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On March 5, 1770, a soldier fired into a crowd.
1770年3月5日，一名士兵向人群开枪。
Six years later, the United States' Founding Fathers remembered the "Boston Massacre" as they declared independence from Great Britain.
六年后，美国的开国元勋们在宣布从大不列颠独立时，纪念了“波士顿大屠杀”。
Why?
为什么？
To answer that, we have to flash back to 1767.
要回答这个问题，我们必须回到1767年。
Anxious to regain the money spent defending the colonies during the French and Indian War, Great Britain enacted a series of taxes on common British imports called the Townshend Acts.
英国急于收回在法印战争期间用来保卫殖民地的钱，于是制定了一系列针对普通英国进口商品的税收政策，称为汤森德法案(Townshend Act)。
Previously, the British-American relationship had been characterized by salutary neglect, meaning that trade regulations and taxes were rarely enforced.
此前，英美关系的特点是有益的忽视（英国政府对殖民地的一项政策），这意味着贸易法规和税收很少得到执行。
New taxes on common goods like tea and paper made colonists furious.
对茶叶和纸张等普通商品征收的新税激起了殖民者的愤怒。
They weren't represented in the British Parliament.
他们在英国议会中没有代表。
So why should they be taxed as if they were full British citizens?
那么，为什么他们要像真正的英国公民一样纳税呢?
By early 1770 the colonists, including the revolutionary group the Sons of Liberty, had turned their frustration toward the merchants who continued to stock imported English goods.
到了1770年初，包括革命团体“自由之子”在内的殖民者将他们的挫败感转嫁到继续囤积英国进口商品的商人身上。
They posted signs on those merchants' shops branding them as importers.
他们在那些商人的商店上贴上了他们是进口商的牌子。
On February 22 Ebenezer Richardson, a neighbor of one of those merchants, shot and killed an 11-year-old boy who was part of a mob harassing him for trying to take down the sign.
2月22日，其中一名商人的邻居埃比尼泽·理查森(Ebenzer Richardson)开枪打死了一名11岁的男孩，这名男孩是一群暴徒的一员，因为埃比尼泽·理查森试图拆除广告牌而遭到骚扰。
The child's death sparked a week of riots — and when a handbill posted on March 5 claimed that the British soldiers were preparing to defend themselves, the rioters' anger intensified.
这名儿童的死亡引发了一周的骚乱——当3月5日张贴的传单声称英国士兵正准备自卫时，暴徒们的愤怒加剧了。
That day a crowd of 50 or 60 people gathered outside the Customs House, harassing the one British sentry outside.
当天有五六十人聚集在海关大楼外，骚扰外面的一名英国哨兵。
When a few reinforcements joined him, the crowd — emboldened by the fact that the soldiers weren't legally allowed to shoot unless they'd read the Riot Act — dared them to fire their weapons.
当几名增援部队加入他的行列时，因法律上士兵们不允许开枪，除非他们阅读了防暴法案，民众挑战士兵们，让他们开枪。
Panicked, one did; others followed.
惊慌失措中，一个人开枪了；其他人也跟着做了。
As the smoke cleared, three of the crowd were dead, and two more, wounded, would die later.
随着烟雾散去，人群中有三人死亡，另有两人受伤，后来也死亡了。
Both sides tried to control the narrative.
双方都试图控制这种说法。
But while the British soldiers ultimately went free, branding the event a massacre fueled the flames of colonial discontent far outside Boston — and set the stage for the American Revolution to come.
然而，尽管英国士兵最终获得了自由，但把这一事件称为一场大屠杀，点燃了远在波士顿之外的殖民地的不满之火——并为美国独立革命的到来奠定了基础。
