6 OUR USE OF THE LAND 



American side and some of them fought in the ranks of the 

 ragged American armies. 



The war was not over when Cornwallis surrendered at 

 Yorktown. It still had to be paid for. One of the first things the 

 new American government had to do was to pay its debts. 

 Much of this money had to come from some kind of taxes on 

 the farmers. Unfortunately for the farmers, money was scarce. 

 Many of them couldn't pay the taxes, and as a result the courts 

 took their land from them. The farmers who had fought for the 

 Revolution felt that it was flatly unjust that their land should 

 be taken simply to repay government debts to rich townsmen. 



Under the leadership of Captain Daniel Shays, the farmers 

 of the Petersham region gathered together in a large band. 

 Armed with pitchforks and scythes, they set out to stop the 

 courts from seizing their farms. 



Very much upset by what was going on in the back country, 

 General Knox wrote to General Washington of Shays' follow 

 ers, "Their creed is that the property of the United States has 

 been protected from the confiscation of Britain by the joint 

 exertions of all, and therefore ought to be the common property 

 of all. . . . This dreadful situation, for which our govern 

 ment have made no adequate provision, has alarmed every 

 man of principle and property in New England." 3 



To quiet the fears of the men of principle and property, the 

 militia was called out. Before breakfast one wintry morning, 

 Shays and his army were routed and caught at Petersham. It is 

 hard to tell what those men of property and principle would 

 think if they knew that today a new state highway through 

 this area has been named "The Daniel Shays Highway." 



After the trouble with Shays had ended and the Constitution 

 was adopted, the people of Petersham settled down to farming. 



8 Vernon Louis Parrington, Main Currents in American Thought, Vol. I, The 

 Colonial Mind, 1620-1800, Harcourt, Brace # Company, New York, 1927, 

 p. 277. 



