An eye-opening story of America on the edge of revolution, revealing the life of young John Adams and his key role in the trial of the Boston Massacre.
History remembers John Adams as a Founding Father and our country’s second president. But in the tense years before the American Revolution, he was still just a lawyer, fighting for justice in one of the most explosive murder trials of the era.
On the night of March 5, 1770, shots were fired by British soldiers on the streets of Boston, killing five civilians. The Boston Massacre has often been called the first shots of the American Revolution. As John Adams would later remember, “On that night the formation of American independence was born.” Yet when the British soldiers faced trial, the young lawyer Adams was determined that they receive a fair one. He volunteered to represent them, keeping the peace in a powder keg of a colony, and in the process created some of the foundations of what would become United States law.
In this book, New York Times bestselling authors Dan Abrams and David Fisher draw on the trial transcript, using Adams’s own words to transport readers to colonial Boston, a city roiling with rebellion, where British military forces and American colonists lived side by side, waiting for the spark that would start a war.
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“This engrossing account of eighteenth century legal procedure and the colorful individuals involved in the colonies’ most celebrated trial delivers another boost to John Adams’s rising reputation.”
— HistoryNet
“An expert, extremely detailed account of John Adams’ finest hour.”
— Kirkus ReviewsBe the first to write a review about this audiobook!
Dan Abrams is the co-author with David Fisher of the New York Times bestsellers John Adams under Fire and Theodore Roosevelt for the Defense, among other books. He has written for the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, and the Yale Law and Policy Review, among many others.A graduate of Columbia University Law School, he is the chief legal affairs correspondent for ABC News as well as the host of top-rated Live PD on A&E Network and The Dan Abrams Show: Where Politics Meets the Law on SiriusXM. He is CEO and founder of Abrams Media, which includes the Law & Crime network.
David Fisher is the award-winning author of almost one hundred books, including twenty-six New York Times bestsellers. He has written works of nonfiction, fiction, reference, and humor and collaborated with legendary figures in a variety of fields, from Hall of Fame athletes to Nobel Prize–winning scientists. He lives in New York with his wife, Laura.
Roger Wayne served in the Air Force as a radio and television broadcast journalist in South Korea and won several awards before obtaining a BA degree in communications and journalism. He is an actor living in New York, narrating audiobooks, working on independent film projects, performing off Broadway, and auditioning for major network shows.