As the United States prepares to celebrate its 250th birthday next year, let’s take a moment to remember a protest involving tea that occurred shortly before the revolution. And no, I’m not talking about that famous one that occurred in Boston, but rather another one that happened in eastern North Carolina almost a year later and was carried out by women. It’s known as the Edenton Tea Party of 1774.
The Charlotte Museum of History on Saturday is holding an event highlighting this lesser-known part of American history. The person leading that event is Katie Hatton, who is Editor of the North Carolina Colonial Records Project at the NC Office of Archives and History. She joins WFAE's Marshall Terry.
Marshall Terry: So I think everyone knows the story of the Boston Tea Party or has at least heard of it. The Edenton Tea Party, as I sai,d happened almost a year later. What happened exactly?
Katie Hatton: So, much like the Boston Tea Party, the Edenton Tea Party was also an act of political protest in response to British colonial taxation policies in the lead up to the American Revolution. However, unlike Boston, at Edenton, this political act was undertaken solely and exclusively by women. And I should also add that instead of dumping tea into the harbor, as we hear about in Boston, the women of Edenton signed and published a resolution in protest of these taxation policies. So a little bit less dramatic, but just as important. And by doing this, they gave their oaths to boycott British goods.
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Terry: What was the response from England?
Hatton: We know that the Edenton Tea Party Resolves as a petition was sent to England and published in a newspaper there. It was also sent to Parliament. We don't have any record of the Parliament receiving it or responding to it in any particular way, but we know it was read in London newspapers.
Terry: Just how unusual was it for women to organize and carry out something like this in 1774?
Hatton: This was highly unusual. As far as we can tell, the Edenton Tea Party Resolves was the first collective political action carried out specifically by women within all of the 13 colonies from any time, even prior to the American Revolution.
Terry: I grew up in North Carolina and I don’t recall this being taught as part of state history, much less national history. Why has it faded from memory? I found, while doing some research, a New York Times article from almost 100 years ago about a Daughters of the American Revolution reenactment of this event, so it seems like it used to be a bit more well-known.
Hatton: There's actually not many records indicating any talk about it, even within the town of Edenton, until the 1830s. Then by the 1850s and 1860s, we see more amateur historians wanting to kind of look into this event and recount it. And finally, around the turn of the century, that's when we finally see around the Edenton area people talking about trying to research more into the event. But it's only actually been within the past couple of years that historians have really sat down and tried to identify these 51 signers as individual women themselves.
Terry: Other Revolutionary War-era history did occur in the Carolinas. I’m thinking of the Battle of Kings Mountain in particular, which occurred not too far from Charlotte. But I feel like people tend to think of all the events from this period happening farther to the north, especially in places like New England. Is that view something you hope to change?
Hatton: It's certainly something that we hope to change. We've been doing a lot of research and trying to find ways to highlight the North Carolina events within the American Revolution and finding different ways through either children's books, online exhibits, reenactments, or other events to kind of promote and share the history of North Carolina and the important contributions we had towards the American Revolution. And there were certainly plenty of them. A lot of campaigns were happening in the Carolinas in the 1780s, and those campaigns eventually bring about the surrender at Yorktown.
The Charlotte Museum of History is an underwriter of WFAE.
