(Dawe, Philip) | One of the most famous Revolutionary cartoons

(Dawe, Philip)

The Bostonian's Paying the Excise-Man or Tarring & Feathering. London: Robert Sayer and John Bennett, 1774

Mezzotint (350 x 252 mm). Engraving by Philip Dawe, affixed to card at upper corners, with hinged mat; closed tear to lower margin repaired, restoration to lower left corner, some minor smudging to lower margin. In custom clamshell case.

Among the earliest visual depictions of the Boston Tea Party"

One of the most famous political cartoons of the American Revolution, depicting the tarring and feathering of one of the King's excise-men, John Malcomb, by a mob in Boston in January 1774. For dramatic purposes, the cartoon slightly alters chronology, and shows the Boston Tea Party going on in the background. The two events were actually about six weeks apart ... but by the time this cartoon was issued on October 31, 1774, the two outrages against British authority had probably blended together in the public mind. In the print, Malcomb, tarred and feathered, is held down by a group of Bostonians, while one of them forced him to drink tea. A 'Liberty Tree' is above them, with the Stamp Act nailed to it upside down. The left side of the print shows the Tea Party in progress" (Celebration).  

Labeled "Plate I" in the lower left corner, this print was the first in a series of five issued by Sayer and Bennett, London engravers and mapmakers.

REFERENCE

Celebration of My Country 47; Cresswell 670; Fowble 93; Revolutionary Hundred 16