From Diary of the American Revolution, Vol I. Compiled by Frank Moore and published in 1859.
August 8. –The riflemen on their way from the southern colonies through the country, administer the new-fashioned discipline of tar and feathers to the obstinate and refractory Tories that they meet on their road, which has a very good effect. Those whose crimes are of a more atrocious nature, they punish by sending them to General Gage. They took a man in New Milford, Connecticut, a most incorrigible Tory, who called them d–d rebels, &c., and made him walk before them to Litchfield, which is twenty miles, and carry one of his own geese all the way in his hand. When they arrived there, they tarred him, and made him pluck his goose, and then bestowed the feathers on him, drummed him out of the company, and obliged him to kneel down and thank them for their lenity. 1
1 Barber’s Historical Collections of Connecticut, page 480.