A Christmas Eve Execution (episode 263)

Transcript

Music

Jake:
[0:04] Welcome to HUB History where we go far beyond the freedom trail to share our favorite stories from the history of boston, the hub of the universe.
This is episode 263 a christmas eve execution.
Hi, I’m jake This week. I’m talking about Boston’s Grim Christmas celebration in 1774.
At the height of the British occupation, there had been redcoats in boston for six years at that point.
But after the tea party, the previous december, the number of occupying troops skyrocketed until there was nearly one british soldier for every adult male bostonian,
they were supposed to be there to enforce the intolerable acts, but their presence only fanned the flames of rebellion in the colony.
An increased army presence in Boston always led to an increase in desertions and December 1774 was no exception On December 17 while his unit was away on exercises.
Private William Ferguson got really drunk and then he either tried to dessert and start a new life here in America or he went to see about getting some laundry done.
Either way, he was convicted and boston was shocked to bear witness to an execution by firing squad in the middle of boston common bright and early on christmas eve.

[1:26] But before we talk about boston’s christmas eve execution, I just want to pause and thank everyone who supports hub history on patreon.
I just want to pause and say thank you to everyone who supports hub history on patreon.
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[3:10] The addition of the Boston Gazette and Country Journal that ran on December 26, 1770 for was full of political news from London from the Continental Congress in Philadelphia and local stuff.
There are the usual ads for businesses that have just gotten in shipments of valuable or unique goods that will be offered for sale, lost gloves, horses, and enslaved black men and upcoming estate auctions.
And there were notes on current events in boston, with about 6000 british troops stretching the compact city to its limits.
There was often a section of the paper dedicated to reports on the actions of the local soldiery, and this post christmas paper was no exception with a brief report noting,
we hear that on friday last a soldier of the 64th Regiment was found froze to death on dorchester neck,
Last Saturday Morning one William Ferguson.
A soldier of the 10th regiment lately arrived from Quebec age 28 was shot at the bottom of the common in this town for desertion.

[4:17] At the time of the execution on the morning of christmas eve it was overcast and snowing according to john barker barker was a lieutenant in the late infantry company of the fourth Regiment, known as the King’s own.
His unit had arrived in boston over the summer and spent the warmer months, camped out in tents on boston common, finally moving into permanent barracks as the weather got cold in mid november, It was a cold winter and the snow started on November 17.
Within days of the moving out of their tents, there was snow all day on December 22, a mix of snow and sleet on the 23rd.

[4:55] Loyal listeners may recall that we discussed the longtime ban on celebrating christmas in early boston while the formal band was over by 17 70.
For there wouldn’t be a shared local tradition of celebrating the holiday until the mid to late 19th century as we heard in episode 2 12.
So perhaps Lieutenant john barker’s diary entry for saturday december 24th won’t be too much of a surprise.

[5:22] Bad day, constant snow till evening when it turned out rain and sleet.
A soldier of the 10th shot for desertion, the only thing done in remembrance of Christmas Day, The night before last, two men deserted.
One from the king’s own, the other from the 43rd William Ferguson’s 10th regiment had only arrived in Boston on November one, but desertions always seemed to spike in the weeks after a new regiment was transferred to Boston.
This pattern goes clear back to the first soldiers who arrived in Boston when the British occupation started in October 1768,
after a fleet anchored in boston harbor on september 30th, Paul, revere wrote that the next day at noon on saturday october the first, the 14th and 29th regiments.
A detachment from the 59th Regiment and train of artillery with two pieces of cannon landed on the long wharf.
They’re formed and marched with insolent parade drums beating fifes playing and colors flying up King Street, Each soldier having received 16 rounds of powder and ball.

[6:33] The desertion started almost immediately at the time. Enlistments in the british army weren’t for a set period, but rather for life, while individual soldiers might also maintain a side job like rope, making haircutting or tailoring.

[6:50] In the early weeks of the occupation of boston, the army and the town were arguing over how the soldiers would be quartered while the soldiers slept in cold, damp canvas tents on boston common while they shivered on the common.
These red coats could see the sailors, merchants, and farmers who drove boston’s economy seeming to lead a much more comfortable lifestyle, a lifestyle that could be theirs if they just got far enough out of boston that their officers couldn’t find them.

