ANNOUNCER: The Whiskey Rebellion has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Democracy demands wisdom, and by Tom and Sara Songer of the Torron Group in State College, Pennsylvania.

[music playing] NARRATOR: On the night of September 6, 1791, a group of men carrying torches ambush a federal tax collector along Pigeon Creek in Washington County, Pennsylvania.

They strip him naked, shave his head, and tar and feather him.

An act of political protest and intimidation.

Tarring and feathering was a pretty horrible thing to do to someone and then leave you in the woods.

This was a federal agent!

NARRATOR: Rebels were protesting a federal tax on whiskey production they saw as a threat to their way of life.

If the federal government would confiscate your still, they would confiscate your very existence.

Everything they did angered people!

This is not just about some disgruntled guys in Western Pennsylvania.

This is about the first serious challenge domestically to the federal government.

If you're on the side of the people who feel they need to resist this tax, maybe we need to continue the revolution.

[music playing] NARRATOR: In the third year of his first term as president of the United States, George Washington assigned Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton, the task of solving the nation's debt, which between foreign, domestic, and state debts, totaled almost $80 million, a staggering sum for a federal government with little money.

But Hamilton saw the debt not as a burden, but as a grand opportunity.

He claimed he had found a way to address the debt and put the young Republic on a course to prosperity.

He wanted to be able to shape the economic arc of the American economy.

He said, if we follow my plan, he had already worked out his plan, we will compete with Britain in a generation.

NARRATOR: To Hamilton, the exciting part of the debt was the amount owed to wealthy Americans who had financed the revolution.

He planned to repay them in a way that ensured their continued support for the federal government.

People often think he wanted to pay the debt off quickly, but he wanted to keep it going, actually, because this would lead to a situation, in Hamilton's view, where the federal government would have access to the lending class, which would want to lend money to the federal government in order to make money on interest payments, regular, reliable interest payments.

NARRATOR: To make the interest payments, the government would need revenue.

Hamilton convinced Congress to pass a domestic excise tax on distilled spirits.

At the time, a growing American industry, especially in Pennsylvania, where West of the Allegheny Mountains, farmers made the famous Monongahela rye whiskey.

[music playing] Well, before Kentucky Bourbon, there was Pennsylvania rye.

And not just what we made on the frontier, not just that raw, untamed spirit, we actually had the first aged, mellow liquor that was known to come from this country.

NARRATOR: For farmers in Western Pennsylvania, distilling grain into whiskey was more than tradition.

It was an economic necessity.

If you had to ship that grain over land in a wagon with a mule, by the time it got there, it was spoiled.

And so they were ingenious enough to realize that if they turned it into whiskey, it was easier to transport and it just got better with age.

You need fewer pack animals, and you're making more money.

So why wouldn't you do this?

And in fact, it becomes a necessity at some point.

NARRATOR: Whiskey was an integral part of daily life on the frontier.

During harvest, farmers brought their grain to community distillers and paid them with a portion of the whiskey.

Hamilton didn't understand that these four counties had formed a culture in which whiskey was the medium of exchange.

You paid people you owed money to in whiskey.

You paid your minister's salary in whiskey.

And so you were going to be stuck with the excise tax.

Hamilton wrote up manuals for the inspectors to go to every still and write down everything, and test the alcohol content with a hydrometer.

This was the level of detail that he was obsessed with, and this was the level of on the ground intrusion that they were subject to.

If somebody dared to defy this excise tax, they would be summoned to come before a federal court, not a local court.

They would have to go all the way to Philadelphia, where they would have to pay the fine in coin, which they did not have in the first place.

The distillers in the East, who were easy to monitor, paid a tax on how much they actually distilled.

The more efficient you were and the more alcohol you were producing you could get your tax down to fractions of what a small artisanal farmer was paying.

But in the West, they were taxing stills.

What's the volume of the still?

What can that still produce in a year's time?

That's what we're going to tax you on.

But Mr.

Hamilton, we only distill six months out of the year.

This is an incentive for you to be a bigger distiller.

You're going to pay tax as if you distilled all year.

So there was conflict there between the kinds of people who lived out West, and the kinds of people who were making decisions about their lives, who lived in the East.

That division is going to cause problems, especially if you've just had a revolution over ideas like equality.

NARRATOR: The man Washington appointed to collect the tax in the four Western counties was General John Neville, a wealthy man with extensive military and business Connections.

