"
The journals now announced that two regiments, augmented to seven
hundred and fifty men each, were to embark at Cork for Boston; and
General Gage informed the local authorities that he expected their
arrival, and asked quarters for them, when the subject was considered
in the Council. This body now complied so far as, in the words printed
at the time, to "advise the Governor to give immediate orders to have
the Manufactory House in Boston, which is the property of the
Province, cleared of those persons who are in the present possession
of it, so that it might be ready to receive those of said regiments
who could not be conveniently accommodated at Castle William." This
building, as already remarked, stood in what is now Hamilton Place,
near the Common, and for twelve years had been hired by Mr. John
Brown, a weaver, who not only carried on his business here, but lived
here with his family; and hence it was his legal habitation, his
castle, "which the wind and the rain might enter, but which the King
could not enter."
Mr. Brown, having before declined to let the troops already in town
occupy the building, now, acting under legal advice, declined to
comply with the present request to leave it; whereupon it was
determined to take forcible possession.
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