Counterfactual 1: If Revere Had Never Reached Lexington

For the Journal of the American Revolution, Jim Piecuch just reviewed The Ride: Paul Revere and the Night that Saved America by Kostya Kennedy.

Piecuch writes:

Kennedy begins his book by posing an intriguing question: What might have happened if Massachusetts militia had not been present at either Lexington or Concord when British troops arrived on April 19? He speculates that John Hancock and Samuel Adams could have been captured or killed, that the munitions at Concord could have been seized, and that such events might have put the American Revolution on a completely different, perhaps even unsuccessful, course.

In Kennedy’s view, the question that gives rise to this hypothetical scenario can also be stated as: What might have happened had Paul Revere not made his ride to warn the inhabitants of towns outside Boston that British regulars were coming? While it is impossible to answer such a question, Kennedy uses it to underscore the importance of Revere’s ride, declaring that “Perhaps no night was more critical to [America’s] fate” (page 4).

I’ve been cogitating along similar lines but not coming to the same firm conclusions.

Let’s start with the question of what would have happened if Paul Revere had been satisfied with arranging for the signals from the North Church steeple to his colleagues in Charlestown. The rider they sent west toward Lexington never made it, probably stopped by a British mounted patrol. We don’t even know who that man was. But let’s imagine Revere went to bed thinking he’d sent the warning as Dr. Joseph Warren had asked.

Or we can imagine Revere heading out of Boston as he did but being stopped by the H.M.S. Somerset, or by that same mounted patrol in west Charlestown. If Revere had never made it past Medford, how would that have affected events the following day?

In that case, Dr. Warren’s warning would have reached Lexington about half an hour later than it did, as soon as William Dawes arrived in town. Since it took hours for Adams and others to persuade Hancock to leave Lexington, and since the regulars didn’t arrive until hours after that, those thirty minutes probably wouldn’t have made a big difference.

TOMORROW: But what if neither Revere nor Dawes had reached Lexington?