[7:19] Meanwhile, the british army was considered to be the most professional force in europe, but that came as a result of constant drilling and harsh forms of discipline like corporal or capital punishment.
For most crimes, including a first offensive desertion. Corporal punishment was the usual sentence.
In a thesis titled, we might now behold American grievances, red dressed soldiers and the inhabitants of Boston 1768-1770.
David Nesher describes how brutal the lashing of a British regular in Boston could be marshall justice was a source of particular disgust for the inhabitants of boston.
Besides preventing desertion, military justice was also intended to maintain order and discipline.
Petty crime such as thievery and indiscipline were the realm of regimental. Courts martial punishment generally meant lashes and the number of strokes often numbered in the hundreds.
The spectacle was meant to awe the rest of the regiment into order, but in boston it meant further civilian disgust for the army.

[8:31] It was not long after the arrival of the troops, that the inhabitants were witnesses to the spectacle,
On October six, quote nine or 10 soldiers of Colonel Cars, 29th Regiment for sundry misdemeanors were severely whipped on the common,
Not long after.
On the 14th, the display repeated itself as quote one Rogers.
A new England ban was sentenced to receive 1000 stripes and a number of other soldiers were scourged in the common.
The Journal of the Times was aghast to report that,
Some gentlemen who had held commissions in the army, observing that only 40 of the 170 lashes received by Rogers at this time was equal to punishment to 500 that they had seen given on other regiments.

[9:22] There was also a racial aspect to boston’s disgust for the army system of punishment.
The drummers whose duties included inflicting punishments of the 29th regiment were Afro Caribbean and origin,
when lashes were to be given, the convicted man was tied to a frame made of hal Burt’s, an ancient pole arm retained by the 18th century army as a symbol of rank and whipped by the drummers before the assembled regiment.
As the Journal of The Times reported to behold Britain scourged by negro drummers was a new and very disagreeable spectacle.
Such a display of military authority, quote, however necessary was shocking to humanity.

[10:07] By the end of October 1768, the first month of the occupation, about 70 soldiers had deserted.
It was time to strike fear into the hearts of anyone who might be tempted to follow in their footsteps.
So the senior officers in boston decided to send patrols deep into rural massachusetts to find deserters who thought that they had run far enough to be safe to bring them back to boston and to put them on trial for their lives.
Ni Cr writes by 12 October 1768, the Army began dispatching parties of soldiers disguised as deserters into the countryside to apprehend those who went off from their regiments.

[10:51] In his diary injury, for October 22, 1768, Boston merchant John Rowe described attending the court martial for one of the accused deserters that was captured by one of these patrols.
This for noon was held a general court martial on a soldier of the 14th who deserted.
Colonel Dalrymple sat as President I attended.
Also, general gauge and Colonel Robertson In. We might now behold American grievances. Red dressed, nice er describes how one of these disguised army patrols caught the private who stood trial in October 22.

[11:31] For a while, the Subterfuge worked on 14 October disguised soldiers from the Grenadier Company of the 14th regiment captured Richard,
Eames, also a soldier of the 14th regiment who had hired himself out as a laborer for a farmer some 25 miles from Boston.
The disguises worked well enough that when they reached the farm, the party was led two teams by the farmer himself.
On the 22nd teams was brought before a general court martial.
He pleaded that he had not been paid arrears owed to him and that he had often been struck while it exercise contemporary parlance for drill practice.
Well witnesses testified that he had in fact been paid regularly and that he had only been struck as much as any other soldier.
He was given a good character as an honest man, though sometimes unfortunate and liquor.
Nevertheless, the army needed an example and Richard Eames was their means of providing it.
The court sentenced him to death and on the 31st the sentence was executed, Eames, dressed in white was shot on the common and the regiment was paraded around his body As you’ll hear in a few minutes.
This practice of parading. The whole regiment passed. The condemned man’s dead body was not carried out in William Ferguson’s case in 1770 for but it certainly was in 1768.

[13:00] In an article about the team’s execution. J. L. Bell quotes the October 31, 1768, Boston Chronicle is reporting that teams,
is ordered to be shot on the common this afternoon between the hours of eight and 12 o’clock, all the troops in town were ordered into the common this morning by six o’clock to attend the execution.
Much like William Ferguson’s death. The Boston Gazette and Country Journal for October 31, 1768 carried a very terse notice of Richard Eames execution that day this morning, A soldier was shot at the bottom of the common for desertion.
The same day’s edition of the Journal of the Times went into much more detail noting,
all the troops in town marched into the common this morning, drumming the deadbeat,
at eight o’clock, Richard Arns or Eames, as we’ve come to know him,
A private of the 14th regiment dressed in white, having just before had the sacrament administered to him by the reverend Mr Palm’s chaplain of the regiment who also accompanied them, was pursuant to the sentence of a general court martial,
shot for desertion.

