Gaspee affair
1772 burning of a British navy schooner
Gaspee affair
The Gaspee affair was a significant event in the lead-up to the American Revolution. HMS Gaspee was a Royal Navy revenue schooner that enforced the Navigation Acts around Newport, Rhode Island, in 1772. It ran aground in shallow water while chasing the packet boat Hannah on June 9 off Warwick, Rhode Island. That night a group of men led by Abraham Whipple and John Brown attacked, boarded, and burned the Gaspee to the waterline. The event sharply increased tensions between American colonists and Crown officials, particularly given that it had followed the Boston Massacre in 1770. Crown officials in Rhode Island aimed to increase their control over the colony's legitimate trade and stamp out smuggling in order to increase their revenue from the colony. Concomitantly, Rhode Islanders increasingly protested the Townshend Acts and other British policies that had interfered with the colony's traditional businesses, which primarily rested on involvement in the maritime trade. Along with similar...
Read on Wikipedia · Image Welcome Arnold Greene, Public domain
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