King William Archives - New England Historical Society

In provincial Boston, the birth of a prince of England caused a big, big celebration. When news of the birth of Prince George William reached the colonists in March 1718, gunners discharged cannons, people partied at the Old State House and crowds gathered to cheer “huzzah.”

King George III

Bostonians didn’t just celebrate royal births. They celebrated royal birthdays, accessions, coronations and anniversaries of coronations. They did it with pageantry and ceremony. Richard Bushman, in King and People in Provincial Massachusetts, refers to “incessant round of ceremonies exalting the king.”

Old State House 1793

Bushman argued the demonstrative allegiance to the monarchy had to do with the belief that the king had a reciprocal obligation: to protect his people. When the king showed he no longer intended to provide that protection, the people no longer had an obligation of loyalty to him.

Though the colonists didn’t always agree with their monarch, they demonstrated their loyalty to him up until the eve of the Boston Tea Party.

Any Royal Reason for a Party

King William

Puritan Bostonians sympathized with the Parliamentarians during the English civil wars. So they didn’t get too excited with the accession of the Roman Catholic James II to the throne in 1685. But when ordered to proclaim him king, thousands assembled in High Street to cheer with “huzzahs.” They also listened the drums beat, the trumpets sound and the volleys fired.

When the Protestant King William was proclaimed king in Boston on May 29, 1689, the colony threw the biggest, happiest celebration ever. People came from all over to view the procession of provincial leaders and gentlemen, followed by a militia regiment and companies of horse and foot from all over the countryside. Dinner was served to the upper classes at the Old State House, and wine was served to the crowds in the street. Cheering filled the air until 9 p.m., when the bells rang and people went home.

Birthday celebrations for William were well attended until his death in 1702. Diarist Samuel Sewall reported many people mourned him. As the years went by, the celebrations for the English monarch grew more elaborate.

In 1716, the Boston News-Letter described King George’s accession to the throne. The artillery of the fort at Castle William was discharged, and the Town House was “finely illuminated” with toasts given to the royal family, the royal governor and others.

Celebrating the Birth of a Prince

Prince George William

On March 17, 1718, the Boston News-Letter reported on the celebration of the birth of a prince: George William. A “handsome entertainment” was held at the Old State House for the governor, his council, civil and military officers, gentlemen and merchants.” Great demonstrations of joy followed the firing of artillery.

News traveled so slowly in those days. So the colonists hadn’t yet learned the infant prince, born in November, had already died on February 17.

On May 30, 1720, Samuel Sewall noted in his diary “Colours are out, and Guns fire for K. Charles 2d Birth, Return.” King Charles II had returned to England to claim the throne on his 30^th birthday – in 1660, 60 years earlier.

Loyal Zeal

When King George II acceded to the throne in 1727, Boston celebrated. The town demonstrated “loyal zeal and affection, and with much more state solemnity and magnificence than was ever before seen among us,” according to the New-England Weekly Journal.

Three militia regiments and five troops of horse formed in front of the Old State House and people covered the roofs. Bells rang all day, and at night the people lit bonfires and set off fireworks. And on Boston’s main streets, three and four rows of candles illuminated the windows of houses.

King George II

Birth of a Prince, Again

The Boston News-Letter reported the birth of another royal baby on May 14, 1738. The new prince, the grandson of King George II, would become King George III.

In late 1760, the news of George II’s death reached Boston. Royal Gov. Francis Bernard led a procession under military escort from the Old State House to Council chambers. Outside stood a militia regiment and a vast crowd of people. They listened to the proclamation of George as king from the balcony.

We…do now, with full Voice and Consent of Tongue and Heart, Publish and Proclaim, That the High and Mighty Prince George, Prince of Wales, is now … become our only Lawful and Rightful Liege Lord George the Third … To Whom we acknowledge all Faith and constant Obedience, with all hearty and humble affection: Beseeching God … to bless the Royal King George the Third, with long and happy Years to Reign over us.