[14:11] The regiment then marched around the corpse as it lay on the ground when it was put into the coffin which was carried by his side into the common and buried in a grave near where he was shot and the church service read over him.
This was the first execution of the kind ever seen in this town though during the late war, meaning the Seven Years war or french and indian war.
A much larger body of troops had been encamped here.
Some of the first ladies among us presented a petition for his pardon the evening before and we flattered ourselves as it was his first desertion, and in a time of peace,
and which could not have happened had he been courted agreeable to act of Parliament on Castle Island,
it would have met with success,
but the numerous desertions from so important as service as the troops are now engaged in, it seems prevented this act of grace.
Some accounts read into that report and say that Ames was buried on boston common where he fell, But J.
L. Bell and other local historians argue that a grave near where he was shot probably means that he was buried in an unmarked grave in the central burying ground on the edge of the common, at the corner of Boylston and Tremont streets.

[15:27] At the time of Ferguson’s desertion in 1770 for General Thomas Gauge had only recently replaced Thomas Hutchinson as the Royal Governor of Massachusetts,
was no stranger to the tensions growing in the colonies As Royal Governor of New York and Commander in Chief of British forces in North America.
He’d ordered the first regiments into Boston in 1768 After resigning that post in 1773,
had the good fortune of being back in England when the tea party happened and not being in a position to take any of the blame for it.
In early 1774, he was asked to return to the colonies and take over government of Massachusetts,
with a distinguished career as a diligent officer in the Seven Years war and a reputation as being at least somewhat sympathetic to the colonial cause, gauge started out popular here in boston,
but that sentiment wouldn’t last long When he arrived here in May 1770 for John Hancock in the ceremonial militia unit that provided the governor’s personal guards met him at Long Wharf,
but the very next night Hancock declined to attend the formal dinner at Faneuil Hall to welcome gauge.
A few weeks later, gauge fired hancock from this mostly ceremonial position and the rest of the company of cadets resigned in protest, but you can hear more about in episode 20.

[16:54] In the meantime gauge began implementing the intolerable acts, closing the portal boston,
ending representative government in the province and consolidating the british garrisons from Halifax philadelphia, new york and New Jersey in boston.

[17:10] The influx of troops meant that boston suddenly seemed overcrowded with red coats.
These new arrivals were going through the same exercise in cold and shivering, that the regiments who arrived in 1768 had gone through sleeping in tents and other unsuitable quarters while the officers arranged their barracks,
at the same time, the logistical nightmare of relocating so many units around the continent meant that their pay was sometimes laid,
while the sudden influx of soldiers with enough time on their hands to work, second jobs led to a labor surplus that drove wages down for both the red coats and working class Bostonians.
Meanwhile, as serena Zabin, excellent, recent book, the boston massacre, a family history makes clear,
the soldiers who had now been in boston for over six years were ever more ingrained into boston civic life, maintaining jobs, bolstering the local economy and marrying local women.

[18:11] The 10th and 52nd regiments have been among the last units to relocate to Boston.
Having spent the previous seven years in Quebec, the newly British province captured from France in the seven years war.

[18:25] They mostly garrisoned forts along the great lakes, then carried briefly in Quebec city before being redeployed to boston just a few weeks before the drama of William Ferguson’s execution,
In describing how William Ferguson found himself staring down the barrel of a firing squad in December 1770 for Don Haggis rights,
on saturday december 17th 17 70 for the 10th Regiment of Foot, marched out of boston and into the massachusetts countryside, quote, to give them in a little exercise.
Unquote to keep these men fit for service regiments took frequent marches of several miles into the country, quote, with arms, knapsacks, etcetera. Unquote.
The local inhabitants watch these movements closely, ever wary that the troops might be on some sort of enforcement mission.

[19:18] Only about three months before general gauge sent a detachment from the 4th regiment on a march to a powder house in the farthest corner of Charlestown with orders to seize a large supply of gunpowder that was stored there.

[19:33] The detachment got up and boarded longboats before dawn, then rode as far as they could at the Mystic River before marching to what’s now Powder House circle in Somerville.
The operation went off without a hitch with the powder locked up within the ford on Castle Island while the sun was still barely above the horizon.
The colonial response to this seizure was eye opening for gauge. However, rumors spread quickly that the red coats had fired on the people of Charlestown killing six or that they had burned Cambridge or that the Royal Navy was shelling boston.
Almost immediately militia companies across the province and as far away as Connecticut mobilized and tens of thousands of men were on the march by the next morning.
David Hackett Fischer quotes a young traveler named McNeil, who was on his way from Shrewsbury to boston on the morning of september 2nd, who said he never saw such a scene before.
All along the road were armed men rushing forward, some on foot, some on horseback at every house.
Women and Children were making cartridges, running bullets, making wallets of food, baking biscuits crying and bemoaning, and at the same time animating their husbands and sons to fight for their liberties though not knowing whether they should ever see them again.

