The Alternative of WIlliams-Burg

As reports of American colonial resistance to British taxes reached London, the publishers Sayer and Bennett responded with five mezzotints, produced between October 1774 and March 1775. The unsigned works probably were designed and engraved by the adept satirist Philip Dawe. This fourth print responds to "The Articles of Association" adopted by the First Continental Congress in October 1774, which asserted that "to obtain redress of…grievances, which threaten the destruction to the lives, liberty, and property of his majesty’s subjects in North-America, we are of the opinion that a non-importation, non-consumption, and non-exportation agreement…will prove the most speedy, effectual, and peaceable measure." Related boycotts went into effect in December, a month and a half before this print appeared.

Set in Williamsburg, the capital of colonial Virginia, the satire shows rough-looking men with cudgels encouraging well-dressed planters to pledge loyalty to the Continental Congress. Women, children, and an enslaved Black man witness and tacitly support the signing. Containers of tar and feathers hang from a gibbet in the background to encourage reluctant signers, and a barrel of tobacco, used as a makeshift desk, is lettered "A present for John Wilkes"—the lord mayor of London who supported American liberties. Papers on top of the barrel mention "The Resolves of Congress" which the signers here pledge to uphold. Refusing to export tobacco to Britain was a significant means for Virginians to encourage Parliament to abolish the hated taxes recently imposed on imported goods (see 24.90.31–24.90.35 for all the prints in the Sayer and Bennett series).