May 10, 1768

The St. George's Fields Massacre

A crowd forms in St. George's Fields, in London, near King's Bench prison where John Wilkes is being held, in the hopes that he would be released to attend the opening of Parliament. Upon it failing to disperse after the Riot Act was read, a detachment of mostly Scottish troops fired on the crown, killed five or six, wounding 15. Boston radicals use the fervent it creates as a template for their characterization of the Boston Massacre in March 1770.