[20:52] They left scarcely half a dozen men in a town unless old and decrepit and in one town, the landlord told him that himself was the only man left.

[21:02] You can hear more about the powder alarm in episode 76, but suffice it to say that the rumors turned out to be false.
The militia soon returned home, but this was a wake up call to general gauge that his troops would not always be able to move around the countryside uncontested.
It’s likely that marches like the one the 10th regiment undertook on december 17th served as more than just exercise for the men in the regiment,
sending bodies of troops into the increasingly hostile towns around Boston was a way to probe for resistance and it could also likely serve as a faint distracting the watching colonists from an actual raid.
In fact, the march of the 10th regiment on december 17th may have been intended as a bit of distraction, while other regiments sailed north to Portsmouth and seized the powder stored there at Fort William and mary,
but paul revered already carried word of the raid to new Hampshire patriots who themselves rated the forts and removed the powder two days before the ships from boston arrived.
You can learn more about that incident in episode 76 as well.

[22:12] William Ferguson was not among the soldiers of the 10th who went on that march through the countryside to stay fit for service and distract the locals.
Instead, he was back in the unit’s barracks, recovering from an illness or so, he claimed After a long day in the field, the regiment was ordered to form up for roll call at about eight p.m.
Hours after Boston’s early December Sunset.
Here Don Haggis picks up the story again.
William Ferguson was missing. This was unusual. Forum, a tailor who had never been absent since enlisting in Great Britain and joining the regiment in Canada. As a recruit.
In April 1772, two corporals found Ferguson’s knapsack in the barracks and examined it.
Typical protocol when a man went missing for it was important to determine whether he’d taken his spare clothing with him as men who planned to dessert often did.
They found only the stiffening of an old stock in the knapsack and reported Ferguson’s absence to his company sergeant.

[23:17] It would be almost impossible for a deserter to make a new life for himself within the town of boston, which was still small enough that everyone knew nearly everyone else.
So if Ferguson was deserting, he’d have to get out of town.
However, David Ni Sears paper explains the measures that gauge had ordered to prevent such escapes to prevent further desertions.
Centuries were placed about the town to make it more difficult for anyone within the town, particularly soldiers, to leave without first being seen or stopped.
The chain of centuries was particularly dense at the neck where a guard house, which soon became known as the fortification was constructed.
As it was the solitary land bridge between the town and the rest of massachusetts.
According to Lieutenant barker, the fortification on the neck was finished on november 26th.
Nice. Your continues. The job was made more difficult in the winter, when soldiers could abscond across a frozen boston harbor.
But for most of the year, the army was able to exert a great deal of control over who came, and more importantly, who left boston,
for Bostonians whose sympathies lay with the patriot cause desertion among the occupying troops made for good politics by eroding the morale of the remaining troops.

[24:40] However, even those whose political leanings were of a more Tory bent tended to be unwilling to help round up and turn in deserters, especially after the brutal example of richard team’s execution.

[24:54] The addition of the journal of the times dated February 13, 1769, just a few months after Eames was killed, explains the challenge of preventing soldiers from deserting in winter,
and the hesitance of Bostonians and reporting deserters.
We’ve had more of winter since february set in than in all of the preceding months.
The ice having opened new passages out of town for the soldiery, desertions are more numerous than ever, notwithstanding all the care of the officers and vigilance of the military guards which almost surround the town.
The practice of sending out sergeants parties in disguise still continues, but we do not hear of anyone deserter being brought back accepting poor teams whose execution is thought to have been. As in politics as it was illegal.

[25:43] It deters those country people from making discoveries which a prospect of a reward might tempt them to do as they now apprehend, that this cannot be done without involving themselves in the guilt of blood.
So executing deserters provided a strong deterrent to other soldiers who might be tempted to strike out on their own.
However, the knowledge that they were contributing to taking someone’s life also deterred civilians from reporting deserters.
It’s kind of like today’s America, knowing that the consequence of calling the police on someone who’s selling loose cigarettes outside your store might be an officer murdering them with an illegal chokehold.
Makes you kind of question whether you should call the police in the first place.

[26:27] So, to be up to the boston garrison to police their own deserters and up to the centuries posted at boston neck to spot soldiers who are heading out of town.
And that’s exactly what happened on december 17th, as reported by Lieutenant john barker.

