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 BOILED CHICKEN HALIBUT, HOLLANDAISE 
 
 CUCUMBERS POTATOES PARISIENNE 
 
 BROILED GUINEA CHICKEN 
 LETTUCE SALAD APPLE FRITTERS 
 
 PI N EAPPLE ICE 
 
 CLAMS IN BLANKET 
 COFFEE 
 
 Squantum, 
 
 February 21, 1903 
 
CONCERNING THE SILVER PUNCH BOWL 
 MADE BY PAUL REVERE IN 1768 AND 
 USED AT A WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY 
 DINNER GIVEN FEBRUARY 2TST, 1903 
 AT SQUANTUM, RHODE ISLAND, BY MR. 
 AND TviRS. MARSDEN J. PERRY 
 
This bowl, commemorative of events prior to the American Revolu- 
 tion, was purchased of the associates, whose names are inscribed upon 
 its surface, by William Mackay, one of their number, from whom, 
 upon his decease in January, i8oi, it passed to William Mackay, his 
 son, and upon the demise of the latter, in 1832, it became the 
 property of William Mackay, his grandson in direct line, a resident of 
 the city of New York. At his death in 1873 it passed into the hands 
 of his brother, Robert C. Mackay, of Boston, and Robert C. Mackay, 
 March iith, 1902, transferred it to Marian Lincoln Perry, of Provi- 
 dence, R. I., a great, great-granddaughter of John Marston, one of 
 the fifteen associates. 
 
, A 
 
3e-n\4™'"^ pranWl'in SttVtns. 
 
 The 
 
 Silver Punch Bowl 
 
 MADE BY PAUL REVERE TO 
 COMMEMORATE A VOTE OF 
 THE HONORABLE HOUSE OF 
 REPRESENTATIVES OF THE 
 MASSACHUSETTS BAY IN 1768 
 

 1768— 1903 
 
 
 y^ 
 
 / 
 
The Silver Punch Bowl 
 
 HE reputation of the great Boston 
 mechanic, Paul Revere, does not depend 
 solely upon any one of his many quali- 
 fications. He was as ardent a patriot as 
 he was an excellent mechanic, and as 
 fearless a post-rider for the leaders of the Revolu- 
 tion as he was a good soldier, bearing a commission 
 as lieutenant from Governor William Shirley, under 
 which commission he served His Majesty King George 
 II. on an expedition against the French at Crown 
 Point. He was a man of many resources; and, as his 
 biographer aptly puts it, " he was an artificer of many 
 trades, who was relied upon by the leading patriots for 
 valuable services in the times that tried men's souls." 
 
 It has been said that " although his bells were hang- 
 ing in many steeples, his cannon had been heard 
 
around the world, his articles of silverware were 
 sacredly cherished in many a family, a few of his cari- 
 catures and historic engravings were still treasured in 
 the hands of those who knew their value, yet Revere 
 himself was comparatively unknown. Today his name 
 is a household word, made so in a great measure by 
 the muse of Longfellow." 
 
 That famous midnight ride, set to the music of the 
 poet's verse, has traveled many times around the 
 world, ever adding in its course to the undying fame 
 of the hero and the poet. 
 
 But it is not to celebrate an incident in his patriotic 
 career that your attention is drawn ; it is to an incident 
 in his peaceful days, when older and possibly wiser 
 heads were planning those acts against the British 
 crown which Revere and those like him carried to a 
 successful termination. 
 
 It is well known how absolutely without price a 
 piece of Revere silverware is today, how scarce it is, 
 and how our antiquaries and collectors would give 
 almost anything to possess even a spoon which came 
 from the hands of the grand old silversmith. 
 
 Here is shown, not a piece made for a household 
 purpose, but a royal punch bowl commemorative of 
 an historic event, which was the worst annoyance that 
 King George III. received from the colonists before 
 the Revolution. 
 
To fully understand why and for whom this bowl 
 was made let us go back to the year 1765 and con- 
 sult the historians of the times, who will readily tell us 
 how hot the temper of the people had become by 
 contact with the officers of the British crown, when 
 King George III., led by his ministry, had saddled 
 upon our ancestors the infamous Stamp Act, the out- 
 cropping of the most villainous doctrine ever set forth 
 to grind a free and enlightened people into the dust — 
 taxation without representation. 
 
