Shays' Rebellion

Perhaps the most famous image of Shays' Rebellion: "Regulators" Daniel Shays (left) and Job Shattuck (right), from a 1787 Boston Almanack woodcut, artist unknown.

Shays' Rebellion was a rebellion in central and western Massachusetts (mainly Springfield) from 1786 to 1787. The rebellion is named after Daniel Shays, a veteran of the American Revolution who led the rebels, also known as "Shaysites" or "Regulators". Most of the rebels were poor farmers angered by their debt and taxes. They could not pay their taxes and were afraid of going to jail or having their homes taken away from them.

They tried to stop the courts from taking property from indebted farmers by forcing the closure of courts in western Massachusetts. The participants in Shays' Rebellion believed they were acting in the spirit of the American Revolution, modeled their tactics after the crowd activities of the 1760s and the 1770s, and used "liberty poles" and "liberty trees" to symbolize their cause.

Shays' Rebellion started on August 29, 1786, and by January 1787, over 1000 rebels had been arrested. A militia, which had been raised as a private army, defeated an attack on the federal Springfield Armory by the main rebel force on February 3, 1787.

Shays' Rebellion produced fears that the American Revolution’s democratic impulse had gotten out of hand. Over time, the farmers grew into armies, controlled by Shays and his men, as they tried to take back their rights.

Shays' Rebellion Media

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  Populist Governor John Hancock refused to crack down on tax delinquencies and accepted devalued paper currency for debts.

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  Governor James Bowdoin instituted a heavy tax burden and stepped up a collection of back taxes.

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  Militia general William Shepard defended the Springfield Armory against rebel action.

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  General Benjamin Lincoln depicted in a portrait by Henry Sargent

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  This monument marks the location of the final Shays' Rebellion battle in Sheffield, Massachusetts.

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  The 1787 Constitutional Convention by Junius Brutus Stearns, 1856

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  Elbridge Gerry, depicted in this 1861 portrait, opposed the Constitution as drafted, although his reasons for doing so were not strongly influenced by the rebellion.