THE BLOODY MASSACRE PERPETRATED IN KING STREET, BOSTON, ON MARCH 5, 1770

Paul Revere’s mass-produced engraving shows the patriot version of events. Soldiers appear as a firing squad, shooting simultaneously at an unarmed and bewigged crowd; more likely the shooting was chaotic, and the fatalities were from lower classes who were not the sort to wear wigs. Crispus Attucks, an African-Indian dockworker, was killed, but Revere depicts only whites among the injured. Anne S. K. Brown Military Collection, Brown University Library.

READING THE IMAGE How does this picture attempt to enlist its viewers’ sympathies?

CONNECTIONS Does this picture accurately represent the events of the Boston Massacre? What might account for its biases?