A meeting of citizens of Concord appointed a committee, of which Mr.Hoar was Chairman, and A.G.Fay, Secretary, who called a meeting of prominent persons from different parts of the State to meet at the American House in Boston, to take measures for forming a new party and calling a State Convention.

This Convention was held at Worcester on the 7th of September, and formed a party under the name of Republican, and nominated candidates for State offices.

Its meeting has been claimed to be the foundation of the Republican party of Massachusetts, and its twenty- fifth anniversary was celebrated accordingly in 1879.

But it effected little more than to change the name of the Free Soil party.

Few Whigs or Democrats united to the movement.
A secret organization called Americans, or Know-Nothings, swept the Commonwealth like a wave, electing all the State officers, and, with scarcely an exception, the entire Legislature.
The candidate for Governor nominated by the Republicans at Worcester, himself joined the Know-Nothings, and labored to defeat his own election.
The next year the attempt was more successful.