Boston Tea Party

REBELLION BREWS IN BOSTON

And angry groups soon gathered by the town’s tallest tree,

With names like The Daughters and The Sons of Liberty.

Who gave the tax-takers the fine choice of whether

To forgo their collections or wear the tar and the feather!

And fitful and fuming, the colonies chose not

To buy British-made goods in a continental boycott.

They donned their rough clothes, homespun and threadbare,

-- But worn with great pride in the cause they did share.

Yes, King George would learn that they’d never be cowed,

And to speak as one voice, the thirteen colonies vowed.

‘Twas a time of great tumult with passions so high

Some even hinted that they should live free or die!

So the days grew tense with the colonists furious,

‘Til a cold night in Boston turned deadly serious.

As a snowballing crowd hit England’s tax officer

And the redcoats shot five in The Boston Massacre.

And how tempers did flare! --- though many said it was wise

To try as they could to still reach compromise.

And so the Crown ended taxes, only leaving in use

A wee tariff on tea, believing none would refuse.

Ah, but refuse they did, as New England turned frantic

And dumped the King’s tea in a now-flavored Atlantic.

Mobs dressed up as Mohawks and marched down to the sea,

They stormed onto ships and they tossed off the tea!

And the waves churned and roiled that fateful night,

For the tea leaves were clear: men were willing to fight!

And that none on these shores would have of the notion

That the King might tax them from across the ocean.

And The Boston Tea Party, as the night was then called,

Greatly maddened King George who quite shortly installed

New laws on New England, to punish those rebels

Who treated his rule like a handful of pebbles!