Why Americans Drink Coffee: The Boston Tea Party and the Rise of Coffee

On the night of December 16, 1773, colonists in Boston boarded three ships and dumped more than 92,000 pounds of East India Company tea into the harbor. Ask why Americans drink coffee rather than tea, and that night is usually the answer: drinking tea became unpatriotic, so the new nation switched to coffee.

It is a great story, and it contains some truth. But historians who have dug into the records say the real reasons are more practical: coffee was already widely sold, often cheaper, and closer at hand. Here is how a political protest, a network of coffeehouses and, nearly a century later, a civil war made coffee America’s drink.

Key takeaways

• The Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773) protested the Tea Act, which gave the East India Company a monopoly on tea sales in the colonies.
• Patriots did urge people to give up tea; John Adams wrote in 1774 that tea “must be universally renounced.”
• Historian Michelle Craig McDonald’s research suggests coffee was already more widely sold and cheaper than tea before the Tea Party, so the protest was not a sudden turning point.
• In the Civil War, Union soldiers received 36 pounds of coffee a year, and coffee appeared in soldiers’ diaries more often than words like “war” or “Lincoln.”

The night of the Tea Party

The Tea Act of 1773 did not create a new tax. It let the British East India Company sell tea directly to the colonies, undercutting colonial merchants, while the existing tea tax stayed in place. To many colonists it was a reminder that Parliament could tax them without their consent, and a threat to local businesses.

In Boston, protesters refused to let the tea be unloaded. On the evening of December 16, groups of men, some loosely disguised, boarded the ships at Griffin’s Wharf and broke open the chests, pouring the contents into the water. The protest was planned in part at the Green Dragon, a Boston coffeehouse and tavern that served as a meeting place for patriots.

Britain responded in 1774 with the Coercive Acts (called the Intolerable Acts in the colonies), including the closure of Boston’s port. The conflict was on its way to war.

Coffee as a patriotic choice

Giving up tea became a visible way to show where you stood. The best-known evidence comes from John Adams himself. In a letter to his wife Abigail, written in Falmouth on July 6, 1774, he described arriving at a house and asking the hostess whether a weary traveler might have a dish of tea. She refused: the town had renounced tea, but she offered to make him coffee instead.

Adams reported that he had drunk coffee every afternoon since and had coped with it quite well, before concluding that tea must be given up everywhere and that he needed to be weaned from it, the sooner the better. It is a lovely scene, and it shows that refusing tea had become a public, political act.

What historians say now

The leap from “patriots refused tea” to “America became a coffee nation because of the Tea Party” is where historians push back. In a 2026 NPR report, historian Michelle Craig McDonald, author of Coffee Nation, explained that her study of advertisements from the 1760s and 1770s showed coffee was already more broadly sold than tea, and was cheaper per pound. In her view, the Tea Party probably was not the dramatic turning point it is often described as.

Harvard historian Joyce Chaplin added two cautions: smuggling makes colonial trade records unreliable, and public praise of coffee over tea may partly have been political posturing. Both drinks had become affordable luxuries by the Revolution.

Geography helped coffee too. Most of the colonies’ coffee came from the Caribbean, much closer than China, where tea came from. That Caribbean coffee carried a dark side that is easy to forget: by 1790, half the world’s coffee was grown in the French colony of Saint-Domingue (today’s Haiti) by enslaved people working in brutal conditions.

The coffeehouses of the Revolution

Coffee had arrived in the colonies long before 1773. McDonald points to coffee-grinding equipment linked to the Mayflower, and the first colonial coffeehouse opened in Boston in 1676. By the time of the Revolution, coffeehouses were part of urban life.

Coffeehouses were business hubs as much as cafés. They offered newspapers, business directories, currency exchange, maritime insurance and auctions, and merchants gathered there to hear the latest economic news. The line between coffeehouse and tavern was blurry: coffeehouses could serve alcohol and taverns could serve coffee. But coffeehouses had a reputation as places for a clear head, which made them natural spots for planning, arguing and organizing. (Many also excluded women, a reminder of who had a voice in that public life.)

