Hub Town Tours Circular Letter Vo. 10, No. 5 Issue: “A City Rejoices.”

Reading of the Declaration of Independence from the Old State House, July 18, 1776

Three Hearty Cheers

Soon after the Continental Congress adopted the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, it was widely circulated. Once the first copies of the document arrived in Boston eleven days later, it was reprinted in the American Gazette, a Salem newspaper. On July 18, Colonel Thomas Crafts read the Declaration aloud from the Town House’s balcony (today's Old State House) to a jubilant crowd. Henry Alline, who witnessed the event, recalled that after the reading there were "three hearty Chears," accompanied by artillery salutes, musket fire, church bells, and the destruction of the royal lion and unicorn atop the building which were "Committed to the flames to the Satisfaction of every body but Tories." His account captures the joy and optimism Bostonians felt as they welcomed the promise of a new nation. -Scholaris

The Child Independence

Upon its completion in 1713, Boston’s Town House served as the seat of royal power in Massachusetts. At the head of King’s Street (now State Street), this brick building stood proudly as a bastion of British authority, in clear view of the thousands who disembarked at Boston's Long Wharf. It was here that the Massachusetts General Court met, where James Otis argued against the Writs of Assistance in 1761. John Adams later remarked that “Then and there the child Independence was born.” It was just outside these walls that the Boston Massacre took place in 1770. And it was here that, in 1776, Bostonians learned for the first time that they were citizens of a new nation. 4 years later, with the passage of the Massachusetts Constitution in 1780, the Town House officially became the State House. - Discipulus

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