Why shays rebellion happened

Worse still, they were neighbors and even kinsmen. Could we ever shoot at them? Could they shoot at us? Still, we advanced. Suddenly, at yards, Gen. Sheppard ordered the cannon fired over our heads. We marched onward. The cannon discharged a second time.

Again the shot fired passed above us. We could not believe that Massachusetts men would harm other Massachusetts men.

Then the unthinkable happened. The cannon let loose a third time and blasted directly into our center ranks. Through the smoke we could see one All was confusion as we ran for our lives. For me the Rebellion was over. I just heard about the rest of the story from the others. Lincoln and his state army arrived in Springfield about two days after the incident at the arsenal.

Lincoln would not follow, but he did. When he caught up with them, he took prisoners. The rest scattered to their homes or crossed the border into Vermont with Daniel Shays.

Sam Adams, that old revolutionary who had taught Massachusetts farmers how to close down courts and hold tea parties, was now a member of the state senate. Adams argued that they should be treated harshly.

About a dozen men were actually sentenced to hang. The others got pardons. A bounty was put on the heads of Daniel Shays and three other rebel leaders. Luckily for them, they escaped to Vermont.

In April , state elections were held and the legislature became more moderate. Also, the voters put a new governor into the statehouse: John Hancock. It also lowered taxes, released debtors from jail and passed other acts alleviating the grievances that had started the rebellion in the first place.

The following month, the Constitutional Convention began its deliberations in Philadelphia. Next time the forces of law and order might not be so lucky. If you had been a Massachusetts citizen in , who would you have supported: Daniel Shays or Gov.

At the same time those who opposed Shays and his actions said things like, "Monarchy is better than the tyranny of the mob. Vaughn, Alden T. June , pp. About one year after the rebellion had been crushed, Daniel Shays and his lieutenant, Eli Parsons, exiled and still hiding out in Vermont, petitioned Gov. Hancock and the legislature for a pardon and permission to return to Massachusetts. In the following activity the class will role-play a debate before the Massachusetts Legislature on this question: Should Daniel Shays be pardoned and allowed to return to Massachusetts?

Three students will assume the roles of Sam Adams and two other members of the Massachusetts Legislature who will oppose the pardon. Team members may also wish to do addition library research.

Each team should be given a chance to present its own arguments and also to question the opposite side. The rest of the class will take the roles of Massachusetts legislators. Working in small groups, students should develop a list of reasons for and against granting the pardons. These should be used in evaluating the quality of the presentations. After the debate has been concluded, the class, as the Massachusetts Legislature, should vote on the debate question based on the reasoning presented by both teams.

Debrief the debate activity by having the students who took the role of legislators compare their lists of reasons with those covered in the team presentation. Find out what really happened to Daniel Shays by referring to an encyclopedia or the sources listed at the end of the article. Shays then led a force of about 1, men in an attempted raid of the Springfield armory on January 26, The group was intercepted on the day before its planned attack; four protestors died in a brief conflict with the militia and the group dispersed.

It had to rely on a state militia led by General Benjamin Lincoln and sponsored by private business people. The group in Maryland included Madison, Hamilton, and other Founders including John Dickinson, and it recommended that a meeting of all 13 states be held the following May in Philadelphia. Some rebels were publicly paraded to the gallows before release. Two were executed for burglary. Shays was pardoned the following year.

He returned to Pelham briefly, then moved to Sparta , New York , where his legend made him a popular attraction for visitors. He died in and was laid to rest in an unmarked grave. Nationalists used the rebellion to heighten paranoia, and George Washington was convinced enough by their arguments to come out of retirement and take part in the Constitutional Convention , where he was elected the first president of the United States. When the Massachusetts Ratifying Convention began, many communities in Massachusetts that supported the rebellion sent delegates that had taken part in it.

Leonard L. Paul de Valle. Lenox Historical Commission. National Constitution Center. National Archives. But if you see something that doesn't look right, click here to contact us!

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