The 19th century: coffee becomes everyday

After independence, coffee steadily moved from a city habit to a national one. Supply from Latin America grew, and Brazil, where coffee plantations relied on enslaved labor until slavery was abolished in 1888, became the world’s dominant producer during the 1800s. More supply meant lower prices, and coffee became something farm families, laborers and pioneers heading west could afford every day.

Coffee also suited American life. It could be roasted, ground and boiled over a campfire with very little equipment, which made it a staple on wagon trails and cattle drives. That tradition of strong, simple, boiled coffee is where the idea of “cowboy coffee” comes from.

The Civil War: coffee as fuel

If the Revolution made coffee political, the Civil War made it essential. According to an NPR report drawing on historians’ work:

• Union soldiers received 36 pounds of coffee a year as part of their rations, roughly 1.6 ounces (about 45 g) a day.
• Smithsonian curator Jon Grinspan found that the word “coffee” appeared in soldiers’ diaries more often than “war,” “bullet,” “cannon,” “slavery,” “mother” or “Lincoln.”
• In 1859 the Sharps Rifle company began producing a carbine with a small hand-cranked grinder built into the stock.
• The Union blockade cut off most coffee to the South. Confederates roasted rye, rice, sweet potatoes or beets as substitutes, none of which contained caffeine, and soldiers on opposite sides sometimes traded tobacco for coffee during lulls in the fighting.

One Union cavalryman, Ebenezer Nelson Gilpin, summed it up in his diary in April 1865: nobody “can soldier without coffee.” Hundreds of thousands of men came home with a daily coffee habit, and the country’s taste for coffee only deepened.

Timeline: how America became a coffee nation

So, why do Americans drink coffee?

The honest answer is a mix of reasons. Coffee was close at hand from Caribbean and later Latin American suppliers, often cheaper than tea, and easy to brew anywhere. The Revolution gave it a patriotic story, coffeehouses gave it a social role, and the Civil War turned it into a daily necessity for a generation. The Tea Party is the most memorable chapter, but not the whole book. For the longer global story, see our history of coffee.

Brew a piece of American coffee history

Raise a mug on Tea Party day with coffee in the spirit of the trail and the coffeehouse. Our Cowboy Blend mixes dark and medium roasted beans for a bold, smooth cup with cocoa, caramel and vanilla tones, strong enough for a long day. For something cleaner and more classic, House Blend is a medium roast of Central and South American coffees with nutty, sweet chocolate and mild citrus notes. Both are roasted 1–5 days before delivery. Find more in our blends.

FAQ

Did the Boston Tea Party make Americans drink coffee?

It helped make coffee a patriotic symbol, but historians say coffee was already widely sold and often cheaper than tea before 1773. The shift was gradual and had economic causes too.

What did John Adams say about coffee?

In a July 6, 1774 letter to Abigail Adams, he described being refused tea and served coffee instead, said he had borne it well, and concluded that tea must be universally renounced.

How much coffee did Civil War soldiers drink?

Union soldiers were issued 36 pounds of coffee a year, roughly 1.6 ounces a day, and coffee is mentioned constantly in their diaries.

Where did colonial America get its coffee?

Mostly from the Caribbean, including the French colony of Saint-Domingue, where coffee was grown by enslaved people.

Sources

1. “John Adams to Abigail Adams, 6 July 1774,” Founders Online, National Archives. founders.archives.gov
2. James Doubek, “But first, coffee: The drink that energized the American Revolution,” NPR, 2026. wunc.org (NPR)
3. The Kitchen Sisters, “If War Is Hell, Then Coffee Has Offered U.S. Soldiers Some Salvation,” NPR, 2016. wunc.org (NPR)

Facts checked in October 2026.

Keep reading: The history of coffee · The best coffee beans in the world · Blends collection