 The Stamp Act levied a duty, or tax, of half a penny 
 to twenty shillings on any piece of parchment or paper 
 on which anything should be written or printed. The 
 news of its passage reached Boston in April, 1765, 
 and was received with alarm and indignation. Not 
 only Massachusetts Bay, but every province, exhibited 
 a spirit of resistance. In Virginia the resolutions of 
 the House of Burgesses, drawn up by Patrick Henry, 
 gave an impetus to public sentiment throughout the 
 length and breadth of the land, and every province 
 was in a blaze of excitement and resentment. 
 
 On the 1 2th of August, the birthday of the Prince 
 of Wales, the people of Boston, instead of honoring 
 the event by public rejoicings, shouted, " Pitt and 
 Liberty;" and the enthusiasm increased until, two 
 days after, the stuffed figures of Andrew Oliver, Secre- 
 
tary of Massachusetts Bav, who had been appointed 
 distributor of stamps, and of Lord Bute were seen 
 dangling from Liberty Tree, the effigy of Bute being 
 a boot with a devil peeping out with a " Stamp Act " 
 in his hand. 
 
 The subsequent proceedings originated with Revere's 
 organization, the Sons of Liberty, who cut down these 
 figures, and carried them in procession through the 
 streets of the town, borne on a bier. The multitude 
 moved in perfect order, and their route was lined with 
 townspeople. They passed through the Town House, 
 and under the council chamber, where the Governor 
 and council were sitting, and the patriotic crowd 
 shouted, " Liberty, property, and no stamps ! " into 
 the ears of the listening dignitaries. The Sons of 
 Liberty were preceded by some forty or fifty trades- 
 men. From King (now State) Street they proceeded 
 to Fort Hill, and there burnt the effigies in a huge 
 bonfire. Governor Hutchinson fled to the castle for 
 safety by means of a boat from Dorchester Point. 
 Old Boston had rarely been so excited. It hardly 
 needs mention that all business was suspended on that 
 day. 
 
 The officers of government could not appease the 
 ire of the people, who in a large body proceeded to 
 Kilby Street, where a building had been erected by 
 
Oliver, which was supposed to be the intended office 
 for distributing the stamps, and instantly demoHshed 
 it, bearing on their shoulders a portion of its ruins to 
 Fort Hill, and there made a bonfire with it in full 
 view of Oliver's house — all of which induced Mr. 
 Oliver to declare that he would not attempt, directly 
 or indirectly, to introduce any of the King's stamps 
 into the market. 
 
 A change in the British ministry soon repealed the 
 obnoxious tax law ; and on receipt of the glad tidings. 
 May 1 6, 1766, the town bells were rung. Liberty Tree 
 was hung with lamps, and fireworks were displayed in 
 every direction. In the evening a magnificent pyramid 
 was erected on the Common, on which were two 
 hundred and eighty lighted lamps; and subscriptions 
 were raised for releasing the prisoners for debt, that 
 all might partake in the general rejoicing of the 
 Liberty Boys. 
 
 During the quasi existence of the Stamp Act, on 
 Monday, August 26, 1765, some boys lighted a bon- 
 fire in front of the Town House on State Street, now 
 known as the Old State House, and a great number of 
 people gathered there, whose watchword appeared to 
 be " Liberty and property." The assembly soon 
 became a riotous mob, and at once beset a house 
 tenanted by Mr. Paxton, surveyor of the port, who 
 
had made himself obnoxious in many ways to the 
 people. The owner of the house stood in front of it, 
 and to save his property, Paxton having left with his 
 effects, invited the mob to drink a barrel of punch at 
 the next tavern, which offer was gladly accepted. 
 Thence the mob went to Mr, Storey's, deputy register 
 of the admiralty, whose house was opposite the north 
 corner of the Town House, and staved it to pieces, 
 took out all the books and papers and records of the 
 admiralty, carried them to Fort Hill, and there with 
 them fed the liberty flame, or bonfire. They then 
 visited the house of Mr. Hallowell, comptroller of the 
 customs, broke into it, and destroyed or carried off 
 gyerything of any value. 
 
