Burns Cage

(1854), the last great fugitive slave case in Boston. Burns was an escaped slave of a Virginia planter and was arrested in Boston on the charge of theft. He was then claimed as a fugitive. This aroused the people to fever-excitement, and large meetings, addre ed by Wendell Phillips and Theodore Parker, were held in Faneuil and Me i on a on Halls on the evening of May 26. The audience, refusing to wait until morning, armed themselves with clubs and axes and broke into the jail, but were driven away bya pistol shot. Burns was tried and the order for his rendition i ued. He was conveyed to the cutter “‘ Morris,” surrounded by a large military force. The streets were thronged and many of the houses were draped in black. Indictments for riot brought against Phillips, Parker and others were quashed on technical grounds.