Captain Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader or highest rank officer of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police depa ...

Thomas Preston ( 1722 – 1798 was a British military officer who served in

Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

Massachusetts Massachusetts ( ; ), officially the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Maine to its east, Connecticut and Rhode ...

. He commanded the troops involved in the

Boston Massacre The Boston Massacre, known in Great Britain as the Incident on King Street, was a confrontation, on March 5, 1770, during the American Revolution in Boston in what was then the colonial-era Province of Massachusetts Bay. In the confrontati ...

in 1770 and was tried for murder, but was acquitted. Historians have never settled whether he ordered his men to fire on the colonists. Preston was originally from

Ireland Ireland (, ; ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe. Geopolitically, the island is divided between the Republic of Ireland (officially Names of the Irish state, named Irelan ...

; his people were among the Protestants settled there.

Boston Massacre

Preston was a captain of the

29th Regiment of Foot The 29th (Worcestershire) Regiment of Foot was an infantry regiment of the British Army, raised in 1694. Under the Childers Reforms it amalgamated with the 36th (Herefordshire) Regiment of Foot to become the 1st Battalion, the Worcestershire R ...

, part of the British garrison in Boston under the overall command of

Thomas Gage General Thomas Gage (10 March 1718/192 April 1787) was a British Army officer and colonial administrator best known for his many years of service in North America, including serving as Commander-in-Chief, North America during the early days ...

. He was present at the

, also known as the Incident on King Street, when on 5 March 1770 a group of soldiers from the 29th fired on colonists of the city, after an aggressive mob had confronted them and thrown snowballs, clubs, and rocks at them. Captain Thomas Preston showed up on the scene to help the other troops. Charges were brought against him and other soldiers, but he was acquitted in a trial held in

. Future

United States President The president of the United States (POTUS) is the head of state and head of government of the United States. The president directs the executive branch of the federal government and is the commander-in-chief of the United States Armed For ...

John Adams John Adams (October 30, 1735 – July 4, 1826) was a Founding Fathers of the United States, Founding Father and the second president of the United States from 1797 to 1801. Before Presidency of John Adams, his presidency, he was a leader of ...

was his attorney. An eyewitness report by John Tudor, who was a merchant, says that Preston gave the order to fire, but many historians believe that he did not. Two of his men, Hugh Montgomery and Matthew Kilroy, were found guilty of

manslaughter Manslaughter is a common law legal term for homicide considered by law as less culpable than murder. The distinction between murder and manslaughter is sometimes said to have first been made by the ancient Athenian lawmaker Draco in the 7th ce ...

. They " prayed clergy" to avoid the death sentence. Instead, they were branded on the thumb with a hot iron, the letter "M" for murder. Captain Preston was tried separately. The main issue was whether or not he had called the order to fire, he was found not guilty. After his trial, Preston retired from the army. He reportedly settled in Ireland. Adams later recalled seeing him in London in the 1780s, when Adams was serving there as US Minister to Britain.

In popular culture

* In the 2008 American miniseries, ''

'', Preston was played by British actor

Ritchie Coster Ritchie Coster (born 1 July 1967) is an English character actor. He is best known for playing the roles of Dietrich Banning in ''The Tuxedo'' (2002), the Chechen in ''The Dark Knight'' (2008), Elias Kassar in '' Blackhat'' (2015), Mayor Austin ...

. * In the 2012 video game, ''Assassin's Creed III'', Preston was voiced by an unknown actor. * In the 2015 History Channel miniseries, ''Sons of Liberty'', Preston was portrayed by Shane Taylor.

Bibliography

* Hibbert, Christopher. ''Redcoats and Rebels: The American Revolution Through British Eyes''. Avon Books, 1990. * Zobel, Hiller (1234). ''The Boston Massacre.'' New York: W.W. Norton. *
Massacre Soldiers
' in ''West's Encyclopedia of American Law'', edited by Shirelle Phelps and Jeffrey Lehman, 2nd ed., vol. 2, Gale, 2005, pp. 85–86. ''Gale In Context: U.S. History'' Accessed 28 Feb. 2022. * Tudor, John.
An Eyewitness Describes the Boston Massacre (1770)
' ''The American Revolution'', Primary Source Media, 1999. American Journey. ''Gale In Context: U.S. History''. Accessed 28 Feb. 2022. * Linder, Douglas. "The Boston Massacre Trials: An Account." ''Available at SSRN 1021327'' (2007). * Reid, John Phillip. "A Lawyer Acquitted: John Adams and the Boston Massacre Trials." ''The American Journal of Legal History'' 18.3 (1974): 189–207.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Preston, Thomas Year of birth uncertain 18th-century deaths 29th Regiment of Foot officers Worcestershire Regiment officers Irish officers in the British Army Boston Massacre People indicted for war crimes British people acquitted of murder People acquitted of international crimes