CHAPTER ELEVEN: Rebel: London, 1771–1775

Franklin returns to America after five years in England and undertakes a seven-month postal inspection tour of the colonies, during which he grapples with his divided loyalties between England and Pennsylvania. When violent conflict erupts between frontier settlers and peaceful Indians, Franklin's defense of individual tolerance alienates him from growing political factions, intensifying his resolve to strip the Proprietors of their charter and pursue royal government—a campaign that costs him reelection but ultimately secures his appointment as assembly agent to London.

Franklin arrives back in Philadelphia in 1762 with renewed ties to his son William, now royal governor of New Jersey, though Thomas Penn hopes William's position will make Franklin more tractable. Instead, Franklin embarks on a lengthy postal inspection tour across the colonies from Virginia to New Hampshire, extending mail service to Montreal and establishing faster delivery routes. He takes his daughter Sally on the tour as a coming-out party, where she meets Caty Ray Greene in Newport and Franklin suffers two dislocated shoulders. While in Boston, Franklin reflects on his divided desires: he wishes to settle in England but acknowledges that affairs in Pennsylvania remain unsettled. He and Deborah begin construction of their first owned home on Market Street, though Deborah continues to refuse travel or relocation. The Paxton Boys crisis erupts in late 1763 when frontier settlers massacre peaceful Christian Indians, threatening to march on Philadelphia where more Indians are sheltered. Franklin publishes an emotional pamphlet denouncing the violence and arguing against collective punishment based on race or tribe, using the logic that killing all red-haired people for one red-haired man's crime would be absurd. However, his harsh characterization of the frontiersmen as "barbarous" reflects his own prejudices. Governor John Penn initially resists the mob but privately negotiates with them, offering to drop charges and instituting a scalp bounty—moves that enrage Franklin and prompt his condemnation of Proprietary government. Franklin accelerates his campaign against the Proprietors, pushing through twenty-six resolutions calling for royal government and launching a petition drive that garners only 3,500 signatures against 15,000 for the opposition. The 1764 Assembly election becomes brutally vicious, with pamphlets attacking Franklin over his son's illegitimacy, his alleged theft of scientific ideas, and his lecherousness. Franklin finishes thirteenth of fourteen candidates for eight Philadelphia seats but his faction retains control of the Assembly, which votes to send him back to England as agent to petition the king against Proprietary rule. He leaves Philadelphia in November 1764 with three hundred supporters cheering him on, cannon fire, and a song, telling different friends he expects either a few months' absence or never to return.