 The Lieutenant-Governor, Thomas Hutchinson, 
 did not consider himself a party to the Stamp Act or 
 custom house concerns, and gave himself, for a time, 
 no uneasiness ; but while he was at supper he was 
 apprised that the mob had him in special remembrance. 
 He sent his children away, determined to see the event 
 out ; but his eldest daughter returned for him and he 
 prudently left with her. 
 
 The mob entered his house, which stood fronting 
 North Square, and destroyed or carried off everything, 
 including a thousand pounds of specie and the family 
 plate, with large and valuable collections of manuscripts 
 
and original papers (the efforts of a long life) relating 
 to the policy and features of the country from its 
 earliest settlement by Europeans, The loss of these 
 papers cannot be estimated. 
 
 Hutchinson was appointed governor of the province 
 by King George III. in 1769. In T772 a number of 
 his letters were obtained in London by Benjamin 
 Franklin, who sent them to Boston, which disclosed 
 his secret enmity to his country, in one of which he 
 wrote: "There must be an abridgement of English 
 liberties in colonial administration." The Legislature, 
 on ascertaining his treachery, voted an impeachment; 
 but Hutchinson, obtaining early information of what 
 was transpiring, dissolved the Legislature and sailed 
 for England June i, 1774. There he experienced the 
 neglect and contempt of the lords, for whom he had 
 sacrificed his reputation for honor and integrity, and, 
 becoming an object of disgust with all parties, like 
 Arnold, he lived some few years in a state of chaQ;rin 
 and despondence, and died in June, 1780, at the age 
 of sixty-nine years. 
 
 When the Stamp Act went into operation, Novem- 
 ber I, 1765, the day was ushered in with the tolling of 
 bells and the firing of minute guns, while the flag of 
 every vessel in port was at half-mast : thus the people 
 showed their determination to nullify the Act. Again 
 
the multitude crowded around Liberty Tree, and hung 
 upon its branches the effigies of Greenville and Lord 
 Bute. In the afternoon they were cut down and 
 carted, with great solemnity, first to where the General 
 Assembly was in session, and thence to the gallows on 
 the Neck, where they were again suspended, and 
 finally torn in pieces, and given to the winds of 
 heaven. Then the people quietly dispersed to their 
 homes, at the request of their leaders, and the night 
 was undisturbed by confusion or noise. 
 
 The times were, indeed, tempestuous, even with the 
 repeal of the hated Stamp Act, and persons began 
 seriously to prepare themselves for the storm which 
 evidently was brewing between the colonies and the 
 mother country, the cloud of which, no larger than a 
 man's hand, had already appeared upon the horizon. 
 
 It was when the news arrived from England that 
 the Stamp Act had become a law that the great 
 Boston mechanic, Paul Revere, with a few other 
 patriots, organized the famous Society of the Sons of 
 Liberty, whose active work continued until American 
 independence had been achieved. 
 
 These Sons of Liberty were, for the most part, of 
 the laboring classes and mechanics, with here and there 
 a sprinkling of lawyers and merchants, under the 
 direction of influential leaders. They were success- 
 
fully secret in all their meetings and concerted move- 
 ments. They even issued warrants for the arrest of 
 persons suspected of lack of patriotism. They 
 arranged in secret caucus for the government of elec- 
 tions and the programme for patriotic celebrations, 
 and, in fact, were the mainspring of every public 
 demonstration against the government. They were 
 some three hundred in number, and they held their 
 public meetings around the " Liberty Tree," at the 
 junction of Newbury, Orange, and Essex Streets, or, 
 as would be said today, Washington and Essex Streets. 
 Thousands of people assembled under this historic 
 tree when the Sons of Liberty met there ; but their 
 secret meetings, according to John Adams, were held 
 in the counting room of Chase & Speakman's distil- 
 lery in Hanover Square. It has been more generally 
 believed from Paul Revere's well known leadership, 
 that the Sons met at the old Green Dragon Tavern in 
 Union Street. 
 
 It was not long before the Sons of Liberty had 
 organizations in many towns in this province, and in 
 towns in New York, Rhode Island, Georgia, Mary- 
 land, and South Carolina. Probably no single repub- 
 lican organization in the history of governments ever 
 before wielded so much power for good as that of the 
 Sons of Liberty, composed of laboring men and 
 mechanics. 
 
