James Bowdoin II was an American political and intellectual leader from Boston, Massachusetts, during the American Revolution and the following decade. He initially gained fame and influence as a wealthy merchant. He served in both branches of the Massachusetts General Court from the 1750s to the 1770s. Although he was initially supportive of the royal governors, he opposed British colonial policy and eventually became an influential advocate of independence. He authored a highly political report on the 1770 Boston Massacre that has been described by historian Francis Walett as one of the most influential pieces of writing that shaped public opinion in the colonies.
Portrait by Robert Feke, 1748
Portrait of Bowdoin as a child by John Smibert
John Hancock (British mezzotint, 1775) was a perennial opponent of Bowdoin in matters political and personal.
James Bowdoin portrait
The Boston Massacre was a confrontation in Boston on March 5, 1770, in which nine British soldiers shot several of a crowd of three or four hundred who were harassing them verbally and throwing various projectiles. The event was heavily publicized as "a massacre" by leading Patriots such as Paul Revere and Samuel Adams. British troops had been stationed in the Province of Massachusetts Bay since 1768 in order to support crown-appointed officials and to enforce unpopular Parliamentary legislation.
The Bloody Massacre, a 1770 engraving by Paul Revere of the Boston Massacre in Boston in March 1770
Old State House in Boston, the capital of the Province of Massachusetts during the colonial era from 1713 to 1776; the cobblestone circle is labeled "Site of the Boston Massacre", but the Boston Massacre occurred nearby on what now is a busy Boston street.
A variation of Revere's famous engraving, produced just prior to the American Civil War, which emphasizes Crispus Attucks, the black man in the center who became an important symbol for abolitionists.
A grave marker for the Granary Burying Ground in Boston, where those killed in the Boston Massacre were buried