“FIRE, FIRE, DAMN YOU, FIRE! I DARE YOU!” yelled the colonists on the street as they threw snowballs, rocks, shells and clubs at the British soldiers. This was the beginning of what was called the Boston Massacre, it occurred on the night of March 5th, 1770. On this night, five men and boys were killed because of the confusion between the soldiers and the colonists. In this event, the British soldiers clearly felt threatened and the colonists were instigating trying to pick a fight with them. Another reason that proves that the British are innocent is that Captain Preston was standing in front of his soldiers. In addition, there was a misfire which led to the start of the soldiers to shoot. They also fired because they believed that Captain …show more content…
Well unfortunately, this is how the British soldiers felt during the Boston Massacre but it was worse because they continuously screamed and dared them to shoot them. After awhile they grew more and more violent. “The mob still increased and were more outrageous, striking their clubs… and calling out.” (Primary Source #3) During the trial, Captain Preston says he used ,”all in [his] my power to persuade them to retire peacefully, but to no purpose”. This shows that he tried to get the colonists to calm down but they kept going which caused more problems for themselves.
In addition, there are witnesses stating Preston’s position. According to Captain Preston “he was standing in front of their guns” (Primary Source #4) This supports to what Captain Preston says about him not ordering anyone to fire. This makes sense because if he did give the command to fire the gun, he would have been killed since he was standing in front of them. Another supporting fact is that there was a man standing next to Preston, in FRONT of the soldiers, who witnessed what happened. The evidence was on his jacket where it showed the scorched cloth from the