"That memory may their deed redeem"

Today and continuing through Monday the 19th spectators and actors gathered outside of Boston to commemorate another April 19 when 235 years ago a group of farmers confronted the mightiest army in the world and started the American Revolution.

Faced with the increasing expense of maintaining a large British Army in America to fight the French and Indian wars, the national debt of England had soared, almost doubling in the ten years ending in 1765. In search for new tax revenues, Parliament passed the Stamp Act of 1765. The colonies were largely self-governing and this was the first attempt to assert London’s authority over them. It was an odious precedent for taxing British Americans without the approval of their colonial legislatures, and if it wasn’t resisted, the door would be open for more taxes to follow.

The colonials rebelled with protests, tarred and feathered collectors, burned their houses, and used every stratagem to negate the stamp act. Parliament wisely concluded the act couldn’t be enforced – at least not easily – and repealed it. But Parliament didn’t give up. A tax on British tea led to the iconic Boston Tea Party in 1773 when men disguised as Indians boarded the Dartmouth laying at anchor and threw its tea cargo overboard into Boston harbor. Parliament responded in 1774 with the Coercive Acts, which among other things, closed the port of Boston to all trade – putting an economic noose around New England’s neck.

General Thomas Gage was the military governor of Boston with about 4,000 troops under his command. He was married to an American-born woman who was known to have sympathies for the colonials. Perhaps that and knowledge that he lacked the troops to put down a large-scale rebellion led Gage to govern the hotbed of anti-British sentiment in Boston with a light touch, while he governed his own troops with a heavy hand for every abuse they inflicted on the local citizens.

Among the thought leaders who were pushing the idea of independence from English meddling in America’s affairs were Samuel Adams and John Hancock. Adams was the second cousin of John Adams, a shrewd political manipulator, and a propagandist. He was likely responsible for inciting a street gang in 1770 to harass a squad of British soldiers, which resulted in the Boston “Massacre.” Hancock, on the other hand, was the polar opposite of Samuel Adams. He was wealthy, refined, naïve, and easily manipulated. Both men were visible enough in Boston society that when rumors began to circulate that the British might arrest them, they left for the small village of Lexington, about 11 miles away, where Hancock had relatives.

In Lexington Reverend Jonas Clarke had succeeded the father of John Hancock as town minister. In the 20 years since his arrival, Clarke had established himself as a key figure in the town's affairs. He was politically savvy and worked to enlighten the politically unsophisticated farmers and shopkeepers who made up the village. In 1765, Clarke had authored the town's protest of the Stamp Act, and in 1774 he had urged the remobilization of the town militia, which had essentially disbanded when there was no longer a threat from Indian raids.

Captain John Parker, a 45-year old farmer, was perhaps the most respected citizen of Lexington. That and the fact that he was a veteran of the French and Indian Wars, led to his election as the leader of the Lexington militia. In April of 1775 he was dying of tuberculosis.

Dr. Joseph Warren was a Boston surgeon who, along with Samuel Adams and John Hancock, was a prominent political figure in Boston’s political life giving him immense personal prestige as a patriot. After the Boston Massacre, Warren conducted the autopsy on one of the dead men and assembled a report on the incident. Royal officials wanted to put him on trial for an editorial he had published about the “massacre” that they considered inflammatory, but no local jury would indict him.

It’s hard to know the mind of General Gage during these days and history does little to shed light on his thoughts. He had to know that militias in communities surrounding Boston were gathering gun powder, muskets, and bullets – against British law – yet only once did he sally forth to capture gun powder in the nearby village of Somerville. That foray served to create the Colonial “Powder Alarm” prompting the Americans to be more judicious in buying and hiding their armaments. Gage was cautious to avoid escalating tensions against the British, but in April 1775 he received a direct order from London to arrest Adams and Hancock and destroy a munitions cache believed to be hidden in Concord – 5 miles beyond Lexington.

Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith was chosen by Gage to lead the Concord expedition and was given Gage’s secret orders on the afternoon of April 18 that he was not to read until his troops were underway. He was to proceed from Boston "with utmost expedition and secrecy to Concord, where you will seize and destroy... all Military stores... But you will take care that the soldiers do not plunder the inhabitants or hurt private property." Major John Pitcairn was appointed second in command for the mission. Gage ignored the arrest order for Adams and Hancock, concerned that it could spark an uprising.

Things went badly from the start. The expedition was to leave around midnight but Smith arrived late and it didn’t get started until 2 a.m. Boston was crawling with colonial spies who tipped off Dr. Warren that British troops were moving out to arrest Hancock and Adams – or so it was thought. Warren sent Paul Revere and William Dawes on horseback by separate routes, in case one was captured, to warn the Lexington militia. Along the way, they were to wake up farm residents and tell them that the British were coming, sending more riders out into the countryside that night to warn other villages.

