John Hancock: Merchant King and American Patriot

He was a rich, powerful aristocrat, a merchant king who loved English culture and fashion, and, above all, he was a loyal British subject with ambitions of a lordship and a grand retirement estate in England. There simply was no doubt about it: John Hancock was the least likely man in Boston to start a rebellion. How, then, did this Tory patrician become one of the staunchest supporters of the American Revolution?