ABSTRACT
Machias and Liverpool were struggling settlements when fighting broke out between British troops and Massachusetts militia units at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. The Liverpool-Machias comparison prompts us to turn to an assessment of political geography rather than physical geography for an answer to why two similarly remote communities had different responses to the imperial crisis. Land distribution in Liverpool and Horton reflected the New England practice of proprietorial control, but in Nova Scotia the behavior did not produce the same political and social results as it did in New England. Settlers in Nova Scotia also found themselves caught between New England practice and Nova Scotia policy on the issue of church support. By 1775 the people of Machias and Liverpool had evolved significantly different attitudes about how their respective localities fit into the larger political world. In Machias, the people actively sought the help of the provincial government in Boston, which guided local developments.
