“The Ghost of Major John Pitcairn,” 24 June

Sticking with the saga of Henry Howell Williams and his quest for (over?)compensation meant I mustered only a brief mention of the Battle of Bunker Hill on its Sestercentennial.

But today I’m watching the reenactment of that battle in Gloucester, and I’ll discuss some aspects of the event in the coming days, both on this site and live.

On Tuesday, 24 June, I’ll speak on “The Ghost of Major John Pitcairn” for Old North Illuminated’s digital speaker series.

Our event description:

After Major John Pitcairn was killed in the Battle of Bunker Hill, he was remembered in Britain as “a Gentleman of universal good character.” In Massachusetts, however, people still accused Pitcairn of having ordered redcoats to fire at the Lexington militia two months earlier. The major’s body was laid in the crypt of the Old North Church, but his memory haunted American history through stories, rumors, and artifacts linked to his name.

In this talk, J. L. Bell, proprietor of the history blog Boston 1775, sifts through the evidence behind those legends before digging into how a church warden with a shaky reputation sent Maj. Pitcairn’s body back to Britain—or did he?

I suppose I should make clear that I know of no stories about Pitcairn’s spirit haunting people or places. Rather, his memory and Americans’ hunger to make meaning of that memory have produced several oft-repeated narratives.

I’ll talk about several legends of Maj. Pitcairn: his pistols and horse, who shot him at Bunker Hill, how Bostonians remembered him, and what happened to his body in the decades after his death. Some of those stories might even be true.

Register to hear this talk online with a donation through this Eventbrite page. It’s scheduled to begin at 7:00 P.M., and there will be time for questions afterward. Assuming the recording goes well, a video will appear online afterward.