Pope's Day was a ritual inherited from England that became the template for mob violence in response to the Stamp Act.

In the 1730’s or earlier, Boston’s artisans began to commemorate [Guy Fawkes or Pope's ] day with a parade and elaborate dramaturgical performances that mocked popery and the Catholic Stuart pretender... As the years passed, artisans from [the competeing Niorth and South End] areas formed paramilitary organizations with elaborate preparation preceding the annual event. Though not so intended, Pope’s Day became a school for training lower-class leaders, for organizing men who worked with their hands and for imparting to the lower element a sense of its collective power.

Boston’s Pope’s Day also involved the ritual of status reversal so well known throughout Europe. November 5 became the day when youth and the lower class ruled, not only in controlling the streets of the town but also in going from house to house to collect money from the affluent for financing the prodigious feasting and drinking that went on from morning to night.

From Alfred F. Young, “Pope’s Day, Tar and Feathers, and “Cornet Joyce,jun .From Ritual to Rebellion in Boston, 1745-1775,”

In December 1765, John Adams (1735-1826), who would later become the second president of the United States, wrote that

" The Stamp Act, "that enormous engine...for battering down all the rights and liberties of America," had raised a spirit of resistance throughout mainland British North America. "In every colony, from Georgia to New Hampshire inclusively, the stamp distributors and inspectors have been compelled by the unconquerable rage of the people to renounce their offices. Such and so universal has been the resentment of the people, that every man who has dared to speak in the favor of the stamps, or to soften the detestation in which they are held, how great soever his abilities and virtues had been esteemed before, whatever his fortune, connections, and influence had been, has been seen to sink into universal contempt and ignominy."

"The people, even to the lowest ranks, have become more attentive to their liberties, more inquisitive about them, and more determined to defend them, than they were ever before known.... Our presses have groaned, our pulpits have thundered, our legislatures have resolved; our towns have voted; the crown officers have everywhere trembled, and all their little tools and creatures been afraid to speak and ashamed to be seen...."

Archibold Hinschelwood offers a contemporary Loyalist, or pro-British, perspective:

I had the pleasure to receive your letter...and am greatly obliged to you for your kind remembrance of me, and the pains you have taken to get me appointed for the disposal of the stamps in this province [Nova Scotia]....

There is a violent spirit of opposition raised on the continent against the execution of the Stamp Act, the mob in Boston have carried it very high against the Secre[tar]y [Andrew Oliver]...for his acceptance of an office in consequence of that Act. They have even proceeded to sow violence, and burnt him in effigy. They threaten to pull down & burn the stamp office row building; and that they will hold every man as infamous that shall presume to carry the Stamp Act into execution, so it is thought Mr. Oliver will resign.

I don't find any such turbulent spirit to prevail among us, if it should, the means are in our Hands to prevent any tumults or Insults; what the consequences may be in the colonies who have no military force to keep the rabble in order, I cannot pretend.

Stamp Act Riots sites, for further research:

http://www.strike-the-root.com/3/smith/smith8.html
http://www.npg.si.edu/cexh/brush/index/portraits/oliver.htm
http://www.ushistory.org/declaration/related/sons.htm
http://www.bcpl.net/~cbladey/guy/html/usaplot.html

My Kinsman, Major Molineaux a short story by Nathanial Hawthorne that draws upon the Poe's Day and Stamp Act Riots:

http://etext.virginia.edu/toc/modeng/public/HawKins.html