Boston Massacre in Facts and Numbers

• The Massacre occurred on the evening of March 5, 1770

• 5 civilians died as a result of the incident, 3 died on the scene and 2 died later. Some websites incorrectly add up the number of victims to be 7 in total.

• All victims of the Massacre, Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, James Caldwell, Samuel Maverick and Patrick Carr, were buried at Granary Burying Ground in Boston.

• There were two separate Boston Masacre trials. The trial of Captain Preston started almost 8 month after the incident and lasted for one week, from October 24, 1770 to October 30, 1770. The second trial was for the soldiers. It started almost one month after Preston’s aquital, on November 27, 1770 and ended on Dec 14, 1770.

• 9 British regulars were charged during the B.M. trials. Preston and six of his men were acquitted, two others were found guilty of manslaughter.

• The heavy military presence in Boston that lead to the Massacre was the result of British enforcement of the Townshend Acts of 1767.

• 4,000 troops were dispatched to Boston in October of 1768—not a small number, considering that Boston’s population was only about 20,000 residents at the time.

• The three years that followed the Massacre, from 1770 to 1772 passed rather quietly without any major confrontation between the British and the colonists.

• Before the “The Boston Massacre” name became common, the incident was also called The Bloody Massacre in King Street, from the title of the famous Paul Revere engraving. In the early 1800's it was also called the State Street Massacre.