[26:42] Desertions are still too frequent among us, though not as bad as it has been Last night.
A soldier of the 10th deserted from his post at the blockhouse where he was century, and this evening one of the 10th was taken as he was endeavoring to make his escape on the water side.
But the night was too light and the century too vigilant for him, supped this evening with Baron at the neck and skated by moonlight.

[27:09] That soldier who was allegedly endeavoring to make his escape by the waterside was William Ferguson, and the article by Don Haggis allows us to fill in the details,
at about the same time as the roll call a century on the neck that connected boston to the mainland, raised the alarm because he saw someone on the ice.
The guard turned out and man, there were doubts that covered the neck and parties were sent along the beaches.
A private soldier in the 4th regiment, a grenadier named Samuel Lewis stooped down to get a view along the water’s edge in the moonlight and perceived a man near the water.

[27:48] Louis moved towards the man and called for him to stop upon which the man instead tried to make his way past louis towards boston,
Louis, a 33 year old Somerset Shire native who had been in the army for a dozen years, pushed the man down with the muzzle of his fire lock and asked why he had not stopped,
the man.
An intoxicated William Ferguson claimed not to have heard louis louis asked what brought him there, and if he had an intention to dessert for a parcel of rascals referring to the rebellious colonists,
Ferguson responded that he had merely lost his way in the darkness.

[28:27] Captain Charles, Cochran of the 4th Regiment. Coming up to them, heard this discourse and took Ferguson into custody, brought before the officer of the watch and questioned Ferguson kept to his story.
He claimed that he had been on his way to visit another soldier who hailed from the same town in Ireland when he got lost in the unfamiliar streets of boston.
At this 0.1 of the century’s searched Ferguson and Don Haggis notes incident, Butler searched Ferguson’s pockets and found them to be quite full, containing two shirts, one clean, the other dirty,
two white stocks, two pair of thread stockings, one pair and a half of yarn or worsted stockings, which appeared clean but not ironed,
one pair of unmade black cloth leggings with binding, which was typical winter wear for boston soldiers, thread and a tailor’s thimble.
The officers Riley asked Ferguson if he was going for a long visit, to which Ferguson replied that he was taking his shirts and stockings to a soldier’s wife who worked as a washerwoman.

[29:37] The officers were unconvinced. So William Ferguson stood trial at a court martial on December 20 at the time.
The british articles of war required that a prisoner be tried within eight days of his arrest For even a serious crime like desertion. The prisoner would face a regimental court martial made up of 9-13 officers from his own unit.
In a few pretty unusual cases, the defendant could appeal his verdict to the general court martial, but that would not be the case for private Ferguson.

[30:12] The prosecution offered nine witnesses who testified that Ferguson had been headed out of town at night across the ice in an obvious attempt to evade the centuries on boston neck, and he’d been carrying all of his spare clothing.
All that seemed like pretty conclusive evidence When it was his turn to offer his defense.
On December 22, Ferguson gave this rather weak sounding explanation, as quoted by Don Haig ist last saturday morning, the regiment being ordered to march some miles into the country.
I was left at home being in the sick reports, though not so bad, but I could work at the regimental leggings, which I was ordered to work at.
After the regiment was marched from the barracks, I sent out for some liquor of which I drank pretty freely, and which made me inclined to have some more In some time.
After a townsman of mine came to my room to see me and asked me to go and drink a dram on which I went and then returned to my work, but finding myself incapable of working,
I proposed to myself to take my linen and stockings to a namesakes wife in the 52nd Regiment, who washed for me in Quebec,
and please me much better than she who washes for me at present.

[31:31] Elsewhere. It’s noted that the namesake was alexander Ferguson, no relation, I imagine, in my hurry and putting up my linen and stockings together with being intoxicated with liquor.
I likewise put the leggings. I was working on into my pockets.
The reason by having the clean linen and stockings with me was to have them done over again to my liking.

[31:54] I went in search of the 50 seconds barracks, and on my way met with two sailors, they asked me if I would have a dram to which I unluckily consented.
They had a bottle of rum which they gave me, and of which I drank out of the bottle.
They pressed me to drink again, which I did, and got entirely insensible of what I was about or where I was going to,
so staggered along, sometimes falling, sometimes walking until stopped by the centuries at the advanced lines, and was taken prisoner to the guard, where the field officer, on seeing me, told me that I would pay for what I’d done,
for I should be either hanged or shot.
Which put me in such a panic that I found myself got quite sober.
I was searched for necessaries and ordered prisoner to our own barracks guard room.
I sincerely believed my missing my way was occasioned by my being a stranger, and so much in liquor as I’m not acquainted in the town, not having mounted at any other place, but the barracks guard,
it’s very well known in the regiment that I never made the least attempt to dessert, and I solemnly declare to God a notion of the kind never entered my breast, as I always have been well used and paid by the regiment.
I serve in and never had any other inclination but to serve his majesty in any part of the world were called upon.

