The Liberty Archive FREECAPITALISTS.ORG

Illustrated Episode · Volume IV, chapter 21 · 18 October 1775

Burn, destroy, and lay waste

On a country road a woman carrying a child looks back over her shoulder as families with a handcart and a cow hurry away, while warships fire at a burning wooden town beside the harbor below.
Falmouth, Massachusetts, October 1775. Captain Henry Mowat's ships are shelling the town while its last families hurry their belongings up the road into the country. His orders were to "burn, destroy, and lay waste" every seaport on the coast up to Maine. Rothbard calls it a savage terror raid, and it spurred Congress to build a navy. Chapter 21 of Conceived in Liberty.

Download the painting, full size (JPEG)CC BY 4.0

Free to reuse under CC BY 4.0: credit freecapitalists.org. How to credit.

Adapted from Murray N. Rothbard, Conceived in Liberty (Mises Institute, 2011), CC BY 3.0.

What happened

By the autumn of 1775 Admiral Graves at Boston could not stop the American schooners and whaleboats that were preying on his supply ships. So he decided to punish the coast. He sent Captain Henry Mowat north with orders, Rothbard says, to "burn, destroy, and lay waste" the seaports to Maine, and singled out Gloucester and Falmouth for their opposition to government. Gloucester proved too hard. Mowat anchored off Falmouth on 16 October and warned the people to leave. A town committee bargained for time and handed over a few arms, and the deadline was set for nine o'clock on the morning of the 18th. At 9:40 a red pennant went up on his flagship, the Canceaux, and the squadron began firing, with shot, bombs, and incendiary shells, until six that evening. Landing parties then set fire to what was left. Some 400 buildings burned, nearly every public building and two thirds of the houses, and more than a thousand people lost their homes in a town of about 2,500. Rothbard calls it a wanton, savage terror raid. It did not break the coast, but it did move Congress: by December it had agreed to a marine corps and a fleet of four vessels.

Sources

  1. Murray N. Rothbard, Conceived in Liberty (Auburn, Ala.: Mises Institute, 2011 single-volume ed.), vol. IV, ch. 21, 'Privateering and the War at Sea', pp. 1211-1215. CC BY 3.0. Rothbard
  2. 'Burning of Falmouth', Wikipedia (accessed 2026-10-02): Mowat's squadron, the 9:40 a.m. opening on 18 October 1775, the red pennant on the Canceaux, some 3,000 projectiles, over 400 buildings burned, over 1,000 residents homeless. Secondary source
  3. Boston Public Library, American Revolution in Massachusetts research guide, 'Burning of Falmouth' (accessed 2026-10-02): 18 October 1775; over 400 buildings; two hours' warning; incendiary shot and landing parties. Secondary source
  4. Discover Concord, 'The Destruction of Falmouth' (accessed 2026-10-02): the committee's delay and handful of arms, 'many women and children still remaining', the fleet in line of battle, the red pennant, Rev. Bailey's description of the shells, and the churches, courthouse, library and waterfront burned. Secondary source
  5. Encyclopedia Virginia, 'The Town of Falmouth, Burnt by Capt. Moet, October 18, 1775' (accessed 2026-10-02): the engraving in Burke's An Impartial History of the War in America (1780), and the summary that nearly all public structures and two thirds of private homes were destroyed. Secondary source