The Boston Massacre

On this day in 1770, five Americans – among a so-called "motley rabble of saucy boys, negroes, and molattoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs" – were shot dead by British troops in Boston. The incident would help spark the American Revolutionary War five years later. The soldiers were subsequently arrested. Remarkably, they were successfully defended at trial by a future American president: John Adams.

Adams later described his role in diary entry:

"The Part I took in Defence of Cptn. Preston and the Soldiers, procured me Anxiety, and Obloquy enough. It was, however, one of the most gallant, generous, manly and disinterested Actions of my whole Life, and one of the best Pieces of Service I ever rendered my Country. Judgment of Death against those Soldiers would have been as foul a Stain upon this Country as the Executions of the Quakers or Witches, anciently. As the Evidence was, the Verdict of the Jury was exactly right. This however is no Reason why the Town should not call the Action of that Night a Massacre, nor is it any Argument in favour of the Governor or Minister, who caused them to be sent here. But it is the strongest Proofs of the Danger of Standing Armies."