Samuel Adams and Henry Tufts book

 

Samuel Adams and The Vagabond Henry Tufts, Virtue Meets Vice in the Revolutionary Era Nathaniel Parry, McFarland Books 2024.

Nathaniel Parry has written a wonderful book about patriot Samuel Adams and criminal Henry Tufts. The stark differences between and similarities to each other are detailed in remarkable new ways. New research is put into the context of the patriot cause and the reality that crime was rampant in the Colonial Era. The book is thoroughly researched and referenced with over thirty pages of chapter notes. To a genealogist or researcher, this is a library list of discoveries waiting to be explored.

Many people know Samuel Adams from the beer sold today or from studying history in school. He was an important part of the early rebellious acts of the American revolution and contributed to two early newspapers of the time. If you weren’t well versed in Samuel Adams role leading up to and at the start of the Revolution, you will be after reading this book.

 The same will hold true for Henry Tufts. This new book, together with other new discoveries of legal proceedings, confirm the worst: Henry Tufts is a bad apple on the Tufts family tree.  The Tufts family is full of patriots and other leaders, but Henry was a criminal. The connection between Adams and Tufts was previously known as Adams was the Governor of Massachusetts in 1794 when Henry Tufts was pardoned for stealing six silver spoons. For those Tufts historians or genealogists who have followed Henry Tufts’s tale, this book is a great summary and puts the timeline of his story together with the important events surrounding the Revolution. As a contributor by reference, I am amazed at the thoroughness of Parry’s research. It is a testament to all those who have researched the Tufts before him.

This book gives the reader a new perspective on many things that occurred in Samuel Adams’s and Henry Tufts’s time. By comparing the lawlessness practiced by the patriots (such as smuggling) with that practiced by criminals, Parry sheds light on the rule of law, mob rule, class division, alcohol, racism, and other social issues in Colonial times.

It’s refreshing to read accurate history portrayed as it really happened, not watered down as so often happens in history books. 

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