The name " Sons of Liberty " originated from a 
 similar term applied to the Bostonians by Colonel 
 Isaac Barre in his speech in Parliament, when George 
 Greenville brought forward his infamous scheme of 
 taxation, which resulted in the Stamp Act, when Barre 
 said " The people of the American colonies, I believe, 
 are as truly loyal subjects as the King has, but a 
 people jealous of their liberties, and who will vindicate 
 them if they should ever be violated." 
 
 After the delivery of the speech from which the 
 foregoing is an extract the town solicited the portraits 
 of Colonel Barre and General Henry Seymour Conway, 
 Secretary of State from 1765 to 1768, able parliament- 
 ary defenders of the colonies. The request was com- 
 plied with, and the pictures were sent over in 1767; 
 but they disappeared from Faneuil Hall after the 
 evacuation of Boston by the British soldiery. 
 
 It was General Conway who moved to bring in a 
 bill to repeal the Stamp Act, after Pitt had made his 
 celebrated speech, in which he said : " I rejoice that 
 America has resisted. Three millions of people so 
 dead to all the feelings of liberty as voluntarily to sub- 
 mit to be slaves would have been fit to make slaves of 
 the rest. ... In a good cause, the force of this coun- 
 try can crush America to atoms. But, on the ground 
 of this tax, when it is wished to prosecute an evident 
 
injustice, I am one who will lift my hands and my 
 voice against it. In such a cause your success would 
 be deplorable, and victory hazardous. America, if she 
 fell, would fall like the strong man. She would 
 embrace the pillars of state, and pull down the Consti- 
 tution with her." 
 
 The news of the repeal of the Stamp Act reached 
 Boston in the spring of 1766, and the third day follow- 
 ing, being May 19th, was set apart for general rejoicing. 
 At one in the morning the bell on Dr. Byles' church 
 (now the Hollis Street Theatre), being nearest to 
 Liberty Tree, began to ring. This was answered by 
 the bells of Christ Church at the North End, from 
 which edifice Paul Revere, on April 18, 1775, hung 
 out his lanterns of warning, and soon every town bell 
 was ringing. 
 
 Passing lightly over the year subsequent to the 
 repeal of the Stamp Act, provincial history brings vis 
 to the passage, by the Legislature of Massachusetts 
 Bav, of what has been called the strongest state paper 
 ever sent forth in the province — the celebrated circular 
 letter written by that stern old patriot, Samuel Adams, 
 to the other colonies, which passed the Legislature in 
 February, 1768, by a nearly unanimous vote. 
 
 From a condition of deep loyalty to the Crown, at 
 the date of the repeal of the Stamp Act, the provincials. 
 
in 1768, became its determined enemies. Nothing 
 they desired was done; their wishes and rights had 
 been disregarded, and what they thought to be the 
 worst evil to their trade and commerce had been 
 imposed upon them — a hated revenue bill. It is 
 stated by contemporaneous history, what may well be 
 believed today, that the Revolution commenced with 
 the aggressive acts of the Crown in 1768. But, not- 
 withstanding the unfortunate condition of affairs, there 
 was no overt act of violence on the part of the people; 
 so well disciplined were they by their leaders that even 
 the anniversary of the repeal of the Stamp Act passed 
 away in quiet. Charles Townshend, the author of the 
 Taxation Bill, had died, and was succeeded in office by 
 Lord North, who would not concede a single favor to 
 the colonists ; and it was at this juncture of affairs that 
 Samuel Adams thought out and drafted his celebrated 
 circular letter, which contained a reference to every 
 question which had arisen between the colonists and 
 the home government, such as the right of the Crown 
 to tax the province without a representation in Parlia- 
 ment, and the powers of the Crown ; and strong 
 allusion was made to the great value there would be to 
 England in the growing American trade if fostered and 
 protected, and of the great loss that would be sustained 
 if that trade were taxed to death to support a set of 
 
hungry office-holders. For seven days was the Legis- 
 lature engaged in debating this circular letter, and it 
 may be presumed that nothing important was left out. 
 