He was from Virginia originally.

He was a crony of Hamilton's and Washington's.

He was the local Gentry.

He created kind of a Virginia paradise for himself in the mountains of Pennsylvania.

He had a big, big house.

He called it Bower Hill.

Think of Monticello in Virginia and think of a Pennsylvania version of that.

So he stood out.

NARRATOR: Neville had enslaved people to run his farm.

Between Bower Hill and his son's neighboring property, they owned almost 80 individuals, the largest enslaved community West of the Alleghenies.

Highly skilled, the staff ran the farm autonomously, allowing Neville the freedom to conduct his business, which included whiskey.

He's a man who has the largest still in Western Pennsylvania.

He has a 500 gallon still.

What better way to keep an eye on your competition than to administer the tax.

It's a smart business decision from Neville's perspective.

NARRATOR: Neville had originally voiced opposition to an excise tax.

His acceptance of the federal appointment was seen by many as a betrayal.

On September 6, 1791, a party of armed men waylaid Robert Johnson, newly hired collector of revenue for Allegheny and Washington counties.

[horse neighs] They seized him, stripped him of his clothes, shaved his head, and tarred and feathered him.

This is boiling hot pitch that can create third degree burns.

It is an incredibly painful form of punishment and is also a very pronounced form of political protest.

NARRATOR: Robert Johnson survived the attack and looked to the courts for justice, but there were no arrests.

It's not like no one had ever seen this before, because they tarred and feathered British tax collectors during the revolution.

So this was part of a tradition, and it's like, oh, the revolution is starting over again.

NARRATOR: On September 7, elected delegates from the four Western counties met at the Sign of the Green Tree tavern on the waterfront in Pittsburgh to work for the repeal of the tax.

Moderates such as Hugh Henry Brackenridge and Albert Gallatin came with the hope of directing local anger into legal political channels.

After three days of spirited debate, they adopted a petition to Congress declaring the tax dangerous to liberty and oppressive to the people.

Secretary Hamilton reluctantly recommended to Congress a few concessions for small farmers, but the Whiskey Act of 1792 barely changed the tax rate while increasing penalties.

If you didn't register your still, it was a $250 fine, that's the equivalent to four years of income.

NARRATOR: That summer, John Neville could find no men who would serve as tax collectors.

But in Washington County, an army captain named William Faulkner offered to rent Neville a room in his tavern as a tax office.

Faulkner had been warned not to cooperate.

Now he was a target.

Captain Faulkner was not at home the night rebels rode up and took aim.

[gun shots] Then they broke down the door.

The Mingo Creek Association was responsible for the attack, and their growing influence had a paralyzing effect on the enforcement of the tax.

They called for a second Pittsburgh meeting, then dominated the proceedings.

The resolution called for repealing the excise tax and replacing it with a tax on the wealthy.

They demanded John Neville's resignation, and they would boycott any tax officials attempt to collect the tax, stating they would treat them with the contempt they deserve.

The Mingo Creek Association becomes effectively a shadow government in the West.

They are forming an independent power base separate from the state and separate from the federal government.

They have their own militia units.

They have their own courts.

For George Washington, this is his worst nightmare.

NARRATOR: Due to violent opposition and threats to his life, John Neville was unable to collect the tax.

Meanwhile, in Philadelphia, the Washington administration was engaged in a series of crises.

[music playing] President Washington has a lot on his plate.

He's got the French Revolution, a war against Native Americans in Ohio, and a yellow fever epidemic that kills 1 out of 10 Philadelphians.

In many ways, the Whiskey Rebellion grows because things fall through the cracks.

In '94, the insurrection comes roaring back because a shadowy figure known only as Tom the Tinker arises, and nobody knows who it is.

Tom the Tinker was a master engager of the public in the press.

He would regularly run broadsides in the Pittsburgh Gazette, and he would label people.

Here's someone who's going against the grain, here's someone who's leaking information, and he would put targets on people's back.

NARRATOR: Tom the Tinker and his men did not isolate their attacks on federal agents.

They turned their attention on anyone who paid the tax.

If you "collaborated" with the federal government, Tom the Tinker and his men would pay you a visit.

Kill your livestock, burn your barn.

They destroyed property.

They tarred and feathered people.

They were quite violent.

NARRATOR: In 1794, Congress finally amended the law to enable excise tax cases to be heard in local courts.

