Tarring and Feathering

Colonials grew to despise Parliament’s taxes on the American colonies. Directing their anger at tax collectors, mobs would sometimes apply hot tar to the man’s skin (usually burning or blistering it) and then coat the tar with feathers.

Cartoons, like this one, depict the process: “The Bostonian’s paying the excise-man, or tarring and feathering.”

Credits

Lithograph by Pendleton, 1830, after a print published in London in 1774.

Library of Congress, Reproduction number LC-USZ62-1308.