 Bancroft, in his history, says of the writer of this 
 wonderful production: "The ruling passion of Samuel 
 Adams was the preservation of the distinctive charac- 
 ter and institutions of New England. He thoroughly 
 understood the tendency of the measures adopted by 
 Parliament; approved of making the appeal to Heaven, 
 since freedom could not otherwise be preserved; and 
 valued the liberties of his country more than its tem- 
 porary prosperity — more than his own life — more than 
 the lives of all." 
 
 Adams wrote to Lord Camden, who had been the 
 friend of the colonies in the Stamp Act agitation : 
 " The position that taxation and representation are 
 inseparable, is founded on the immutable laws of 
 nature. But the Americans had no representation in 
 Parliament when they were taxed. Are they now then 
 unfortunate in these instances, in having that separated 
 which God and nature joined ? Such are the local 
 circumstances of the colonies at a distance of a thousand 
 leagues from the metropolis, and separated by a 
 wide ocean, as will forever render a just and equal 
 representation in the supreme Legislature utterly im- 
 practicable." 
 
Copies of this document, which detailed the antag- 
 onistic position of the province toward the Crown, in 
 consequence of the laws levying duties upon imports 
 and other aggressions, were sent to every province in 
 the country, the legislatures of which sustained Massa- 
 chusetts Bay in the position she had taken in issuing 
 the circular letter. 
 
 On the 2ist of June, 1768, Governor Bernard trans- 
 mitted to the House a government letter from Lord 
 Hillsborough, secretary of the provinces, a part of 
 which reads as follows : " It is the King's pleasure that 
 so soon as the General Court is again assembled at the 
 time prescribed by the charter, you should require of 
 the House of Representatives, in His Majesty's name, 
 to rescind the resolution which gave birth to the 
 circular letter from the speaker, and to declare their 
 disapprobation of, and dissent to, that rash and hasty 
 proceeding ; and if, notwithstanding the apprehensions 
 which may justly be entertained of the ill consequences 
 of a continuance of this factious spirit that seems to 
 have influenced the resolutions of the Assembly at the 
 conclusion of the last session, the new Assembly 
 should refuse to comply with His Majesty's reasonable 
 expectation, it is the King's pleasure that you should 
 immediately dissolve them." 
 
On the 30th of June, 1768, the vote was taken to 
 rescind the circular letter. Ninety-two voted not to 
 rescind, and seventeen voted in favor. In obedience 
 to the mandate of King George III., Governor 
 Bernard prorogued the House on the day of their 
 refusal to rescind, but not before they had appointed a 
 committee to prepare a petition to the King, praying 
 that His Majesty would be graciously pleased to 
 remove His Excellency Francis Bernard, Esq., from 
 the government of the province. 
 
 But the Sons of Liberty in Boston determined to 
 show their appreciation of the patriotic stand taken by 
 the ninety-two members of the House of Representa- 
 tives in their vote not to bend the knee to royalty ; so 
 fifteen of them commissioned one of their number — 
 their leader, and the most eminent among them, 
 Paul Revere — to make for them a silver punch bowl 
 to commemorate the action of that noble band. And 
 this disobedience of the King's mandate, as embodied 
 in the act of the ninety-two not to rescind that circular, 
 is why Paul Revere made his famous punch bowl in 
 1768 for fifteen Sons of Liberty. 
 
 Round the rim of this bowl are the names of the 
 subscribers in a round-robin as follows: John Marston, 
 Ichabod Jones, John Homer, John White, William 
 Bowes, William Mackay, Peter Boyer, Daniel Mai- 
 
colm, Benjamin Cobb, Benjamin Goodwin, Caleb 
 Hopkins, John Welsh, Nathaniel Barber, Fortesque 
 Vernon, Daniel Parker. 
 
 The inscription on one side of the bowl is as 
 follows: "To the Memory of the glorious ninety-two 
 Members of the Hon^.' House of Representatives of 
 the Massachusetts Bay, who, undaunted by the insolent 
 Menaces of Villains in Power, from a strict Regard to 
 Conscience and the Liberties of their Constituents, on 
 the 30th of June, 1768, voted not to rescind." 
 
