MemeMachineGo!

I'm reading David McCullough's 1776 and learned this contrivedly novelistic story. During the siege of Boston, the British officers would entertain themselves at Faneuil Hall.

On January 8, a performance of British Gen. John Burgoyne's farce "The Blockade of Boston" was ironically interrupted by the announcement that some American troops were conducting a raid. The audience mistakenly thought the announcement, made by an actor dressed in the uniform of a Continental Army sergeant, marked the opening of the play.

It would make a better story if that raid on Charlestown had been a decisive turning point in the siege, but the stalemate would remain for another two months.