The original plan would have had the British passing through Lexington in the middle of the night when everyone in town would be asleep. As it turned out Major Pitcairn, who was detached to go ahead with a small force, arrived at sunrise. Captain Parker had assembled almost 40 militia men on Lexington Green (or Common, as it also was called) to protect their families and property and to prevent the arrest of Adams and Hancock, who by that time had been hidden in the countryside. There were about 100 onlookers at the nearby Buckman Tavern.

Of the militiamen who Parker had lined up on the Green that day, nine had the surname Harrington, seven Munroe, four Parker, three Tidd, three Locke, and three Reed. Fully one quarter of them were related to Captain Parker in some way.

Predictably, in a confrontation like this with the militia men and the British squared off, muskets loaded and pointed at each other, accounts vary as to what happened next. Allegedly, Pitcairn cursed the militia and ordered them to surrender their weapons. Parker, in a subsequent deposition said he told the militia to back away and leave the Green. A shot was fired, whether by the militia or British is unknown, but then the British opened fire at almost point blank range and charged with bayonets. Parker's cousin Jonas was run through. One militia man was mortally wounded by a musket ball but managed to crawl to his house just off the Green where he bled to death on his doorstep as his young son and wife watched. In all, eight militia men were killed, ten wounded, and one British soldier was wounded. Of the eight father-son pairs on the Common that day, three sons and two fathers were killed.

The entire incident lasted less than five minutes. Smith arrived after it was over and helped Pitcairn to get control of his men. Making no effort to help with the dead and wounded, the British regrouped and marched on to Concord, which was alerted about the Lexington affair before the British arrived.

In Concord, Smith divided his men into two groups, one to search the town and one to search the countryside. A small group was left to guard the east side of the Old North Bridge spanning the Concord River under the command of an inexperienced officer. It would prove to be a fatal error.

About 400 militia men began to assemble on a ridge above the bridge under command of Colonel Barrett but didn’t advance until they saw smoke rising above the town. Thinking the British were torching homes (when in fact they were burning a gun carriage), the militia moved to the opposite end of the bridge and formed in double file along the west side of the river. As the British were ordered into firing positions, one of them fired, followed by two more shots, killing two militia men instantly. The militia opened fire killing three of the British troops and wounding eight. Realizing that they were outnumbered and trapped in their current situation, the British broke and ran to join the British contingent returning from town.

Colonel Barrett allowed the British companies that had been sent to search the countryside to cross Old North Bridge in peace where they passed through the dead and wounded British on the east side. Smith got his men into marching formation around noon and began the return to Lexington and Boston. By then, militias from surrounding villages had swelled their number to over 2,000, outnumbering the British three to one. The march back turned into a gauntlet of fire as the militia fought Indian-style from behind trees and stone walls while British soldiers insulted them to come out and “fight like men” – i.e. in column and file as they did.

Before leaving Boston, Smith had sent back a messenger asking for reinforcements to follow him. Fortuitously, he met them entering Lexington from the east as he arrived at the town’s western outskirts. That probably saved Smith’s troops from surrendering. However, by then Parker had regrouped and joined the gauntlet of musket fire that continued until Smith finally made it back to Boston at 8 p.m. He had sustained 273 casualties – 73 killed, 174 wounded, and 26 missing. The militia suffered 93 casualties – 49 killed, 39 wounded, and 5 missing.

Less than a month later, the Continental Army was formed with General George Washington as its Commander-in-Chief. On June 17, Washington’s Army took up a position on a hill in Charles Town across the Charles River from Boston and laid siege to the city. The British crossed the river and took the hill, but only after three assaults against it, losing over 1,000 men in the process. Although it was not Bunker Hill, the battle would be called by that name. Gage called it, "A dear bought victory; another such would have ruined us." It claimed the lives of Dr. Joseph Warren, who sent Paul Revere on his midnight ride, and Major John Pitcairn, Smith’s executive officer in the Lexington-Concord campaign. General Gage and his army were evacuated by sea and Boston passed into Washington’s hands. Gage was recalled to London and his military career essentially ended.

I have stood on Lexington Green where John Parker stood that April day, and I’ve stood on the doorstep where Jonathon Harrington died after crawling off of the Green and bleeding to death. The house to which Samuel Adams and John Hancock fled still stands. I’ve toured it and listened for its ghosts. And I’ve stood at the Old North Bridge, no longer the original one, and saw in my mind’s eye what happened there so many years ago. Not far from where British soldiers lay dead, Reverend William Emerson, Concord’s minister, stood behind his house that April morning and watched the fight at Old North Bridge probably unaware that history was being made before his eyes. Sixty years later his grandson, Ralph Waldo Emerson, would write these words:

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world.

The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.

On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set today a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.

Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, or leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.

On the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Concord, the Minute Man statue was erected at the site of the Old North Bridge with Emerson’s poem on its base.