Skip to main content

1

Jan

1776

Plymouth Harbor Defense Organized

Plymouth, MA· year date

The Story

Plymouth organized defenses for its harbor against potential British naval raids. While Plymouth's harbor was less strategically important than Boston's or Salem's, it was still vulnerable to British ships operating along the Massachusetts coast.

The town erected fortifications, organized watch schedules, and prepared for possible attack. These defensive preparations, replicated in coastal towns throughout New England, tied down British naval resources and demonstrated the breadth of colonial military organization.

Sources for Plymouth

History of Scituate, Massachusetts, from Its First Settlement to 1831
James Loring (Samuel Deane)
Plymouth County Registry of Deeds and Massachusetts State Archives
The Works of John Adams, Vol. II: Diary and Autobiography
Little, Brown and Company (Charles Francis Adams, ed.)
History of the Colony of New Plymouth in Massachusetts (2 vols.)
Houghton Mifflin (George D. Langdon Jr.)
History of the Town of Plymouth, from Its First Settlement in 1620, to the Present Time
Marsh, Capen and Lyon (James Thacher)
Records of the Colony of New Plymouth in New England (12 vols.)
William White (Nathaniel Shurtleff, ed.)
The Siege of Boston
Macmillan (Allen French)