Thomas Hutchinson (governor)
Thomas Hutchinson (9 September 1711 – 3 June 1780) was an American merchant, politician, historian, and colonial administrator who repeatedly served as governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay in the years leading up to the American Revolution. He has been described as "the most important figure on the loyalist side in pre-Revolutionary Massachusetts".[1] Hutchinson was a successful merchant and politician who was active at high levels of the Massachusetts colonial government for many years, serving as lieutenant governor and then governor from 1758 to 1774. He was a politically polarizing figure who came to be identified by John Adams and Samuel Adams as a supporter of unpopular British taxes, despite his initial opposition to Parliamentary tax laws directed at the colonies. Hutchinson was blamed by British Prime Minister Lord North for being a significant contributor to the tensions that led to the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War.[2]
Thomas Hutchinson
Himself (acting)
Himself (as governor)
9 September 1711
Boston, Massachusetts Bay
3 June 1780 (aged 68)
Brompton, Middlesex
Great Britain
12 (5 survived to adulthood)
politician, businessman
Hutchinson's Boston mansion was ransacked in 1765 during protests against the Stamp Act, damaging his collection of materials on the history of Massachusetts. As acting governor in 1770, he personally visited the aftermath of the Boston Massacre, an event after which he ordered the removal of British occupational troops from Boston to Castle William. Letters of his calling for the abridgment of colonial rights were published in 1773, further intensifying opposition towards him in the colony. Hutchinson was replaced as governor in May 1774 by General Thomas Gage and went into exile in England, where he advised the British government on its dealings with the colonists.
He had a deep interest in the colonial history of the United States, collecting many historical documents. Hutchinson wrote a three-volume History of the Province of Massachusetts Bay whose last volume, published posthumously, covered his own period in office. Historian Bernard Bailyn wrote of Hutchinson, "If there was one person in America whose actions might have altered the outcome [of the protests and disputes preceding the American Revolutionary War], it was he."[3] Scholars use Hutchinson's career to represent the tragic fate of the many Loyalists marginalized by their attachment to the British imperial system at a time when the American nation-state was emerging. He exemplified the difficulties experienced by Loyalists, paralyzed by his ideology and his dual loyalties to America and Britain. Hutchinson sacrificed his love for Massachusetts for his loyalty to Great Britain, where he spent his last years in an unhappy exile.[4]
Legacy and memory[edit]
During and after the Revolution as an unrepentant Loyalist Hutchinson was often considered a traitor to his native Massachusetts and the cause of freedom. John Adams was characteristically harsh in his assessment of him, calling him "avaricious" and describing him as a "courtier" who manipulated those at higher levels of power to achieve his aims.[94] He was also criticized by British political figures: Thomas Pownall continued to disagree with Hutchinson after the latter's exile, Francis Bernard (despite working on Hutchinson's behalf) disapproved of some of his actions, and Lord North believed the publication of his letters to be responsible for the outbreak of the war.[95]
Biographers in the 20th century have, however, rehabilitated his reputation, seeking to explain how and why he came to be demonized in this way.[96] In recent decades historians have typically portrayed Hutchinson as a tragic figure torn between his rulers in London and his people in Massachusetts. Barbara Tuchman, for example, portrays Hutchinson as an "ill-fated" and "tragic figure".[97] British scholar David Kenneth Fieldhouse says his tragedy emerged because he was "a victim of the clash of two ideologies, his own archaic and static, that of his opponents contemporary and dynamic".[98] Carl L. Becker, a prominent American historian wrote: "Nothing would have pleased him [Hutchinson] more than that New England should have shown its emancipation from provincialism by meriting the goodwill of the King. His irritation with America in general and Boston, in particular, was the irritation of a proud and possessive father with a beloved but wayward child who fails to do him credit in high places." Bailyn has changed his own interpretation over the years. In the 1970s he saw Hutchinson as a bewildered pragmatist. By 2004 he portrayed Hutchinson as a premodern thinker locked in an old mindset at a time when Enlightenment ideas were taking hold thanks to thinkers such as Adam Smith and Tom Paine.[99]
Remnants of Hutchinson's country estate in Milton have been preserved. The main piece, a parcel of land known as Governor Hutchinson's Field, is owned by The Trustees of the Reservations and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. It is open to the public, and nearby property features a ha-ha constructed for Hutchinson in 1771. The ha-ha is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and both properties are part of the Milton Hill Historic District.[100][101] Boston, which had landmarks named after the Hutchinson family, took pains upon his departure to rename them.[102]
In popular culture[edit]
In the 2015 miniseries Sons of Liberty, Hutchinson is portrayed by Sean Gilder.