In 1769, the citizens of Boston held a meeting in which they instructed their representatives in the Provincial Legislature to resist the usurpations of the British Government.

John Adams was chairman of the committee that prepared these instructions, and his associates were Richard Dana and Joseph Warren, the same distinguished patriot who gave up his life as one of the earliest sacrifices to freedom, in the battle of Bunker Hill.
Those instructions were expressed in the bold and decided tone of John Adams, and they increased the public excitement in the province, by the earnestness with which they insisted on the removal of the British troops from Boston.
The popular irritation increased, until on the 5th of March, 1770, a collision occurred between the troops and some of the inhabitants of Boston, in which five citizens were killed, and many wounded.

This was called the Bloody Massacre.

The exasperated inhabitants were with difficulty restrained from retaliating this severity by an extermination of all the British troops.

A public meeting was held, and a committee, of which SAMUEL ADAMS was chairman, was appointed to address the Governor (Gage), and demand that the troops should be withdrawn.