Samuel Dyer

(April 3, 1729 – June 11, 1800) 

Samuel Dyer, a housewright from Dorchester, Massachusetts, is designated as an “Eyewitness to History” as he claims that he was “prevented by Sickness” from participating in the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773. 

Dyer was arrested on July 6, 1774, in Boston by the British authorities for “seducing” British soldiers to desert the army.  In his testimony, given on July 30 and 31, 1774, he stated that “Mr. Samuel Adams did promise him at the House of Doctr. Young in June last”, that not only would Dyer receive £4 for each soldier he could convince to desert, but that “every Soldier should receive the like Sum of four pounds, or three hundred Acres of Land, and a Quantity of Provisions so soon as they arrived at a certain part of the Country, provided they would cultivate the said Land”. Dyer was seized by the British Navy and taken to England for trial.  

Once in England, however, Dyer presented an alternate scenario concerning his activities, claiming that Adams and Young had employed him to collect shipwrights and carpenters to be ready “whenever they wished to collect a Mob”. These activities may have laid the groundwork for the Boston Tea Party. To further his own cause, Dyer sought a monetary settlement from the Crown for this information. After failing to extort money from his situation, Dyer was returned to North America, landing in Newport, Rhode Island, before making his way back to Boston.  

Upon his return, Dyer impulsively attacked two British officers in broad daylight on the street in Boston on October 18, 1774. Armed with two pistols, both of which misfired, Dyer then lashed out at one of the officers with the man’s own sword and cut the Englishman in the back of his ear. Unimpeded, Dyer hurried on foot to the Provincial Congress that had convened in Cambridge the previous day, expecting to be welcomed as a hero. However, the Congress was alarmed that Dyer could have single-handedly instigated a harsh British crackdown or even worse, open warfare – an event that the patriot faction was not yet prepared to undertake. The Congress had no choice but to repudiate Dyer and his actions, and in fact, declared that he was a menace and likely insane. Dyer was sent to the Boston jail, where he possibly remained indefinitely due to the shuttered courts. He vanished from public record.  

Samuel Dyer died on June 11, 1800, in Lynnfield, Massachusetts. Contemporary accounts claim that Dyer, in his delusions, set out on foot on the road to North Reading, Massachusetts, lost his way, fell into a body of water in Lynnfield, and drowned.