Thomas Hutchinson

(noun)

A businessman, historian, and prominent Loyalist politician of the Province of Massachusetts Bay in the years before the American Revolution.

Related Terms

Examples of Thomas Hutchinson in the following topics:

  • The Boston Massacre and Military Occupation

    • Acting Governor Thomas Hutchinson was summoned to the scene and was forced by the movements of the crowd into the council chamber of the State House.

  • Liberty and Property

    • Governor Thomas Hutchinson of Massachusetts stated that "Nothing extravagant appeared in the papers till an account was received of the Virginia Resolves".

  • The Boston Tea Party

    • Protesters had successfully prevented the unloading of taxed tea in three other colonies, but in Boston, embattled Royal Governor Thomas Hutchinson refused to allow the tea to be returned to Britain.
    • In Boston, however, Governor Hutchinson was determined to hold his ground.
    • Governor Hutchinson refused to grant permission for the Dartmouth to leave without paying the duty.

  • The Albany Congress and the Intercolonial Defense

    • The mural depicts some of the delegates (from left to right): William Franklin and his father, Benjamin (Pennsylvania); Governor Thomas Hutchinson (Massachusetts); Governor William Delancey (New York); Sir William Johnson (Massachusetts); and Colonel Benjamin Tasker (Maryland).

  • Rhode Island

    • When dissenters, including Puritan minister Roger Williams and Anne Hutchinson, challenged Governor Winthrop in Massachusetts Bay in the 1630s, they were banished.
    • Anne Hutchinson also ran afoul of Puritan authorities for her criticism of the evolving religious practices in the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
    • Literate Puritan women like Hutchinson presented a challenge to the male minister's authority.
    • In 1637, Hutchinson also purchased land on Aquidneck Island from the American Indians, settling in Pocasset, now known as Portsmouth, Rhode Island.
    • The following year, Algonquian warriors killed Hutchinson and her family.

  • The Massachusetts Bay Colony

    • Some literate Puritan women in the colonies, such as Anne Hutchinson, challenged the male ministers’ authority.
    • Hutchinson's major offense was her claim of direct religious revelation, a type of spiritual experience that negated the role of ministers.
    • Because of Hutchinson’s beliefs and her defiance of authority in the colony, Puritan authorities tried and convicted her of holding false beliefs.

  • The American Enlightenment

    • Politically, the age is distinguished by an emphasis on liberty, democracy, republicanism, and religious tolerance—culminating in the writings of Benjamin Franklin and Thomas Jefferson and the drafting of the United States Declaration of Independence.
    • Deism greatly influenced intellectuals and several noteworthy 18th-century Americans such as John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Paine, and Thomas Jefferson.
    • The most articulate exponent was Thomas Paine, whose The Age of Reason was written in France in the early 1790s and reached America soon thereafter.
    • Thomas Paine's Common Sense, published at the outset of the American Revolution, drew heavily on the theories of Locke and is largely considered one of the most virulent attacks on political despotism.
    • The culmination of these enlightenment ideas occurred with Thomas Jefferson's Declaration of Independence, in which he declared:

  • Jefferson, Slavery, and Race

    • Thomas Jefferson, though an advocate of freedom and equality, owned and fathered slaves.
    • Thomas Jefferson was born into the planter class of a "slave society" in which slavery was the main means of labor production and elite slaveholders were the ruling class.
    • In 1768, Thomas Jefferson began to use his slaves to construct a neoclassical mansion known as Monticello.
    • Some historians have claimed that, as a Representative to the Continental Congress, Thomas Jefferson wrote an amendment or bill that would abolish slavery.
    • Evaluate Thomas Jefferson’s changing views on slavery in the United States

  • Puritanism

    • Roger Williams, who preached religious toleration, separation of Church and State, and a complete break with the Church of England, was banished and founded Rhode Island Colony, which became a haven for other refugees from the Puritan community, such as Anne Hutchinson.

  • The Declaration of Independence

    • In 1776, revolution was fomented by Thomas Paine, who wrote Common Sense; and by Abigail Adams, who advocated for women's rights.
    • The text of the Declaration of Independence was drafted by a “Committee of Five” appointed by Congress, which consisted of John Adams of Massachusetts, Benjamin Franklin of Pennsylvania, Thomas Jefferson of Virginia, Robert R.
    • Thomas Paine and Abigail Adams were two distinct, populist voices upholding the cause of independence during this time.
    • In January 1776, Thomas Paine published a pro-independence pamphlet entitled Common Sense, which became an overnight sensation.