Old landmarks and historic personages of Boston . ritish allies, the tree was cut downby a party led by one Job Williams. Armed with axes, theymade a furious attack upon it. After a long spell of laughingand grinning, sweating, swearing, and foaming, with malicediabolical, they cut down a tree because it bore the name ofLiberty. * Some idea of the size of the tree may be formed from the fact that it madefourteen cords of jesting at the expenseof the Sons of Libertyhad a sorry conclusion;one of the soldiers, in at-tempting to remove alimb, fell to the pavementand was killed. The ground
Old landmarks and historic personages of Boston . ritish allies, the tree was cut downby a party led by one Job Williams. Armed with axes, theymade a furious attack upon it. After a long spell of laughingand grinning, sweating, swearing, and foaming, with malicediabolical, they cut down a tree because it bore the name ofLiberty. * Some idea of the size of the tree may be formed from the fact that it madefourteen cords of jesting at the expenseof the Sons of Libertyhad a sorry conclusion;one of the soldiers, in at-tempting to remove alimb, fell to the pavementand was killed. The ground immedi-ately about Liberty Treewas popularly known asLiberty Hall. In August,1767, a flagstaff had beenerected, which wentthrough and extendedabove its highest flag hoisted upon this staff was the signal for the assemblingof the Sons of Liberty for action. Captain Mackintosh, thelast captain of the Popes, was the first captain-general ofLiberty Tree, and had charge of the illuminations, hanging ofeffigies, etc. * Essex Gazette, LIBERTY TREE. 398 LANDMARKS OF BOSTON. After the old war was over a liberty-pole was erected on thestump of the tree, the latter long serving as a point of directionknown as Liberty Stump. A second pole was placed in posi-tion on the 2d July, 1826. It was intended to have been raisedduring the visit of Lafayette in 1825, and the following lineswere written by Judge Dawes : — Of high renown, here grew the Tree,The Elm so dear to Liberty ;Your sires, beneath its sacred shade,To Freedom early homage day with filial awe surroundIts root, that sanctifies the ground,And by your fathers spirits swear,The rights they left you 11 not impair. Governor Bernard, writing to Lord Hillsborough under dateof June 18, 1768, gives the following account of LibertyTree : — Your Lordship must know that Liberty tree is a large old Elmin the High Street, upon which the effigies were hung in the timeof the Stamp Act, and from whence the mobs at t
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