Editing Tarring and feathering (section)

== 18th-century North America ==
The practice of tarring and feathering was exported to the Americas, gaining popularity in the mid-18th century. Throughout the 1760s it saw increased use as a means of protesting the [[Townshend Acts|Townshend Revenue Act]] and those who sought to enforce it.<ref name=":2" /> After a period of few tarrings and featherings between 1770 and 1773, the passage of the [[Tea Act]] in May 1773 led to a resurgence of incidents.<ref name=":2" />

During the [[Stamp Act 1765]] crisis, [[Archibald McCall (1734–1814)|Archibald McCall]], a wealthy Loyalist landowner, was targeted by a Patriot mob in [[Westmoreland, Virginia|Westmoreland]] and [[Essex County, Virginia]].<ref name="1802 AM to TJ">{{cite web |title=Founders Online: To Thomas Jefferson from Archibald McCall, 19 November 1802 |url=http://founders.archives.gov/documents/Jefferson/01-39-02-0025 |access-date=October 20, 2021 |website=founders.archives.gov}}</ref> He insisted on collecting the British tax that was placed on stamps and other documents. In reaction, a mob formed and stormed his house in [[Tappahannock, Virginia]]. They threw rocks through the windows, and McCall was captured, tarred and feathered.<ref name="Saison">{{cite magazine |last=Saison |first=Dianne |title=In a Class by Itself |url=http://thehouseandhomemagazine.com/api/content/e9684f40-85ab-11eb-8c85-1244d5f7c7c6/ |magazine=The House and Home Magazine |date=March 15, 2021 |access-date=October 21, 2021 |language=en-US}}</ref> In 1766, Captain J. William Smith was tarred, feathered, and dumped into the harbor of [[Norfolk, Virginia]], by a mob that included the town's mayor. A vessel picked him out of the water just as his strength was giving out. He survived and was later quoted in a letter as saying that they "be-dawbed my body and face all over with tar and afterwards threw feathers on me." Smith was suspected of informing on smugglers to the British customs agents, as was the case with most other tar-and-feathers victims in the following decade.<ref>{{cite book|author=Letters of Governor Francis Fauquier|title=''The William and Mary Quarterly''|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=vikjAQAAIAAJ&pg=PA167|volume=21|year=1912|pages=166–67}}</ref>

The practice appeared in [[Salem, Massachusetts|Salem]], [[Massachusetts]] in 1768, when mobs attacked low-level employees of the customs service with tar and feathers. In October 1769, a mob in [[Boston]] attacked a customs service sailor the same way, and a few similar attacks followed through 1774. Customs Commissioner [[John Malcolm (Loyalist)|John Malcolm]] was tarred and feathered on two occasions. First, in November 1773, he was targeted by sailors in [[Portsmouth, New Hampshire]], before undergoing a similar, albeit arguably more violent, ordeal in Boston in January 1774.<ref>{{cite book|last=Young|first=Alfred F.|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/40200615|title=The shoemaker and the tea party: memory and the American Revolution|date=1999|publisher=Beacon Press|isbn=0-8070-7140-4|location=Boston, MA|oclc=40200615}}</ref><ref name=":1">{{cite book|last=Hoock, Holger|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/953617831|title=Scars of independence : America's violent birth|year=2017|isbn=978-0-8041-3728-7|edition=first|location=New York|publisher=Crown|pages=23–26|oclc=953617831}}</ref> Malcolm was stripped, tarred, feathered, beaten, and whipped for several hours. He was then taken to the [[Liberty Tree]] and forced to drink tea until he vomited.<ref name=":2" />

In February 1775, Abner Bebee, a [[Loyalist (American Revolution)|Loyalist]] of [[East Haddam, Connecticut]], was tarred and feathered before being taken to a hog sty and covered in dung. Hog dung was then smeared in his eyes and forced down his throat. Bebee was subjected to this as a perceived punishment for expressing pro-British sentiment by his local [[Committee of safety (American Revolution)|Committee of Safety]].<ref name=":1" /><ref>{{cite book|last=Oliver|first=Peter|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/381408|title=Origin & progress of the American Rebellion; a Tory view.|publisher=Stanford University Press|year=1961|isbn=0-8047-0599-2|location=Stanford, CA|pages=157|oclc=381408}}</ref>

A particularly violent act of tarring and feathering took place in August 1775 northeast of [[Augusta, Georgia]].<ref name=":0">{{cite book|last=Jasanoff|first=Maya|url=https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/630500155|title=Liberty's exiles: American loyalists in the revolutionary world|date=2011|publisher=Alfred A. Knopf|isbn=978-1-4000-4168-8|edition=1st|location=New York|pages=21–23|oclc=630500155}}</ref> Landowner and loyalist [[Thomas Brown (loyalist)|Thomas Brown]] was confronted on his property by members of the [[Sons of Liberty]]. After putting up some resistance, Brown was beaten with a rifle, fracturing his skull. He was then stripped and tied to a tree. Hot pitch was  poured over him before being set alight, charring two of his toes to stubs. Brown was then feathered by the Sons of Liberty, who then took a knife to his head and began [[scalping]] him.<ref name=":0" />

Such acts associated the punishment with the [[Patriot (American Revolution)|Patriot]] side of the [[American Revolution]].<ref name=":2" /> An exception occurred in March 1775, when a number of soldiers from the [[47th (Lancashire) Regiment of Foot|47th Regiment of Foot]] tarred and feathered Thomas Ditson, a colonist from [[Billerica, Massachusetts]], who attempted to illegally purchase a musket from one of the regiment's soldiers.<ref>{{cite journal|last=Levy|first=Barry|date=March 2011|title=Tar and Feathers|url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/338390269|journal=Journal of the Historical Society|volume=11|pages=85–110|doi=10.1111/j.1540-5923.2010.00323.x|via=ResearchGate}}</ref> Ditson was tarred and feathered before having a placard reading "American Liberty: A Speciment of Democracy" hung around his neck whilst regimental musicians played "[[Yankee Doodle]]".<ref name=":2" />

During the [[Whiskey Rebellion]], local farmers inflicted the punishment on federal tax agents.<ref name=":2">Irvin, Benjamin H., "Tar, feathers, and the enemies of American liberties, 1768–1776", ''New England Quarterly'' (2003): 197–238. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/1559903 in JSTOR]</ref> Beginning on September 11, 1791, western Pennsylvania farmers rebelled against the federal government's taxation on western Pennsylvania whiskey distillers. Their first victim was reportedly a recently appointed tax collector named Robert Johnson. He was tarred and feathered by a disguised gang in [[Washington County, Pennsylvania|Washington County]]. Other officials who attempted to serve court warrants on Johnson's attackers were whipped, tarred, and feathered. Because of these and other violent attacks, the tax went uncollected in 1791 and early 1792. The attackers modeled their actions on the protests of the [[American Revolution]].<ref>{{cite book |last=Slaughter |first=Thomas P. |title=The Whiskey Rebellion: Frontier Epilogue to the American Revolution |url=https://archive.org/details/whiskeyrebellion00slau |url-access=registration |publisher=[[Oxford University Press]] |date=1986 |pages=113–114 |isbn=0195051912}}</ref>

There is no known case of a person dying from being tarred and feathered during this period.{{Citation needed|date=September 2021}}