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At the time when the American colonists began to be restless under the rule of Great Britain, the people of New Jersey showed as strong a desire for independence as those of any other Colony, and they were by no means backward in submitting to any privations which might be necessary in order to assert their principles. As has been said before, the people were prosperous, and accustomed to good living, and it was not likely that there was any part of America in which a cup of well-flavored tea was better appreciated than in New Jersey.

But when the other colonists determined to resist unjust taxation, and resolved that they would not use tea, on which a heavy tax was laid without allowing the American people to have anything to say about it, the patriotic people of New Jersey resolved that they too would use no tea so long as this unjust tax was placed upon it. When the tea was destroyed in Boston Harbor, the Jersey patriots applauded the act, and would have been glad to show in the same way what they thought upon the subject.

But when tea was shipped from England, it was sent to the great ports of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston; and what was used in New Jersey came from these places after the consignees had paid the tax. However, to show their sympathy with the efforts which were being made at the sea-ports to prevent the landing of tea, the New Jersey people, that is, those who belonged to the Whig party,–which was the patriotic party, and opposed to the Tories, who favored England,–formed an association, the members of which bound themselves to buy or use no tea until the tax should be removed.

There is a story told of Hugh Drum of Somerset County, who was so thoroughly in earnest on this subject, and who probably supposed that the weak little Colonies would always have to submit to the power of Great Britain, that he took an oath that never again during the rest of his life would he take a cup of tea; and although he lived a great many years afterward, during which the Americans imported their own tea without regard to what any other country thought about it, Mr. Drum never again drank tea.

But at last an opportunity came for patriotic Jerseymen to show that they were not behind the other colonists in resisting the attempt of Great Britain to force upon them this taxed tea.

Nearly a year after the tea had been thrown overboard in Boston Harbor, a vessel from England–loaded with tea, and bound to Philadelphia–put into Cohansey Creek, a small stream which runs into Delaware Bay, and anchored at the little town of Greenwich. This vessel, called the “Greyhound,” was afraid to go up to Philadelphia, because from that port tea ships were sent back to England as soon as they arrived, as was also the case in New York. So the captain of the “Greyhound” thought it would be a good plan to land his tea at Greenwich, from which place it could be taken inland to its destination. Here the cargo was unloaded, and stored in the cellar of a house opposite the open market place.

This business of forcing tea upon the American colonists had become a very serious matter to England; for the East India Company had now in their warehouses at London seventeen million pounds of tea, and, if there should be no sale for any of this in the American market, the loss would be very severe. Consequently every possible method was resorted to, in order to have the tea landed on American soil; it being believed, that, if the tea once got into the hands of the dealers, the people would overcome their prejudices to its importation, and begin to use it again.