“The Powder Alarm” in Essex, Connecticut, on 4 Jan.

I’ll start off the Sestercentennial year with a talk in the America 250 Winter Lecture Series of the historical society in Essex, Connecticut.

My topic on the afternoon of Sunday, 4 Jan 2026, will be “The Powder Alarm: The Breakdown of Royal Rule in New England, September 1774.”

Here’s our event description:

Before dawn on September 1, 1774, the royal governor of Massachusetts ordered some of the colony’s gunpowder moved into army-occupied Boston. That action put thousands of militiamen on the march. As rumors spread, they grew more dire. People in Connecticut heard that the king’s army and navy had attacked Boston. In Milford, a 13-year-old boy went to bed fearing he would “be dead or a captive before to-morrow morning.” But the real result of this event, dubbed the “Powder Alarm” by later historians, was that almost all of New England was free of royal rule—almost two years before the Declaration of Independence.

I’ve spoken about the “Powder Alarm” before, and this time I’ll emphasize Connecticut’s experience through figures like Israel Putnam, Silas Deane, and Joseph Plumb Martin.

Here’s an account of the colony’s reaction from the 8 Sept 1774 Massachusetts Spy:

By letters from Connecticut, and by several credible gentlemen arrived from thence, we are informed that there were not less than 40,000 men, in motion, and under arms, on their way to Boston, on Saturday, Sunday, and Monday last [3–5 September], having heard a false report that the troops had fired upon Boston, and killed several of the inhabitants: Twelve hundred arrived at Hartford from Farmington, and other places forty miles beyond Hartford, on Sunday last, on their way to this place, so rapidly did the news fly. But being informed by expresses that it was a false report, they returned home, declaring themselves ready at a minute’s warning to arm again, and fight for their country, and distressed brethren of Boston.

That report from printer Isaiah Thomas was no doubt exaggerated. In 1774 Connecticut’s total population was just under 200,000. More than half of those people were under the age of sixteen, and half the adults were women, so “no less than 40,000 men” would be virtually the entire adult male population.

Nonetheless, it’s clear the alarm was widespread, reflecting the urgency that people had come to feel about what was happening in Massachusetts. Several other newspaper articles about the “Powder Alarm” also included the phrase “a minute’s warning,” popularizing it just as citizens were discussing how to improve their militia system.

This talk is scheduled to run from 3:30 to 4:30 P.M. in Hamilton Hall at Essex Meadows, 30 Bokum Road in Essex, Connecticut. It’s free and open to the public. The society asks people to register through this page. Doors will open at 3 P.M., and seating will be on a first-come, first-served basis.

(The modern town of Essex appears on the map above as “Potty Pogue” on the Connecticut River.)