Yes, I know that school is out for the summer. Sorry, Alice Cooper, I just had to use your line. However, that does not mean we should not continue our learning, especially in this, our 250th year of American independence. I even learned something last week that I did not know about our road to independence. It is the story of the British schooner, the HMS Gaspee, and its fate in 1772.

I was visiting throughout New England, supporting veterans running for political office, when the good people of Rhode Island shared with me an event that predated that of Lexington, Concord, and Breed's (Bunker) Hill. HMS Gaspee was a Royal Navy revenue vessel that was patrolling the waters of Narragansett Bay, enforcing maritime trade laws and preventing smuggling activities. In essence, it was preventing colonial free trade that sought to avoid onerous British regulation, sound familiar? The schooner ran aground on June 9, 1772, while chasing a colonial ship. Nothing like home-field advantage. It was a local merchant, John Brown, no relation to the fella who raided Harpers Ferry, who organized a raiding party of Patriots that went out on longboats to attack, burn, and destroy the Gaspee. The raiding party of some sixty was led by Captain Abraham Whipple. They took Lieutenant William Dudingston and his crew prisoner, then set the HMS Gaspee ablaze.

The HMS Gaspee event was two years after the Boston Massacre and about three years before the Battle of Lexington. When you speak to the Rhode Islanders, they feel the claim of the "first shot" for American independence should belong to them. Oh, the British were never able to find out the perpetrators of the Gaspee raid. The folks in Rhode Island were very tight-lipped.

I found it interesting that in the month of June, leading to our 250th anniversary of independence, I saw more rainbow flags in New England than American. The acts of rebellion in Rhode Island, June 9, 1772, and at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, on April 19, 1775, are REAL reasons for........

© Townhall