Then, in 1773, came the little fleet of tea ships to Boston; and Boston, though she liked tea, promptly threw it into the harbor. Captain Benjamin Gorham, of the Barnstable family, was master of one of the ships, with a cargo of “Bohea”; and it was solemnly reported that “this evening a number of Indians, it is said of his Majesty of Ocnookortunkoog tribe, emptied every chest into the dock and destroyed the whole twenty-eight and a half chests.” And Cape Cod had her private Tea Party: for one of the fleet had run aground on the “Back Side” at Provincetown. John Greenough, district clerk of Wellfleet and teacher of a grammar school “attended by such only as learn the Latin and Greek languages,” busied himself about the task of transferring the cargo to Boston; but no Cape captain, though several were idle, would undertake the job, and boats were had down from Boston for the purpose. The Boston Committee of Correspondence, meantime, sent out a circular letter reporting their Tea Party, and adding: “the people at the Cape will we hope behave with propriety and as becomes men resolved to save their Country.” For it was suspected that not all the wrecked tea had been shipped to Boston; and indeed it soon transpired that Master Greenough, seeing no harm since the Government got no duty, had thriftily retained two damaged cases for himself and a friend. Brought to see his error, his due apology was spread upon the records: “I do declare I had no intention to injure the liberties of my countrymen therein. And whereas the Committee of Correspondence for this district apprehend that I have abused them, in a letter I sent them, I do declare I had no such intention, and wish to be reconciled to them again and to forget and forgive on both sides.” Other tea than Greenough’s hoard was being hunted out. A Truro town-meeting records: “Several persons appeared of whom it had been reported that they had purchased small quantities of the East India company’s baneful teas, lately cast ashore at Provincetown. On examining these persons it appeared that their buying this noxious tea was through ignorance and inadvertance, and that they were induced thereto by the villainous example and artful persuading of some noted pretended friends of government from the neighboring towns.” There is evidence enough that some tea floated into the channels of trade; but any one guilty of the traffic, when apprehended, was quick to place the blame elsewhere.