Loyal Nine
Loyal Nine
LOYAL NINE. An offshoot of the Caucus Club that evolved into the active leadership of the Sons of Liberty, the Loyal Nine operated behind the scenes to connect the upper-class resistance to increased imperial regulation with the artisans, shopkeepers, sailors, and young toughs who provided the manpower and muscle of the movement. Coalescing in the summer of 1765 as part of the opposition to the Stamp Act, the Nine had connections running up and down Boston society. Samuel Adams was not a member of the Nine, but he maintained close ties with them, as did Joseph Warren. The Nine were, according to historian John C. Miller: John Avery (a distiller, Harvard College classmate of Joseph Warren, and secretary of the group), John Smith (a brazier), Thomas Crafts (a painter), Benjamin Edes (printer of the Boston Gazette), Stephen Cleverly (a brazier), Thomas Chase (a distiller), Joseph Field (a ship captain), George Trott (a jeweler), and Henry Bass (a cousin of Samuel Adams). Captain Henry Welles may also have been a member.
SEE ALSO Adams, Samuel; Caucus Club of Boston; Sons of Liberty; Stamp Act.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Fowler, William M., Jr. Samuel Adams: Radical Puritan. New York: Longman, 1997.
Miller, John Chester. Sam Adams: Pioneer in Propaganda. Boston: Little, Brown, 1936.
Morgan, Edmund S., and Helen M. Morgan. The Stamp Act Crisis: Prologue to Revolution. 3rd ed. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1994.
revised by Harold E. Selesky