Boston Massacre Dbq

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One fateful March night in Boston, Massachusetts 1770 five men were killed and six more were wounded. Dubbed The Boston Massacre by the Sons of Liberty, this event was built up to be much more than it really was. The soldiers were not guilty, but simply victims of tragic circumstance. A common primary source looked at when referring to The Boston Massacre is Paul Revere’s The Bloody Massacre. The silver engraving appears to show the British soldiers standing in a line being commanded to shoot at the colonists who are running away in fear. However this is not a reliable source because Revere was extremely biased. He was a well-known patriot and a very active member of the Sons of Liberty. He also changed aspects of the event in his depiction to sympathize with a greater audience. For example it looks like the commander is ordering the men to shoot when Captain Preston himself said, “my words were, don’t fire, stop your firing.” (Document Three) Revere also changed the color of Crispus Attucks’ skin as a way to gain more sympathy. These facts were twisted in a way that frames the British as murderers, but they were simply acting in self-defense. It was the colonists that gathered together first and started acting violently. Preston even writes in his deposition, “About 9 some of the guard came to and informed me the town inhabitants were assembling to attack the troops” and, “On this a general attack was made on the men by a great number of heavy clubs and snowballs being thrown at them, by which all our lives were in imminent danger.” (Document Three) The soldiers’ lives were in danger, and were put there by the rowdy colonists who wanted to get a rise out of them. The soldiers were only victims of circumstance, a circumstance that was rigged by the unjust decisions of a select few. The British soldiers cannot be held accountable for the sad events that
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