog with a few pictures of these historic sites and my very abbreviated version of the lead up to the War of Independence.

 16th December 1773:

Above is the Old South Church, where Samuel Peck and fellow colonists met to protest against the tea tax imposed on them by the British government.  All other taxes had been removed but the government was stubborn in its determination that the colonists must pay something to Britain.  The people were upset because although they were compelled to pay such taxes, they had no representation in British Parliament.  The government had long since moved troops into the area, with the task of keeping the population of Boston and other cities in order.

It is from the Old South Church that the colonists decided to go to the harbour and dump the chests of tea into the sea, a task that took them over three hours.

The British government naturally reacted to this public protest and over the next few months, troops were sent to Boston to quash the rebellion. Naturally with the army being trained and regimented soldiers, the assumption was that they would soon put down the comparatively small, rag tag bunch of volunteers.

18th April 1775:

The protesters, were aware that an attack from British troops was imminent, with the purpose of capturing their leaders, Adams and Hancock.  Paul Revere and another man waited for a signal as to which way the troops were coming.  The signal was to be by lantern held out from the tower of the 'Old' North Church - one lantern would mean they were coming by land, two would mean they were coming by sea.

Two of their number climbed high into the steeple of the Old North Church, and for only a few seconds, hung out two lanterns.  The time was enough for Paul and his mate to see, and Paul Revere set out on the now famous midnight ride to Lexington, about ten miles out of Boston.  

  

Inside the church, with box pews still used today. Now of course, it is not the case, but in years gone by, pews were individually owned and decorated.  One could not attend church unless you owned a pew. 

  

This box pew has been decorated as they would have been.  Individual owners brought in their own furniture, carpets, foot warmers, wall paper etc to decorate their pews. 

 

 Imagine the two lanterns hanging momentarily from the top window.

 

Paul Revere watches for the signal from the church tower.

Paul Revere sets out on his (borrowed) horse to warn his countrymen that the British troops, several hundred in number, are marching towards Lexington.

One shot rings out - the 'shot that was heard around the world'. Although Gage, the leader of the 70 or so rebels appealed to them not to fire unless fired upon,  the story is told that one person fired a shot (which side is a matter of conjecture) and that's how it all began.  The rest is history.  

June 11th  1776: Congress appointed a committee of five, headed by Thomas Jefferson to draft the Declaration of Independence.

 

 The Declaration of Independence is printed.

  

4th July 1776   Signing of the Declaration of Independence

There will be a few days break in the blog now while we head back to Savannah for R&R, ready to set out on our Nashville - Memphis - New Orleans tour.  We set out on that tour on Thursday.