and, above all, tea. Boston had shown turbulent defiance, and to
hold Boston down British soldiers had been quartered on the
inhabitants in the proportion of one soldier for five of the
populace, a great and annoying burden. And now British soldiers
had killed Americans who stood barring their way on Lexington
Green. Even calm Benjamin Franklin spoke later of the hands of
British ministers as "red, wet, and dropping with blood."
Americans never forgot the fresh graves made on that day. There
were, it is true, more British than American graves, but the
British were regarded as the aggressors. If the rest of the
colonies were to join in the struggle, they must have a common
leader. Who should he be?

In June, while the Continental Congress faced this question at
Philadelphia, events at Boston made the need of a leader more
urgent. Boston was besieged by American volunteers under the
command of General Artemas Ward. The siege had lasted for two
months, each side watching the other at long range. General Gage,
the British Commander, had the sea open to him and a finely
tempered army upon which he could rely. The opposite was true of
his opponents. They were a motley host rather than an army. They
had few guns and almost no powder. Idle waiting since the fight
at Lexington made untrained troops restless and anxious to go
home. Nothing holds an army together like real war, and shrewd
officers knew that they must give the men some hard task to keep
up their fighting spirit. It was rumored that Gage was preparing
an aggressive movement from Boston, which might mean pillage and
massacre in the surrounding country, and it was decided to draw
in closer to Boston to give Gage a diversion and prove the mettle
of the patriot army. So, on the evening of June 16, 1775, there