Editing Gaspee affair (section)

===Whig response===
Colonial [[Patriot (American Revolution)|Whigs]] were alarmed at the prospect of Americans being sent to England for trial, and a [[Committees of correspondence|committee of correspondence]] was formed in Boston to consult on the crisis.  In Virginia, the [[House of Burgesses]] was so alarmed that they also formed an inter-colonial committee of correspondence to consult with similar committees throughout the Thirteen Colonies. 

The Reverend [[John Allen (minister)|John Allen]] preached a sermon at the Second Baptist Church in Boston which utilized the ''Gaspee'' affair to warn listeners about greedy monarchs, corrupt judges, and conspiracies in the London government.  This sermon was printed seven different times in four colonial cities, becoming one of the most popular pamphlets of Colonial America.<ref>G. Jack Gravelee and James R. Irvine, eds.'' Pamphlets and the American Revolution: Rhetoric, Politics, Literature, and the Popular Press'' (Delmare, NY: Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, 1976), viii.</ref>  This pamphlet and editorials by numerous colonial newspaper editors awoke colonial Whigs from a lull of inactivity in 1772, thus inaugurating a series of conflicts that culminated in the [[Battles of Lexington and Concord]].{{cn|date=June 2022}}