Crispus Attucks

This article is about Crispus Attucks. For other uses, see Crispus Attucks (disambiguation).

Crispus Attucks
Portrait of Crispus Attucks
Born	1723 United States
Died	March 5, 1770 Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Occupation(s)	Soldier, Dockworker

Crispus Attucks (c. 1723 – March 5, 1770) was in the American Revolutionary War, was the first person shot to death by British redcoats during the Boston Massacre, in Boston, Massachusetts. He has been named as the first martyr of the American Revolutionary War.

Little is known for certain about Crispus Attucks beyond that he, along with Samuel Gay and James Caldwell, died "on the spot" during the incident. Two major sources of eyewitness testimony about the Boston Massacre, both published in 1770, did not refer to Attucks as a "Negro," or "black" man; it appeared that Bostonians considered him mixed-race. Historians disagree on whether Crispus Attucks was a free man or an escaped slave; but agree that he was of Native American (Wampanoag) and African descent.

While the extent of his participation is unclear, Attucks became an icon of the anti-slavery movement and was held up as an example of the first black hero of the American Revolution. The other victims of the attack were Samuel Gray and James Caldwell who, like Attucks, died immediately during the attack; Samuel Maverick and Patrick Carr died from their wounds afterward. In the early nineteenth century, as the Abolitionist movement gained momentum in Boston, supporters lauded Attucks as a black American who played a heroic role in the history of the United States Because Attucks had Wampanoag ancestors, his story also holds special significance for many Native Americans.

Possible ethnicity and ancestry

Crispus Attucks was born in Boston and became notable as the first casualty of the Boston Massacre; he has become an icon of the American Revolution in the U.S. He was the only African American known to have been killed in conflict during the war. Contemporary accounts portrayed him as mixed race. The first was a report commissioned by the town of Boston, "A Short Narrative of the Horrid Massacre," which contained over one hundred depositions from locals about what they saw on March 5, 1770. The second source, The Trial of William Wemms, referred to Attucks more than a dozen times as a "mulatto" or "molatto," and once as an "Indian", another as a "tall man," and yet another as a "stout," or muscular man. Attucks in all likelihood had both Wampanoag and African ancestry.

Because slavery and racial discrimination were conditions of life in the 18th century, few detailed accounts of ordinary people from the colonial period exist. Some historians believe he used a different name, Michael Johnson. The name "Crispus" was mentioned in some records from the period without a surname; historians have worked to determine if these refer to Attucks. Historians have speculated whether an advertisement placed in the Boston Gazette on October 2, 1750 referred to Crispus Attucks:

Ran away from his Master William Brown of Framingham on the 30th of Sept. last a mulatto Fellow, about 27 years of age, named Crispus, 6 Feet and 2 inches high, short curl'd Hair, his Knees near together than common; and had on a light colour'd Beaverskin Coat, plain new buckskin breeches, blue yarn stockings and a checked woolen shirt. Whoever shall take up said runaway and convey him to his aforesaid master shall have 10 pounds old tenor reward, and all necessary charges paid. And all masters of vessels and others are hereby cautioned against concealing or carrying off said servant on penalty of law.

In the aftermath of King Philip's War in 1676, a Wampanoag man named Jean Attucks was executed for treason. Throughout the 17th to 19th centuries, the surname “Attucks” was used by Praying Indians around Natick and Framingham. The anthropological research of Frank Speck, as well as the work of Algonquian linguistics scholars Ives Goddard, Kathleen Bragdon, and Jessie Little Doe Baird, suggest that "Attucks" is likely an Anglicisation of the Wôpanââk word, ahtuq, meaning "deer", in combination with, ees, meaning "little."

Boston Massacre

Main article: Boston Massacre

In the fall of 1768, British soldiers were sent to Boston to help control growing colonial unrest. Tensions increased with those colonists who opposed the presence of troops. After dusk on March 5, 1770, a crowd of colonists confronted a sentry who had struck a boy for complaining that an officer was late in paying a barber bill.

This 19th century lithograph is a variation of the famous engraving of the Boston Massacre by John Bufford. Produced soon before the American Revolutionary War, this image emphasizes Crispus Attucks, who had become a symbol for Abolitionists. (John Bufford after William L. Champey, ca. 1856)

Both townspeople and the British soldiers of the 29th Regiment of Foot gathered. The colonists threw snowballs and debris at the soldiers. Attucks and a group of men led by Attucks approached the Old State House) armed with clubs. A soldier was struck with a piece of wood and some accounts credited Attucks. Other witnesses stated that Attucks was "leaning upon a stick" when the soldiers opened fire.

Five Americans were killed and six were mortally wounded. Attucks took two bullets in the chest and was the first to die. County coroners Robert Pierpoint and Thomas Crafts Jr. conducted an autopsy on Attucks. Attucks’ body was carried to Faneuil Hall, where it lay in state until Thursday, March 8, when he and the other victims were buried together.

