On October 15, 1774, the ship Peggy Stewart sailed up the Severn River into Annapolis harbor carrying “seventeen packages, containing 2,320 lb. of that detestable weed — tea.”
Handbills were immediately circulated through the city calling for a public meeting. The ship’s owner, Anthony Stewart, a British Loyalist deeply in debt from earlier failed ventures, took a desperate gamble by landing the tea in Maryland.
This ship would soon ignite what we Marylanders call “The Annapolis Tea Party.” On October 19, 1774, under public pressure, Stewart was compelled to burn his own vessel to the waterline.
Dr. Charles Alexander Warfield wasn’t merely an onlooker — he was reportedly among the men who ordered the destruction, declaring they must “destroy the ship and the cargo, or destroy the liberty of the people.” The surname may seem familiar to Marylanders as The Duchess of Windsor was born, Bessie Wallis Warfield. Wallis became Duchess when she married the abdicated King Edward VIII of the United Kingdom in 1937.
Last year marked the 250th anniversary of that act of protest. The very ground where the Peggy Stewart burned once belonged to my ancestors — they stood there as history turned to flame on their own shore.
tudorqueen6 by Meg McGath 