he Boston Tea Party famously saw the destruction of the almost 300 chests worth of tea, tossed into the harbor by “Indians” on December 16, 1773. Initial reports described “the total destruction of the Teas aboard the Ships Dartmouth, William, & Eleanor and the Beaver”—the four ships bringing the East India Company’s tea to Boston in 1773. Passed down ever since, the story of the tea’s universal destruction and Bostonians unanimous approval of it has been a founding myth of the American Revolution.[1] But this is not quite accurate. The William never joined the other vessels in Boston Harbor. It...