Paul Revere's Ride (87 page)

44
. Letter of John R. Adan, n.d., in Frothingham,
Warren,
457.

45
. Forbes has Revere make a dramatic return to Boston on April 19, 1775, Dut there is no evidence that he did so, and the inferences from later correspondence to his wife suggest that he remained in the country. There is positive evidence that he was meeting with the Committee of Safety in Cambridge by early morning on April 20, and with others in Watertown on the same day. He must have been close to that town on the night of April 19— 20. Beyond these facts the sources are silent.

46
. Ezra Stiles,
Literary Diary,
I, 551—52.

47
. One of the few historians to recognize the importance of Heath’s leadership is the soldier-scholar, John Galvin, himself an infantry officer of long experience. Galvin observes that “Heath’s firm grasp of the tactics of the skirmish line and his tendency to see any battle as a series of isolated little fights was just what the provincials needed.” Galvin,
Minute Men,
215.

48
.
Ibid.;
a similar judgment is in Coburn,
Battle…,
132, 135ff; different interpretations appear in Tourtellot,
Lexington and Concord,
192, and French,
Day of Concord and Lexington,
242.

49
. Cyrus Hamblin,
My Grandfather, Colonel Francis Faulkner
(Boston, 1887), 6; Galvin,
Minute Men,
213.

50
. Thomas Boynton, “Journal,” April 19, 1775,
MHSP
15 (1877): 254-55; Sarah L. Bailey,
Historical Sketches of Andover
(Boston, 1880), 308.

51
. Galvin,
Minute Men,
212.

52
. Warren, like many other men that day, wore his hair in fashionable “earlocks,” secured by pins on each side of his head. Cf. Frothingham,
Warren,
461; Heath,
Memoirs,
8.

53
. Tourtellot,
Lexington and Concord,
196; Galvin,
Minute Men,
207.

54
. Heath,
Memoirs,
5.

55
.
Ibid.,
8.

56
. Percy to General Harvey, April 20, 1775,
Percy Letters,
52.

57
.
Ibid.

58
. Mackenzie,
Diary,
I, 26-27. The early iconography of Lexington and Concord sometimes showed the minutemen carrying long-barreled weapons. A later generation of historians inferred that these weapons were long rifles. Revisionists such as Harold Murdock, Christopher Ward, and Allen French pointed out that this idea was mistaken—the long rifle was an artifact of another regional culture in British America, that the New England militia were armed with muskets and were poor shots. Elements of truth and error are combined in these revisionist interpretations. On the day of Lexington and Concord many experienced hunters carried long-barreled muskets and fowling pieces, and used them with deadly accuracy. These men were specially feared by the British soldiers. The musketry of the militia at the North Bridge was also very accurate.

59
. Henry S. Chapman,
History of Winchester
(Winchester, 1936), 104—5; the “white mare” appears again in Hezekiah Wyman’s will, four years after the battle. Other mounted
militia who appear in the incomplete records included William Polly of Medford, who was mortally wounded while fighting on horseback. Entire cavalry troops mustered that day in Sudbury, Groton, and Ipswich. Many officers also were mounted. See Galvin,
Minute Men,
220; Hudson,
Sudbury.

60
. Mackenzie,
Diary,
I, 21.

61
. Lister, “Narrative.”

62
.
Ibid.

63
. Martin Hunter,
The Journal of General Sir Martin Hunter
(Edinburgh, 1894), 161.

64
. The quotation was commonly used by American writers with “English” excised!

65
. Daniel P. King,
Address Commemorative of Seven Young Men at Danvers…
(Salem, 1835); J. W. Hanson,
History of the Town of Danvers
(Danvers, 1848), 108.

66
. Galvin,
Minute Men,
229.

67
. Heath,
Memoirs,
8; Smith,
West Cambridge in 1775,
47; Coburn,
Battle…,
146.

68
. Smith,
West Cambridge in 1775,
39-43; Coburn,
Battle…,
142; Tourtellot,
Lexington and Concord,
198; (Boston)
Columbian Centinel,
Feb. 6, 1793.

