<P> The crowd eventually dispersed after Acting Governor Thomas Hutchinson promised an inquiry, but the crowd re-formed the next day, prompting the withdrawal of the troops to Castle Island . Eight soldiers, one officer, and four civilians were arrested and charged with murder . Defended by lawyer and future American president John Adams, six of the soldiers were acquitted, while the other two were convicted of manslaughter and given reduced sentences . The men found guilty of manslaughter were sentenced to branding on their hand . Depictions, reports, and propaganda about the event, notably the colored engraving produced by Paul Revere (shown at top - right), further heightened tensions throughout the Thirteen Colonies . </P> <P> Boston, the capital of the Province of Massachusetts Bay and an important shipping town, was a major center of resistance to unpopular acts of taxation by the British Parliament in the 1760s . In 1768, the Townshend Acts were placed upon the colonists, by which a variety of common items that were manufactured in Britain and exported to the colonies were subjected to import tariffs . Colonists objected that the Townshend Acts were a violation of the natural, charter, and constitutional rights of British subjects in the colonies . The Massachusetts House of Representatives began a campaign against the Townshend Acts by sending a petition to King George III asking for the repeal of the Townshend Revenue Act . The House also sent what became known as the Massachusetts Circular Letter to other colonial assemblies, asking them to join the resistance movement, and called for a boycott of merchants importing the affected goods . </P> <P> In Great Britain, Lord Hillsborough, who had recently been appointed to the newly created office of Colonial Secretary, was alarmed by the actions of the Massachusetts House . In April 1768 he sent a letter to the colonial governors in America, instructing them to dissolve the colonial assemblies if they responded to the Massachusetts Circular Letter . He also ordered Massachusetts Governor Francis Bernard to direct the Massachusetts House to rescind the letter . The house refused to comply . </P> <P> Boston's chief customs officer, Charles Paxton, wrote to Hillsborough, asking for military support because "the Government is as much in the hands of the people as it was in the time of the Stamp Act ." Commodore Samuel Hood responded by sending the fifty - gun warship HMS Romney, which arrived in Boston Harbor in May 1768 . On June 10, 1768, customs officials seized Liberty, a sloop owned by leading Boston merchant John Hancock, on allegations that the ship had been involved in smuggling . Bostonians, already angry because the captain of Romney had been impressing local sailors, began to riot . Customs officials fled to Castle William for protection . </P>

Who defended the british soldiers in the boston massacre