But before that change could go into effect, Hamilton pushed through existing cases so they would operate under the old law.

So in June of that year, federal Marshal David Lennox rode West with summons for 60 farmers that required them to appear in federal court in Philadelphia.

It just seems obvious that if you wanted to calm things down, you would wait for the new law to pass.

And they certainly didn't do that.

[music playing] NARRATOR: Lennox met with John Neville, who would lead him to each farm.

Neville escorts Linux to the home of local farmer William Miller.

William Miller was absolutely incredulous to see somebody that he felt was a friend and acquaintance, deliver a federal Marshal directly to his door.

He felt betrayed.

[music playing] What they don't realize is there's a group of 30 to 40 rebels following behind them, keeping an eye on them.

At some point, a gun is discharged.

[gun shot] Neville and Lennox retreat, but shots have been fired at federal officers.

So federal agents are now in flight from an armed militia.

This is going to be a problem.

NARRATOR: Lennox rides to the safety of Fort Fayette in Pittsburgh.

Neville returns to his Bower Hill mansion.

By now, John Neville's house is a fortified camp.

He's got his windows boarded up and everything else.

He has actually trained his enslaved people, and he's armed them to defend the house.

So he's ready for action.

NARRATOR: Word of the incident at William Miller's farm spread across the countryside.

The next morning, rebels in the yard wake Neville from his bed.

They know that Neville has a book with all their names in it, who paid the taxes and who didn't.

And they begin to shout, "Give us that book.

We want to destroy it, we'll leave you alone."

NARRATOR: Neville responds with gunfire.

A young man is struck down, mortally wounded.

The rebels returned fire.

WILLIAM HOGELAND: Neville had a certain advantage because he had his wife and her friend loading the muskets for him and passing them to him as he ran out of ammunition.

NARRATOR: Neville's enslaved staff joined in the defense of the house.

[gun shots] After perforating the house with gunfire, the rebels finally retreated.

The following afternoon, 500 rebels from Mingo Creek marched on Neville's estate.

They were led by Major James McFarlane, a local hero of the revolution.

This was Revolutionary War veterans, unmasked, marching in formation and following orders.

This was new.

NARRATOR: When the rebels arrived, they found major Abraham Kirkpatrick of the United States military and 10 of his soldiers defending Neville's house.

Neville had gone.

Rebels demanded that all the writs in Neville's possession be handed over, and Neville must resign.

Shots were fired.

[gun shots] At one point, James McFarlane steps out from behind cover of a tree.

And troops from inside of Bower Hill opened fire and kill him.

ROB WINDHORST: It enrages the farmers.

Their leader has just been killed in what they see as the field of battle, for a cause that they associate with the revolution itself.

ROB WINDHORST: They light the outbuildings on fire one after the other.

BRADY CRYTZER: Rebels storm the mansion.

They burn Bower Hill.

NARRATOR: As the flames reached the main mansion, the federal soldiers surrendered.

Bower Hill was completely destroyed.

With the resistance now in open rebellion, rebels pressured local elites to lead their fight.

Washington County Deputy Attorney General David Bradford agrees to step in.

He's been a cheerleader on the sidelines for the whiskey rebels from the beginning, but he's an attorney.

So he never gets too close, and that really starts to change.

He really adopts this movement as his own.

It's now a separatist movement.

It's a secession movement.

NARRATOR: Acting on Bradford's orders, insurgents robbed the US mail and found letters from four Neville allies addressed to federal authorities reporting on their actions.

To placate the rebels, Pittsburgh citizens banished three of the letter's authors.

Suddenly, it seems to the moderates there was no way to be safe and say, let's just calm down here.

At this point, you had to show your commitment to the cause.

NARRATOR: Word goes out for the resistance to muster at Braddock's Field, 9 miles South of Pittsburgh.

A force of 5,000 gathered there.

They weren't sure what they were going to do once they got everyone out there, but everyone was supposed to bring their weapons.

The rumor was we're going to burn down Pittsburgh.

NARRATOR: At Braddock's field, David Bradford appeared on horseback in a fine uniform, waving a sword.

He delivered a rousing speech praising the French Revolution and the use of the guillotine to purge the enemies of the people.

Rebels cheered him on.

Brackenridge and other moderates nervously mixed with the crowd, hoping to influence the course of events.

And so the decision is made to March on Pittsburgh, actually March on Pittsburgh, which they did.