69
. Mackenzie,
Diary,
I, 19—22; Barker,
British in Boston,
36; an attempt by Anglophile historian Harold Murdock to deny British atrocities in Menotomy fails in the face of repeated testimony by British officers; just as do attempts by other scholars to gloss over the American atrocity at the North Bridge; cf. Murdock,
Nineteenth of April,
83—134.

70
. Benjamin and Rachel Cooper, Depositions,
Journals of the Provincial Congress,
ed. Lincoln, 678.

71
. French,
Day of Concord and Lexington,
250.

72
. Coburn,
Battle…,
147; Lucius Paige,
History of Cambridge, 1630-1877
(Boston, 1877), 414.

73
. Mackenzie,
Diary,
I, 26.

74
. On the bridge, see Coburn,
Battle…,
116, citing Isaac Mansfield, Jr., Thanksgiving Sermon in Camp at Roxbury, Nov. 23, 1775, in J. W. Thornton (ed.),
Pulpit of the American Revolution
(Boston, i860), 236; Heath,
Memoirs,
7; Montresor.

75
. Barker,
British in Boston,
36.

76
. The Kent Lane route, which has been missed by historians of the battle, appears in a manuscript sketch map from Percy’s papers, reproduced in
The American War of Independence, 1775—1783; A Commemorative Exhibition Organized by the Map Library and the Department of Manuscripts of the British Library Reference Division
(London, 1975), 44.

77
. A controversy surrounds Pickering’s actions. He later asserted that he had stopped on Heath’s orders. Heath contradicted him. Cf. Galvin,
Minute Men,
225, 237—38; Octavius Pickering,
Timothy Pickering,
4 vols. (Boston, 1867), I, 74—77; Heath,
Memoirs,
8-9; Coburn,
Battle…,
155; French,
Day of Concord and Lexington,
262—64.

16.
Aftermath

1
. Gage to Barrington, April 22, 1775, Gage
Correspondence,
II, 673; (London)
Lloyd’s Evening Post and British Chronicle,
June 17—21, 1775.

2
. John Andrews, Letters,
MHSP
8 (1865); 405.

3
. William Heath,
Memoirs,
ed. Wiliam Abbatt (1798, New York, 1901), 8-9.

4
. Coburn, after a careful reconstruction of estimates of routes and distances marched by British soldiers, reckoned that Smith’s main body went 35 miles; the detachment to the Concord’s South Bridge, 37 miles, the guard at North Bridge, 36 miles; the companies dispatched to the Barrett farm, 40 miles; Percy’s brigade, 26 miles. Coburn,
The Battle…,
161.

5
. Thomas Boynton,
Journal,
Aug. 19—26, 1775, MHS, published in part in
MHSP
15 (1877): 254. So often did rain follow the major battles of the American Civil War that meteorologists believed the concussion of combat was the cause. Theologians had another explanation.

6
.
De Berniere to Gage, n.d.
[ca.
April 20, 1775?];
MHSC2,
4 (1816): 215-19; Gage to Barrington, April 22, 1775,
Gage Correspondence,
I, 673—74.

7
. Andrews, Letters, 405.

8
. Capt. W. G. Evelyn to the Rev. Wm. Evelyn,
Memoir and Letters of W. G. Evelyn
(Oxford, 1879), 54-55.

9
. De Berniere, 319.

10
.
Ibid.

11
. “Intercepted Letter of a Soldier’s Wife,” May 2, 1775,
AA4,
II, 441.

12
. “Intercepted Letters of the Soldiery in Boston,” April 28, 1775,
AA4,
II, 439-40.

13
.
Ibid.

14
. Barker,
British in Boston,
37, 34.

15
. Mackenzie,
Diary,
I, 29 (April 21, 1775).

16
. Smith to Gage, April 22, 1775.

17
. Percy to Harvey, April 20, 1775, Bolton (ed.),
Percy Letters,
52—53.

18
. Gage to Dartmouth, June 25, 1775, CO5/92, PRO, Kew.

19
. Graves to Philip Stephens, April 22, 1775, ADM1/485, PRO, Kew.

20
. “The Conduct of Vice Admiral Graves in North America, in 1774, 1775 and 1776,” Dec. 11,1776 [postscript dated Dec. 1,1777] signed G. G[efferina]. The author was Graves’s flag secretary in Boston. Graves Papers, Gay Transcripts, MHS.