 On the opposite side of the bowl is a liberty cap, 
 and under it these words within a wreath : " No. 45. 
 Wilkes and Liberty," the figures referring to that 
 number of the North Britain, the paper conducted by 
 John Wilkes, in which he espoused the rights of the 
 colonies. On the other side of the wreath are two 
 flags, one containing the words " Magna Charta," the 
 other " Bill of Rights," and the engraving of a torn 
 letter, marked " General Warrants," which gave the 
 power to search houses, and under which Wilkes had 
 suffered arrest. 
 
 This punch bowl belongs to a descendant of William 
 Mackay, one of the subscribers, who was in that day 
 a merchant. He bought the right of ownership of 
 the other Sons of Liberty ; and the valuable relic is 
 still, and will always continue to be, in the possession 
 
of the family. The name of Revere is stamped on 
 the under side of the bowl. 
 
 The names of William Maclcay, gentleman, Fish 
 Street, and five others appear in the first Boston Direc- 
 tory of 1789 ; viz., Benjamin Cobb, distiller, Long 
 Wharf; John Homer, stonecutter. Fish Street; John 
 Welsh, ironmonger. Union Street ; John White, Scar- 
 let's Wharf; Peter Boyer, town treasurer, Sudbury 
 Street. The other nine had accomplished their life's 
 journey. 
 
 John Marston, whose name is first mentioned upon 
 the list, was a merchant of considerable means. He 
 abandoned his business at the time the Society of the 
 Sons of Liberty was organized, and turned his private 
 residence into an inn called " The Bunch of Grapes 
 Tavern," which was on the corner of State and Kilby 
 Streets, formerly Mackerel Lane. Here the Sons of 
 Liberty and their sympathizers were afforded an oppor- 
 tunity to meet and lay the plans which eventually 
 resulted in the freedom of the Colonies. He was 
 Boston born, and in 1 740 received a commission from 
 Governor Belcher of Massachusetts Bay as captain, 
 and served at the battle and capture of Louisburg. 
 During the Revolution his tavern, the Bunch of 
 Grapes, was the resort of the hottest-headed patriots. 
 On the occupation of Boston by the British, John 
 
Marston was arrested and parolled. He never took 
 active service in the Revolution, but his son, the 
 grandfather of the present John Marston of Phila- 
 delphia, did, and served faithfully to the close of the war. 
 
 Another of the subscribers, Daniel Malcolm, has a 
 history. He was of Irish birth, and intensely Ameri- 
 can, and extremely bitter against the Crown. He was 
 an importer of wines, and had an invoice subject to 
 duty arrive here in a schooner. The vessel was brought 
 to anchor about five miles below the castle. Daniel 
 Malcolm, with twenty or more sturdy fellows in barges, 
 went down at night, unloaded the cargo, and returned 
 to the city with sixty pipes of wine free of duty. He 
 died in 1769, aged about forty-four years. The 
 British soldiers, in revenge for his act of insubordina- 
 tion, made a target of his gravestone, and there it 
 stands in Copp's Hill burial ground with the marks of 
 the British bullets upon it. 
 
 In 1874 this rare old punch bowl, sole relic of an 
 event which must have set King George's teeth on 
 edge, was taken to the rooms of the Massachusetts 
 Historical Society by the late Rev. Dr. George E. 
 Ellis, and the transactions on that memorable and 
 interesting occasion are recorded in the archives of the 
 Society. It was then returned to the Mackay family, 
 in whose possession it has remained until latelv. 
 
Let us fill the bowl and propose prosperity to 
 the descendants of Paul Revere, the maker, William 
 Mackay, and John Marston, and the other thirteen 
 subscribers whose names are on the bowl, as well as 
 drink to the memory of the ninety-two members of 
 the Honorable House of Representatives of the 
 Legislature of Massachusetts Bay, who, undaunted by 
 the menaces of villains in power, voted not to rescind 
 the famous circular letter, so carefully drawn by that 
 intense patriot, Samuel Adams, who, more than any 
 other man of his day, threw fear into the ranks of the 
 British ministry and consternation into the heart of 
 his so-called "Gracious Majesty King George IIL" 
 
LiVERMORE i KNIGHT CO., PROVIDENCE