Nicholas Cresswell Quotes

While most Americans know about the Boston Tea Party, few are aware of the Liberty Tree and how important it was to fanning the flames of rebellion that led to the revolution in 1775 and the Declaration of Independence.

The general temper of the People, as well here as other parts of America, is very warm. They look upon the Chastisement of Boston to be purposely vigorous, and held up by way of intimidation to all America; and in short that Boston is suffering in the Common Cause.

The American Revolution and Declaration of Independence, it has often been argued, were fueled by the most radical of all American political ideas.

In the 1770s the primary threat to American rights seemed to lie less with the King than with the Parliament that claimed a right to bind the colonists “in all cases whatsoever”.

The Stamp Act was to go into operation on the first day of November. On the previous morning, the 'New Hampshire Gazette' appeared with a deep black border and all the typographical emblems of affliction, for was not Liberty dead?

In the Fall of 1774 & Winter of 1775, I was one of upwards of thirty, chiefly mechanics, who formed ourselves into a committee for the purpose of watching the movements of the British soldiers, and gaining every intelligence of the movements of the Tories.

Once vigorous measures appear to be the only means left of bringing the Americans to a due submission to the mother country, the colonies will submit.

The colonists' first protest against the British unfolded on Aug. 14, 1765 at the Liberty Tree. A magnificent elm towering over the other trees nearby, the Liberty Tree stood at the corner of what is now Washington and Essex Streets in downtown Boston.

If we are now to pay these debts to the English, for what were we fighting?

The true history of the American Revolution can never be written… A great many if the people in those days were not at all what they seemed, nor what they were generally believed to be.

I call the war with our Brethren, in America an unjust and felonious war, because the primary cause and confessed origin of it is, to attempt to take their money from them without their consent …

From present appearances there is no prospect of putting the late Coercive Acts in force but by first making a conquest of the New England Provinces.

The execution of the Stamp Act will be impractical, without occasioning more mischief that it was worth by totally alienating the affections of the Americans.

It's worth noting that at the time of the American Revolution, no sane person would have given two cents for its success.

The American Revolution was, in fact, a battle against the philosophy of Locke and the English utilitarians.

After being Washington's aide for four years and becoming the hero of Yorktown, Hamilton was viewed with a great deal of suspicion because of his association with Tories.

The American Revolution was a beginning, not a consummation.

The founding fathers used the well regulated militias to suppress rebellions.

But what topics of reconciliation are now left for men who think as I do, to address our countrymen? To recommend reverence for the monarch, or affection for the mother country? Will the distinctions between the prince and his ministers, between the people and their representatives, wipe out the stain of blood? Or have we the slightest reason to hope that those ministers and representatives will not be supported throughout the tragedy, as they have been through the first act? No. While we revere and love our mother country, her sword is opening our veins.

Some apprehend danger from the defection of Massachusetts. It is a disagreeable circumstance, but not a dangerous one. If they become neutral, we are sufficient for one enemy [the British] without them, and in fact we get no aid from them now.

Without the pen of Paine, the sword of Washington would have been wielded in vain.

There were more Americans in the British Army during the Revolution than there were in the American Army.

The taverns were the headquarters of the American Revolution.

The quarrel between the colonies and the British government seems to become more serious every day ... It may prove the most fatal blow to the authority of the metropolis.

Religious doctrine and rhetoric … contributed in a fundamental way to the coming of the American Revolution and its final success …. Where political theory advised caution, religious doctrine demanded action. By turning Colonial resistance into a righteous cause, and by carrying the message to all ranks and in all parts of the colonies, ministers did the work of secular radicalism and did it better.