The Unexpected Role Green Tea Played In The American Revolution

Tea was such a central fixture of life for the American Colonists that its taxation was the springboard for the American Revolution. During the late 18th-century, early Americans collectively put away a whopping 1.2 million pounds of tea every single year — and the nation's first presidents were among them. Both George Washington and Thomas Jefferson were recorded as enjoying copious amounts of green tea — the same sort tossed overboard during the Boston Tea Party.

Even though the bulk of the tea drank in the colonies was black, green tea represented roughly 33% of all tea exported from China during the 1700s, according to the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum. Hyson green tea — a Chinese crop picked during the peak-quality springtime season — was an especially popular brew at the time. It was also a personal favorite of the aforementioned Founding Fathers. In a letter to Thomas Knox dated December 30, 1757, Washington ordered "6 lb. best Hyson Tea" and "6 lb. best Green Ditto" tea (via National Archives).

During this time, Washington would have been serving as the commander of the Virginia Regiment during the French and Indian War. The following year, he was elected to the House of Burgesses to represent Frederick County. Another time, while laid up at home nursing a long illness, the then-unmarried Washington wrote to his neighbor, Sarah Cary Fairfax, in 1757 requesting some supplies, which included "a Pound, or a smaller quantity if you can't spare that, of Hyson Tea" (via George Washington's Mount Vernon).

Thomas Jefferson, too, enjoyed green tea en masse — not to mention green peas, his favorite. According to The Jefferson Monticello, Jefferson's financial records show consistent and abundant tea purchases, with Hyson again appearing as a regular favorite. In June 1980, he spent £100 on a pound of the tea. Fast-forward to October 1794, Jefferson wrote to Philadelphia grocer and tea merchant John Barnes, enlisting his aid as a regular, personal tea supplier. "Having occasion for about 20. lb. of good tea annually, I think it best to rely for the choice of it on the good faith of some dealer in that article," Jefferson said. "Young hyson we prefer both for flavor and strength, but if you have none good, let it be hyson of the antient kind."

More than a favorite drink of the first and third U.S. Presidents, perhaps green tea's greatest starring role was in the Boston Tea Party, which, per the lore, was planned in a tavern. On the evening of December 16, 1773, American Colonists dumped a whopping 342 chests of loose-leaf tea imported by the British East India Company into the Boston Harbor. That was more than 90,000 pounds of tea, and, according to the Boston Tea Party Ships & Museum, 22% of the supply (and 30% of the ships' total inventory value) was green tea, specifically 60 chests of Singlo and 15 chests of Hyson green tea.