Huzzahs

He concluded with “God save the king” and the crowd gave three huzzahs. The militia fired three volleys, and gunners discharged 63 cannon at Castle William. That night candles illuminated the town and Faneuil Hall hosted an entertainment.

Boston would celebrate the anniversary of King George III’s coronation every year thereafter. On Dec. 22, 1772, 13-year-old Anna Green Winslow wrote in her diary:

The king’s coronation day. In the evening I went with mamma to Col. Marshal’s in King Street to see the fireworks.

That marked the last official celebration of an English monarch’s coronation in Boston. The next year, the events leading up to the Boston Tea Party would overshadow George’s coronation.

This story was updated in 2022.

Our story of Cotton Mather and Joseph Dudley begins in 1686. Cotton Mather has just assumed leadership of the Second Church of Boston, lifting the burden from his father, Increase, just named president of Harvard College.

Cotton Mather

Increase Mather was one of the most powerful Puritan ministers of his day. Cotton wanted to make a name for himself and rise to the level of influence of his famous father. He also had prominent grandfathers, Richard Mather and John Cotton.

King James II had thrown the colony into turmoil that year. He had revoked its charter, which had allowed the colony to choose its own leaders and largely govern itself. James replaced the government with his hand-picked appointee, Edmund Andros. Andros had a second in command, Joseph Dudley. Dudley governed on an interim basis in 1685 while Andros awaited finalization of his appointment.

Portrait believed to portray Joseph Dudley

Andros issued offensive new rules. He banned town meetings, levied new taxes and tried to give away public lands. Dudley enforced his decisions as judge.

Joseph Dudley

Dudley was the son of Thomas Dudley, a devout Puritan who arrived in the new world in 1630 and served four terms as governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Dudley, like his father, embraced Puritan beliefs.

Andros did not like the Puritans . Not only did he curtail the functions of local government, but he also began extending protections to people of other churches.

Sir Edmond Andros, bigoted papist

Dudley believed in the legitimacy of royal power. Even if he disagreed with Andros, as an agent of the king he would not have challenged his authority.

As Andros tried to establish his power, the colonists began to rebel. The Rev. John Wise of Ipswich led a group of men who declared increased taxes could not be collected without town meeting. The men were arrested and hauled before Dudley, determined to show the colonists once and for all that they no longer had the power to set policy on tax issues. When Wise objected, the high-handed Dudley replied: “Mr. Wise, you have no more privileges left you than not to be sold as slaves.”

The remark would haunt Dudley.

Witch Trials and Strange Bedfellows

Against this backdrop, in 1688, Cotton Mather was called upon to pray for the health of the children of one of his parishioners, John Goodwin. Goodwin employed a cleaning woman, Ann “Goody” Glover. Originally from Ireland, she had come to the United States via Barbados. She and her family belonged to the thousands of Irish that the English government forcibly deported to the West Indies as indentured servants in the 1640s.

By 1688, she was an elderly cleaning woman, widowed and living in Boston. She had an altercation with one of the Goodwin children over some missing cloth. Shortly thereafter the children began feeling ill.

A doctor came to see the children, and he diagnosed them as suffering from witchcraft. Cotton Mather and Joseph Dudley served as accuser and judge, respectively. The two oversaw Glover’s conviction. She was hanged for witchcraft, but her real sin was her Catholicism. Had she renounced her Catholicism, they likely would have spared her.

The case foreshadowed the 1692 witch hysteria in Salem, in which the Mathers played a role. Cotton Mather famously, in the Salem case, wrote that spectral evidence could be used, but should not be the sole reason for convicting someone.

The Overthrow of Andros

The alliance between Cotton Mather and Joseph Dudley didn’t last long. In 1689, news of the overthrow of King James II reached Boston. Angry colonists then arrested Andros, Dudley and other appointees of the King. The colonists shipped them off to London to answer charges of 119 illegal acts. Those included attempted theft of public lands, stolen customs payments and arbitrary exercise of power..