21
.
Ibid.

22
.
Ibid.

23
. Barker,
British in Boston,
40.

24
. Nathaniel Ames, Diary, April 19, 1775, and April 19, 1815; Dedham Historical Society. I owe these references with thanks to Robert B. Hanson, who observes that the bullet was not all that Dr. Ames extracted from his patient. The physician’s account book contains an entry: “To extracting a Bullet from the Cubitus of Israel Everett, jr which he received in the battle of Lexington the first of the War with Great Britain, 3s; To sundry visits and dressings of the wound, 12 shilling.” Nathaniel Ames Account Book, April 19,1775; see also Robert B. Hanson,
Dedham,
1635-1890
(Dedham, 1976), 154.

25
. Abram E. Brown,
Beneath Old Roof Trees
(Boston, 1896), 226.

26
. Sabin, “April 19, 1775,” VII, 19; Chase,
The Beginnings of the American Revolution,
15&-57-

27
. Elizabeth Clarke, “Extracts,” LHS
Proceedings
IV (1905-10): 91-93.

28
. Revere to Belknap,
ca.
1798, RFP, microfilm edition, MHS.

29
. Rachel Revere to Paul Revere, n.d., Gage Papers, WCL; printed in French,
General Gage’s Informers,
170-71.

30
. Paul Revere to Rachel Revere, n.d., Goss,
Revere,
I, 263.

31
. Revere to Belknap,
ca.
1798; drafts of Committee Circulars in Massachusetts Archives; Frothingham,
Warren,
466; Cary,
Warren,
188; Paul Revere, “To the Colony of Massachusetts Bay…,” Aug. 22, 1775, MA; a facsimile is published in Harriet O’Brien (ed.),
Paul Revere’s Own Story
(Boston, 1929), 37.

32
. There is no evidence that Revere received money for the midnight ride, but he was reimbursed for his expenses on earlier and later occasions. The spirit of bureaucracy appeared at this early date. An authorization to pay Paul Revere ten pounds four shillings had to be passed as a resolution by the entire Massachusetts House of Representatives and countersigned by sixteen men, including James Warren, Samuel Adams, and John Adams. House Resolution, Aug. 22, 1775, “Resolved that Mr. Paul Revere be allowed and paid…,” MA; facsimile in O’Brien (ed.),
Paul Revere’s Own Story,
36.

33
. Proceedings of the Committee of Safety,
AA4,
II, 744, 765.

34
. Warren, Circular Letter, n.d., April 20. 1775, published in Frothingham,
Warren,
466.

35
. Heath,
Memoirs,
10.

36
. The earliest recorded use of the phrase “public opinion” appeared in Edward Gibbon’s
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
the first volume of which appeared in 1776. The
expression occurs in chapter xxxi, III, 257 (1781). The first recorded American use is by Thomas Jefferson.

37
. Josiah Warren, “Address to the Inhabitants of Great Britain,” April 26, 1775, Wroth
et al.
(eds.),
Province in Rebellion,
doc. 509, pp. 1730—31.

38
. Phinney,
Battle at Lexington,
23;
Memoirs of the Concord Social Circle,
1st series, 97.

39
. Its progress was recorded in endorsements by each successive committee.

40
. This folktale cannot be correct in its estimate of elapsed time; Bissell would have had to maintain a speed of 18 miles an hour. His next stop was in Brooklyn, Connecticut, at 11 o’clock the next morning, a distance of 45 miles. Thereafter the news traveled through the northeast at about five miles an hour—an exceptionally rapid rate of sustained long distance travel in that era. But the other details may be true. Cf. John H. Scheide, “The Lexington Alarm,” AAS
Proceedings
50 (1940): 63.

41
. The chronology of the news of Lexington and Concord is grossly inaccurate in Lester Cappon
et al., Atlas of Early American History
(Princeton, 1976). A more accurate source is Scheide, “The Lexington Alarm,” 49—79; the story of the Kentucky hunters is in George Bancroft,
History of the United States from the Discovery of the American Continent
(Boston, 1858), VII, 312.