Most of the soldiers in the city take cover in Fort Fayette, but not everyone.

The women of Pittsburgh meet the Rebels on the field, and they don't meet them with weapons, they meet them with whiskey, plates of cheese and bacon, and they convince them to simply parade through the town, leaving Pittsburgh unharmed.

NARRATOR: Following the march, rebels burned homes and barns of Neville allies.

But Pittsburgh, the village on the point, had been spared.

This is a region that is acting without regard for and in opposition to federal and state authority.

And some of those rebels were very eager to actually defend the region against a federal attack and secede.

NARRATOR: David Bradford and the Mingo Creek rebels called for a Grand Western Congress to meet at Parkinson's Ferry on the Monongahela to define a new relationship between the Western country and the government of the United States.

Five counties of Pennsylvania and one in Virginia sent delegates.

This meeting at Parkinson's Ferry is going to come up with resolutions to secede from the United States.

But suddenly people show up from Philadelphia sent by George Washington to negotiate, peace commissioners.

NARRATOR: The commissioners offered a full amnesty and no military action in exchange for total submission.

Albert Gallatin gave a long speech asking the crowd to submit, but Bradford was defiant, saying they would defeat the first army that came over the mountains.

The delegation agreed to hold a referendum to determine how many citizens would stand down and take an oath of loyalty to the government.

The results were mixed, but the outcome was predetermined, for President Washington had already called out militias from four different states to put down the insurrection.

These militias will come together to march into the West.

And here's where we see Alexander Hamilton's fingerprints all over it.

He's ordering uniforms, he's requisitioning supplies.

He actually asks to go on the expedition with President Washington.

Hamilton really wanted to go along to be there at the kill, to truly, personally carry out the execution of the law that he had written for Congress those few years earlier.

NARRATOR: Militia from Maryland and Virginia marched North to muster at Fort Cumberland.

Troops from New Jersey and Pennsylvania marched West to meet at Carlisle.

In total more than 12,000 men.

The fact that states sent their militia to participate in this army was a first example of nationalism.

We are coming together to aid the federal government.

So Washington leads the operation against these American citizens in the West.

Commander in chief of the US Army, the President of the United States, actually commanding troops in the field.

NARRATOR: On the evening of October 18, Washington paraded troops into the little town of Bedford, on the Eastern edge of rebel territory.

That night from his headquarters at the house of David Espy, he wrote a letter thanking General Henry Lee and transferring command.

The next morning, he turned back for Philadelphia.

Steady rain accompanied Lee and Hamilton and thousands of troops down the Alleghenies Western slopes in two huge wings as they descended into the forks of the Ohio.

When they came down out of the mountains into the Pittsburgh area and started coming down on the people, it was very, very intense.

They carried out door kicking, late night mass arrests without warrants.

They held people in detention without charge, and they did it with no compunction at all.

NARRATOR: Under Hamilton's direction, the militia rounded up 150 suspected rebels.

20 were marched through the snow to Philadelphia, arriving at the Walnut Street Prison on Christmas Day.

Of those arrested, only 10 stood trial for treason.

Hamilton wanted certain ringleaders to be indicted and tried for treason as examples of what the cost of this insurrection would be.

NARRATOR: None of the rebels would hang.

On July 10, 1795, Washington issued a general pardon for all unindicted rebels still at large.

All, save David Bradford.

With the militia closing in, Bradford fled, escaping downriver to Spanish territory, where he took up a new life.

He was ultimately pardoned by President John Adams in 1799.

[music playing] The Whiskey Rebellion could have been a much greater crisis in American history, at least in our memory.

But Washington's solution, that mixture of firmness and leniency really helped to sweep it under the rug to solve it so life could go on.

And I think that's a big part of why we remember it as such an afterthought, despite the fact that it was such a powerful and meaningful moment.

It's one of the first great tests for the up and coming United States.

And the man of the hour in this moment of great dread is George Washington, who was able to turn the page initially by force and then ultimately through forgiveness.

NARRATOR: In its own time, the conflict was known uniformly as the Western Insurrection, reflecting the rift that could have torn the nation apart.

But the authority of the federal government had passed its first serious test, and many citizens of the young Republic for the first time began to think of themselves as Americans.

[music playing] ANNOUNCER: The Whiskey Rebellion has been made possible in part by a major grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, Democracy Demands Wisdom, and by Tom and Sara Songer of the Torron Group in State College, Pennsylvania.