Andros is taken prisoner during the Boston Riot, er, Revolt.

Andros was replaced with the previously elected government. The Puritans then began lobbying for a permanent return of democratic government.

Dudley denied the charges levied against him by Cotton Mather and blamed Andros. Though seven colonists had leveled charges, they had no agent in London to prosecute. And so Dudley went free, a loose cannon.

Soon Dudley was back in America, this time serving as judge in New York. Here, support for James II was stronger and democracy not well established. Colonists, led by Jacob Leisler, revolted against the colonial governor, but they didn’t have unanimous support.

When the new king, William, sent his instructions to the colony, Leisler was arrested. Dudley won a judgeship in New York and presided over the trial that sentenced Leisler to death. Mather then charged Dudley with being bloodthirsty and high handed in advocating the death penalty, though Dudley disputed that.

William of Orange

In 1693, Dudley – universally unpopular – returned to England. He began building a case for his appointment as governor of all of New England. The idea that Cotton Mather would become his most important ally in regaining power might seem preposterous, but that is exactly what happened.

Dudley’s Return to Power

Increase Mather had served as Massachusetts’ envoy to England in 1690i. He had tried to lobby the new king to restore the original colonial charter that allowed Massachusetts citizens to elect their own governments. He lost support back home when he acquiesced to a replacement charter that reserved more rights for the king.

Increase lobbied his friends to return him to London, but he was blocked. Dudley, meanwhile, living in England and acting as deputy-governor for the Isle of Wight, pulled every string he could to win his way back to New England.

William Phips

He succeeded in having the Mathers’ hand-picked governor, William Phips, arrested and brought to England to face dubious corruption charges. Phips died before he could clear his name. But still Dudley’s reputation was so blackened that he could not win the king’s appointment to govern New England. Richard Coote, 1st Earl of Bellomont won the appointment in 1695.

Dudley chanced on an idea, however. Hearing of Increase Mather’s difficulties in returning to London, he reached out to Cotton Mather with a promise to advocate for his father’s return. The Mathers both desperately wanted this and thought Dudley was now an ally and controllable. Cotton Mather wrote a letter in support of Dudley’s return to Massachusetts as governor.

With Lord Belomont’s death in 1701, and the Mathers now in his pocket, Dudley sought and received the appointment he coveted – a return to New England as its governor.

Cotton Mather and Joseph Dudley Feud Again

It would not take long before Cotton Mather recognized his mistake. Almost immediately Dudley double-crossed the Puritan minister. Mather had advised Dudley who he should take advice from and who he should not trust. Dudley immediately passed on Mather’s opinions to his enemies, infuriating all involved.

John Leverett

Mather also sought appointment as president of Harvard to replace his father. But Dudley declined to give it to him and chose John Leverett instead.

The high-handed treatment of Mather was completely in character for Dudley. But whatever joy he found in the double cross was certainly tempered by the storm of controversy he brought down upon himself.

Both Mathers now took up their pens and pulpits and began railing against Dudley. He was a murderer (in the case of Leisler), they charged. A thief of public funds. He illegally traded with France, they alleged. He smuggled and usurped fishing rights from the colonists. The list of grievances was enormous.

Many of the charges against him were flat out fabrications and exaggerations, but Dudley spent considerable time in rebutting them. He ended up traveling to England for a hearing with the Board of Trade.

Dudley Undone

Dudley would retain his post until 1715. Finally, however, Dudley was undone. A group of businessmen wanted to print money to back a bank proposal, and Dudley thwarted them. Instead he argued the colony should fund the proposal by borrowing and thus protecting the value of currency already in circulation.

This decision added too many people to the list of enemies who hated Dudley and, with much lobbying, he was replaced as governor. The animosity between Dudley and the people would set the tone for relations with the government in New England for the next 50 years, long after Dudley died in 1720 at his Roxbury home.

Images: Joseph Dudley By Attributed to Peter Lely – http://www.eldreds.com/sales/detail.php?itemID=97915, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=14855236.