[33:19] Haggis also quotes one. James Berry, a fellow soldier and Taylor from the 10th regiment who deposed that last saturday the 17th instant.
About four o’clock in the afternoon the prisoner came to deponent for a pair of scissors and that the prisoner appeared to be very much in liquor,
Francis Menzies with the 23rd regiment who was on guard when Ferguson was caught deposed,
That the prisoner appeared to be very drunk when he was brought into the guard room at the lines on Saturday evening the 17th staggering two and again being scarcely able to make a walk of it.
Haggis article points out that the adjutant of the 10th regiment testified that Ferguson had only done duty at the regimental barracks in the month and a half since they arrived in Boston.
So the private would not have known his way around Boston yet.
He also quotes the namesake Alexander Ferguson of the 52nd Regiment, who confirmed that his wife had done laundry for William Ferguson and Quebec and testified,
that on the prisoners being ordered to some of the forts that is outposts on the great lakes and owing opponent a trifle of money he promised to pay him when he returned,
and when he did not return, he told Opponent that as the two regiments were going to the same place, meaning boston, he would pay him when they got there,
and that he would again employed opponent’s wife to wash for him.

[34:48] Haggis also points out that while Ferguson’s story is kind of pathetic.
It’s actually a carefully constructed defense, arguing that he was off duty after being excused from participating in the day’s march, that he had been too drunk to be responsible for his actions, That he didn’t know his way around boston,
and that as a result of all that he had gotten hopelessly lost when he tried to take his laundry to mrs alexander, Ferguson,
a good effort but not good enough.
The court martial found him guilty and recommended a death sentence, which the commanding officer had to approve before it could be carried out with a 1976 article about 18th century British regimental courts martial noting,
The only protection offered to the prisoner from arbitrary and capricious punishment was a 1736 edition to the articles of war.
That the sentence of regimental courts martial could not be put into effect until approved by the commanding officer who was specifically excluded from serving on the court martial board.
This was as close to outside review as the crown and the military allowed in the 18th century.

[36:00] Unfortunately for private Ferguson gauge had a reputation for harshness with Lieutenant john barker noting in his diary entry for december 24th, it is said general gauge never pardons deserters at the same time.
I don’t think his manner of executing him sufficient examples as he has only the pickets of the army out instead of the whole, which would strike a greater terror into the men,
punishments were never meant only to affect criminals, but also as examples to the rest of mankind.

[36:33] When gauge reviewed the case on December 23, he ordered that the death sentence be put into execution tomorrow at 9:00 by shooting said William Ferguson to death by a platoon of the regiment to which he belongs.

[36:49] The pickets of the several regiments commanded by the field officer of the day will attend the execution which will be performed on some proper spot at the back part of the common near the water.

[37:01] The next day, christmas eve would be private William Ferguson’s last general gage’s orders.
Give us a good idea of where and when the execution took place by nine a.m. The sun would have been pretty high in the sky as Ferguson was marched across the common to the water’s edge along what’s now Charles street.

[37:24] This was basically the same stretch of shoreline where members of Ferguson’s 10th regiment would board barges about four months later, they would take them across the back bay to Phipps Farm in Cambridge, where they would start their march to concord,
and into american history books.

[37:41] So now we know where and when the execution took place. And this description of a british military execution in Barbados a few years later gives us a sense of how it was carried out.
The garrison is to be under arms to form three sides of a square.
The 4th side to the sea being left open, they would have positioned private Ferguson with his back to the water and that open side of the square.
So the muskets will be pointed in a safe direction safe.
That is for everyone, but Ferguson The biggest difference between that Caribbean execution and the one taking place in Boston on Christmas Eve 1770 for,
was the gauge only ordered pickets from each regiment to attend the execution.
As lieutenant barker pointed out, punishment was meant to not only affect the criminal but also to provide an example to the rest of the unit,
by only having a few representatives from each regiment attend rather than the whole garrison.
Most of the red coats were spared the awful lesson of the execution.

[38:53] Each corrine garrison will furnish one Sergeant, one corporal and a private from which the firing party for the execution of the prisoners to be formed.

[39:04] I think gauges orders were more typical forming the firing squad from the condemned man’s own unit ensured that the lesson of their friend’s death would be seared into their memories.