Based on the premise of self-defense, John Adams successfully defended the British soldiers against a charge of murder. Two of the soldiers were found guilty of manslaughter. As soldiers of the King of England, they were given the choice of hanging or being branded on their thumbs. They both chose to be branded. In his arguments, Adams called the crowd "a motley rabble of saucy boys, negros and molattoes, Irish teagues and outlandish jack tarrs."

Two years later, Samuel Adams, a cousin of John Adams, named the event the "Boston Massacre," and helped assure that it would not be forgotten. Boston artist Henry Pelham (half-brother of the celebrated portrait painter John Singleton Copley) created an image of the event. Paul Revere made a copy from which prints were made and distributed. Some copies of the print show a dark-skinned man with chest wounds, presumably representing Crispus Attucks. Other copies of the print show no difference in the skin tones of the victims.

The five who were killed were buried as heroes in the Granary Burying Ground, which contains the graves of John Hancock and other notable figures. While custom of the period discouraged the burial of black people and white people together, such a practice was not completely unknown. Prince Hall, for example, was interred in Copp's Hill Burying Ground in the North End of Boston 35 years later.

Folklore

The fragmentary record of Attucks' life and death gave rise to speculation which, over the years, assumed the status of folk-history.

In popular versions of his life, Attucks was born to an enslaved, African-born father named Prince Yonger, and a Wampanoag mother named Nancy Attucks, who was from either the Natick-Framingham area of Middlesex County, just west of Boston, or from the island of Nantucket, south of Cape Cod. Attucks grew up in the household of Colonel Buckminster, his father’s master, until he was sold to Deacon William Brown of Framingham. Unhappy with his situation, Attucks escaped and became a ropemaker, a manual laborer, and/or a whaler. His quarrel with the British soldiers on March 5, 1770 was rooted in indignation regarding the impact of the Townshend Acts on the local economy, as well as the incidents that took place earlier that day.

Legacy and honors

Crispus Attucks' grave in the Granary Burying Ground

• 1858, Boston-area abolitionists, including William Cooper Nell, established "Crispus Attucks Day" to commemorate him.
• 1886, the places where Crispus Attucks and Samuel Gray fell were marked by circles on the pavement. Within each circle, a hub with spokes leads out to form a wheel.
• 1888, a monument honoring Attucks and the other victims of the Boston Massacre was erected on Boston Common. It is over 25 feet high and about 10 feet wide. The bas-relief (raised portion on the face of the main part of the monument) portrays the Boston Massacre, with Attucks lying in the foreground. Under the scene is the date, March 5, 1770. Above the bas-relief stands a female figure, Free America, holding the broken chain of oppression in her right hand. Beneath her right foot, she crushes the royal crown of England. At the left of the figure, is an eagle. Thirteen stars are cut into one of the faces of the monument. Beneath these stars in raised letters are the names of the five men who were killed that day: Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, James Caldwell, Samuel Maverick, and Patrick Carr.
• Although that year leaders of the Massachusetts Historical Society and the New England Historic Genealogical Society opposed the creation of the Crispus Attucks memorial, since the twentieth century both organizations have acknowledged his role and promoted interest in black history and genealogy.
• 1998, the United States Treasury released "The Black Revolutionary War Patriots Silver Dollar" featuring Attucks' image on the obverse side. Funds from sales of the coin were intended for a proposed Black Revolutionary War Patriots Memorial in Washington, DC.
• 2002, the Afrocentrist scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Crispus Attucks as among the 100 Greatest African Americans.
• Places named for Attucks include the Crispus Attucks High School in Indianapolis, Indiana, the Attucks Middle School in Houston, Texas, the Crispus Attucks Elementary School in Kansas City, Missouri, the Attucks Theatre in Norfolk, Virginia, the Crispus Attucks Association in York, Pennsylvania, Crispus Attucks Road in Spring Valley, New York, and the Crispus Attucks Center in Dorchester, Massachusetts.

In popular culture

• The poet John Boyle O'Reilly wrote the following poem when the monument was finally unveiled:

And to honor Crispus Attucks who was the leader and voice that day: The first to defy, and the first to die, with Maverick, Carr, and Gray. Call it riot or revolution, or mob or crowd as you may, such deaths have been seeds of nations, such lives shall be honored for aye...

• Martin Luther King, Jr., referred to Crispus Attucks in the introduction of Why We Can't Wait (1964) as an example of a man whose contribution to history provided a potent message of moral courage.
• In an unsourced, popular book about Attucks, James Neyland wrote his appraisal of the man's significance:

He is one of the most important figures in African-American history, not for what he did for his own race but for what he did for all oppressed people everywhere. He is a reminder that the African-American heritage is not only African but American and it is a heritage that begins with the beginning of America.

• The first line of the Stevie Wonder song, "Black Man" is about Crispus Attucks

External links

• Crispus Attucks: The Original Patriot US Army's The Story of America's Black Patriots
• "Crispus Attucks", Africans in America, PBS
• "Crispus Attucks", AfricaWithin
• Crispus Attucks Association, Inc.
• "The Murder of Crispus Attucks", Library of Congress exhibit, including trial documents.
• "Trial of Murderers", Framingham Website