[39:17] The senior sergeant will take the command of this party. The private will be formed at a small distance in front of the spot where the prisoner will suffer and one rank the corporals in their rear as a reserve,
the sergeants and rear of the corporal’s except the commanding sergeant will be on the flank opposite the brigade, major,
corporals and privates to load with ball cartridges immediately after they’re formed one subaltern, one sergeant, one corporal and 10 privates to escort the prisoners of the place of execution.

[39:51] Ferguson would have been dressed all in white to make the bloody wounds, you would receive all the more horrible to onlookers.
He would have marched to the place of execution, escorted by a detachment of his peers. While the regimental band played the death March.
After a brief prayer by the chaplain, Ferguson faced the firing squad with the title back bay behind him.
There’s no record that he was offered a blindfold.

[40:21] To learn more about boston’s christmas eve execution Check out this week’s show notes at hub history dot com slash 263.
I’ll have links to the articles by Don Haggis that inspired this episode.
Plus I’ll link to his book, british soldiers, american war as well as serena zabin boston massacre book.
I’ll also link to the issues of the boston gazette and country journal and the Journal of the Times that I quoted from along with the diaries of john Rowe and lieutenant john barker, just for good measure.
I’ll link to David nature’s thesis and a handful of posts from J. L. Bell about the execution of Richard Eames.

[41:03] Before I let you go, I have some listener feedback to share.
First up as a listener who was inspired by our interview with Dan Neff from the Fairbanks House Back in episode 93.

[41:15] Hi jake! I enjoyed your two episodes on the Fairbanks house and I was finally able to visit the house last saturday.
I got so much more out of the tour knowing about the tragic story of the family and the interesting findings that daniel Neff discussed as he’s no longer the curator,
like Nikki, I too felt kind of queasy in the west wing in the room where a family member may have been locked up.
However, I think it was because the floorboards were so uneven that they were giving me motion sickness, no one fainted and there’s no longer a chair for people to sit in if they do feel faint.
I’m particularly interested in the house as I have an ancestor Thomas Cornell Jr., who was hanged for killing his mother in their house in Rhode Island in 1673.
Unfortunately, the original Cornell house no longer exists. The floor plan of the Fairbanks house is very similar.
It’ll be the closest I’ll be able to get and experiencing what the scene of the crime or a tragic accident would have felt like love the podcast signed Susan.
I was sorry to hear that dan Neff has left the Fairbanks house, but I’m glad that Susan was able to visit and that she was even able to get a tiny taste of the unexplained phenomena that some people claim to have experienced there.

[42:38] Wayne from the 11 Names project tweeted at us about the North End draft riot we covered back in episode 2 52 saying another solid episode.
I enjoyed the line about the police and the lack of counter protest weaponry.
I definitely chuckled.

[42:56] Tour Guide Ben Edwards shared our 94th episode Tweeting, You may not know about Amelia Earhart’s first career as a social worker in one of boston’s many settlement houses, learn more in this episode of the hub history podcast.

[43:12] To which John Costello replied a lot of trepidation from the Americans including me boarding an Iberia flight from Madrid to Seville, back on June 30.
The plane’s name. Amelia Earhart.

[43:31] Co host American Nikki paid us a visit in episode 2 57 and introduced listeners to the North End immigrant synagogue known as the Vilna shul,
lisa johnson tweeted, how do they fail to mention that Leonard Nimoy attended and that this is part of the synagogue with a picture of a freeze on the wall that appears to be the Vulcan salute.

[43:55] Also carry done. Tweeted, I love the Vilna shul. Last time I attempted to go there, it was closed for renovations.
I’ll reach out and make contact with the Ed director and Emily Holmes responded.
It sounds like they’ve been doing some cool public programs like neighborhood tours with the West End Museum.

[44:16] The aforementioned Wayne from 11 names also tweeted, I learned about father Coughlin by listening to hub history’s interview with professor Charles R Gallagher, author of the Nazis of Copley square.
That was episode 2 58 just a few weeks ago. If you’re interested,
wayne also tweeted in response to episode 2 60 about the mob that almost lynched abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison saying, huh,
serendipitously, I stumbled upon Abington mass, abolitionist lewis ford.
A friend of Garrison at al.
He tells of a similar 1835 mob story in that town.
The bell rope was large and long, which was, as we learned later to draw mr George Thompson by means of a noose I cross referenced the Liberator and it seems Thompson spoke in Abington on October 15.
I wonder if like today, there was a core group of agitators who followed Thompson around to harass him.

[45:21] It does seem that the attempt to Lynch Garrison was part of a wider pattern of many pro slavery mobs that formed in the summer of 1835.
I don’t know if it was a core group that followed Thompson around or not, but if it was, it was probably just as annoying as the group that follows mayor wu around and screams while she tries to speak.
Having witnessed that myself at a neighborhood meeting where she spoke.
It’s very frustrating.

[45:49] We also got notes from a handful of patreon supporters. First up is Marie who wrote in from texas.
Hello jake. Thanks for your note and hub history stickers. My mom and I are both faithful fans of the podcast.
My mom grew up in east boston and I worked in boston for many years.
We’ve since transplanted to Connecticut and texas respectively.
So hub history helps us stay connected to the most influential and unique city in the country, in our unbiased opinion.
Really appreciate the thorough research and the effort you make to preserve boston history we learn from and enjoy every episode.
For example. Did you know that boston was once a tiny peninsula.
Of course ma will always favor the ones about east boston. Nay nodules island. Keep up the great work Marie.

[46:48] Of course it’s Marie’s fault that you have to hear this clip again. But here we go.

Peninsula:
[46:54] Militia units from around New England streamed into Cambridge and Roxbury to keep the british regulars trapped in the peninsula. Town of boston, boston transformed itself from a tiny town on a peninsula to a sprawling city.
It was a small, densely populated city on a tiny mitten shaped peninsula, the tiny Chamakh peninsula that comprised boston before boston was expanded by filling the salt marshes that surrounded the Shawmut peninsula.
John Winthrop and his puritan followers settled on the tiny peninsula they called boston back when boston was a tiny village on the Shawmut peninsula, the only road leading off the peninsula of boston, New England militias rushed to surround boston and trapped the british regulars within the peninsula Town.

Jake:
[47:33] Listener Derek wrote in response to a podcast about Cy Young Day in boston and said hi jake.
I wanted to thank you for the note and stickers that you sent a few weeks ago and for the shout out in this past week’s episode, Cy Young is my favorite player from baseball history, so it was an honor to be mentioned in the same episode as him.
I also wanted to express my appreciation for your podcast last summer. I visited George’s island to the afterwards I was wondering if there were any podcasts about boston history.
I was happy to find hub history. And coincidentally, you had just published an episode on the harbor Islands. So I’ve been enjoying your podcast ever since.
Thank you for your consistent work on hub history and I look forward to your future episodes. Thanks again, Derek.

[48:26] Incidentally, almost all of hub history’s most downloaded episodes have something to do with boston harbor.
So it appears that Derek isn’t alone in his interest.
My interview with Pavlyuchenkova about the environmental history of the harbor islands is the most downloaded episode of all time, followed closely by the episode about Harbor Hermit and Windsor Sherwin.
My interview with kelly Kill chris about Long Wharf, the italian prisoners interned on peaks island and the confederate prisoners held on George’s island all fall in the top 10 as well, right along with them.
In the top 10 is our two part episode about Joshua slocum, which is one of the seafaring topics that inspired our last letter writer Doug Hi jake.
I had intended to write a message to go along with my contribution in september but september came and went, I’m glad to support hub history and although I do not listen weekly, I’m a binge listener.
I’m avoiding your interview with eric jay Dolin until I finish rebels at sea.

[49:36] The episodes in the boston harbor hermit, Joshua slocum and the origins of the national parks are my recent favorites and I like getting to know you a little better in the 250th episode.
That one also reminded me that I had not supported the show in a while.
Have you considered doing an episode on Isabella Stewart Gardner, not the heist per se, but the woman who created the museum and if I missed it in the past episodes, I apologize, keep up the good work. Doug.

[50:10] I’m probably not going to do an episode on the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum heist.
But if that’s a topic of interest to you, check out the last scene podcast from W. B. U. R.
I do have the collector and larger than life personality who created the museum of my topic backlog.
I’m not sure what part of her amazing life will do a show on, but I’m pretty sure she’ll make an appearance one of these days.

[50:37] Thanks so much to the Patreon supporters who wrote those lovely notes as well as all the listeners who took the time to write in.
I love getting listener feedback. Whether you love the episode, we’re just liked it a lot.
I’m always happy to hear episode suggestions, factual corrections and alternate sources that I missed.
If you’d like to leave us some feedback on this episode or any other, you can email podcast at history dot com.
We’re hub history on twitter facebook and instagram plus we’re trying something new.
So look for us on mastodon where I’m at hub history at better dot boston,
or for a simpler method, just go to hub history dot com and click on the contact us link while you’re on the site, Hit the subscribe link and be sure that you never miss an episode.
If you subscribe on apple podcasts, please consider writing us a brief review.
If you do drop me a line and I’ll send you a hub history sticker as a token of appreciation.

Music

Jake:
[51:43] That’s all for now. Stay safe out there listeners.