“Soon heard that the regulars had fired upon Lexington People”

For Loammi Baldwin of Woburn, 18 Apr 1775 was not a good day.

As he wrote in his diary, “My Brother Ruel departed this life after a short illness of 5 or 6 days, Pleurisy fever.” Loammi was there, along with his parents.

Reuel Baldwin was twenty-seven years old. He left his wife Keziah and three young children—Reuel, Ruth, and James—with another child on the way, eventually named Josiah.

The next day, Loammi Baldwin had to muster as a major in the Middlesex County militia. An officer in a horse troop, Baldwin rode instead of marched.

I don’t know if Loammi Baldwin’s diary still exists, but there are two handwritten transcripts of select dates in the Harvard libraries, and much of his entry on 19 Apr 1775 was published in the first volume of D. Hamilton Hurd’s History of Middlesex County in 1890.

There’s an old joke that a man with a watch always knows what time it is, but a man with two watches never does. Likewise, with one transcript we’d feel confident about what Baldwin originally wrote, but with three there are some reasons for doubt about the details.

Here’s how Maj. Baldwin described his experience of the start of the war according to this transcript, with line breaks added to make reading a little easier:

April 19. Wednesday

This morning a little before break of day we was allarmed by Mr. Ledman [probably Ebenezer Stedman] Express from Cambridge—Informd us that the Regulars were upon the move for Concord—

we musterd as fast as possible—The Town turned out extraordinary & proceeded towards Lexington & Rode along a little before main body and when I was nigh Jacob Reeds I heard a great firing proceeded on soon heard that the regulars had fired upon Lexington People & killed a large Number of them

we proceeded on as fast as possible and came to Lexington and saw about 8 or 10 dead & Numbers wounded was informed that the Regulars rushed upon our Lexington men and hollowed damn you Disperse Rebels & fired upon the Lexington Company

we proceeded to Concord by way of Lincoln meeting house come to Concord ascended the hill & pitched & refreshed ourselves a little

about [blank] o’clock the People under my command & also some others came running of the East end of the hill while I was at a house refreshing myself & we proceeded down the road & could see behind us the regulars following

A transcript with a more modern handwriting but more alternative spellings and the name “Stedman” starts at seq. 15 in this document. I can’t tell if this is more accurate to what Baldwin originally wrote. Fortunately, none of the discrepancies so far seriously affect his meaning.

TOMORROW: Cannon fire.

The Launch of Concord’s Arrowhead Ridge

As Patriots’ Day season continues, Boston 1775 is pleased to welcome back our old friend Christopher Lenney, author of Sightseeking: Clues to the Landscape History of New England, as a guest blogger.

In this posting, Chris discusses the origin of a name that has come to appear in maps and descriptions of the Battle of Lexington and Concord, but which the locals of 1775 didn’t use.

The mile-long ridge running parallel to Lexington Road from Meriam’s Corner to the center of Concord has long been a looming presence in the landscape and the history of the town. However, until the mid-twentieth century, it had no single, well-established name. At various times, various parts have been known as ye Hill above ye Meeting house, Meriam’s Hill, Heywood’s Hill, or simply the hill (or hills).

Its present name, Revolutionary Ridge, likely first appeared about 1915 and was popularized as the original name of Ridge Road. It was officially adopted by the U.S. Geological Survey on the 1943 Concord quadrangle map and has become widely accepted.

So anachronistic a name as Revolutionary Ridge has obvious drawbacks when recounting the events of April 19, 1775. It presupposes what hasn’t yet occurred. Something less glaringly modern, please!

Since the 1960s, Arrowhead Ridge, a name of even more recent coinage and one borrowed from another war, has come to fill the void. While a few arrowheads have coincidentally been found there, this is not how the name came about.

Arrowhead Ridge originated almost accidentally with military historian John R. Galvin, who brought a shrewd eye for terrain to the study of the battle. In the text of his book The Minute Men (1967), he employs the term purely descriptively—lowercase—four times:

• “A long ridge, shaped like an arrowhead, runs eastward from the center…The arrowhead points directly at Lexington”
• “At Meriam’s Corner, just below the east tip of the arrowhead ridge”
• “the British were preparing to march out along the arrowhead ridge”
• “climbing up the slope of the arrowhead ridge”

Gen. Galvin was a Massachusetts native (Melrose and Wakefield) who had a lifelong interest in the battle. The term could only have occurred to someone studying a U.S.G.S. topographical map, and then perhaps only to a military topographer. It is inconceivable that Galvin, who was a cadet at West Point from 1950 to 1954, could have been unaware that Arrowhead Ridge (uppercase) was also the name of a fierce October 1952 battle of the Korean War.

To illustrate Galvin’s account, Arrowhead Ridge was understandably, but misleadingly, given equal weight with other place names on the endpaper map of the first edition of his book. From there it slowly spread. A decade later Arrowhead Ridge resurfaced on a map in The Minute Men 1775–1975, a booklet published locally by the Council of Minute Men in 1977.

Relatively few have ever seen the original Galvin map, as most copies of the 1967 edition are now locked away in local history rooms and the map was omitted altogether from the much-revised and more widely available 1989 edition (although use of “arrowhead ridge” persisted in the text). Still fewer have seen the Council of Minute Men publication, which is something of a rarity.

However, virtually everyone interested in the events of April 19, 1775, has seen Arrowhead Ridge where it truly came into its own: on the map of the British retreat on page 223 of David Hackett Fischer’s now classic Paul Revere’s Ride (1994). Although not original to Paul Revere’s Ride, the influence of that book has assured that use of the term would survive and thrive: notably in Time-Life’s The Revolutionaries (1996). Nathaniel Philbrick’s Bunker Hill (2013), and Rick Atkinson’s The British Are Coming (2019). It has even made its way into a 2005 National Park Service report.

While Fischer refers to Galvin at least twenty-four times, the term Arrowhead Ridge never actually appears in the text of Paul Revere’s Ride. It was perhaps introduced by the cartographer, who compiled the map from Galvin and other sources. Its use is somewhat surprising in that Fischer twice takes exception to anachronistic terminology in his footnotes: Hardy’s Hill for Brooks Hill and, more famously, Bloody Angle for Bloody Curve. The latter is especially singled out for criticism as a Civil War name being reused for a battle in the Revolutionary War.

Ironically, in the use of Arrowhead Ridge we can see an example of much the same thing. Only in this case it was not a Civil War name that was borrowed, but one with ultimate origins in the Korean War.

We might ask whether Concordians of 1775 ever thought of that high ground as arrowhead-shaped since they weren’t used to picturing the world from above, the way we are in this era of widespread maps, plane travel, and satellite views.

Thanks, Chris!

“The Inhabitants of Boston are on the move”

Among the items in the London newspapers that arrived in Marblehead in the first week of April 1775 was this:

Yesterday a messenger was sent to Falmouth, with dispatches for General [Thomas] Gage at Boston, to be forwarded by a packet boat detained there for that purpose.

It didn’t take long for the Massachusetts Patriots to figure out that if this report had gone into the newspapers, and those newspapers had traveled to New England, then those dispatches could have made it to New England, too. And in that case, the royal governor might already be preparing to act on them.

Decades later, Mercy Warren wrote of the royal authorities in Massachusetts: “from their deportment, there was the highest reason to expect they would extend their researches, and endeavour to seize and secure, as they termed them, the factious leaders of rebellion.”

I can’t actually find those italicized words in the writings of royal officials, and “deportment” is a lousy basis for such a conclusion. But the Patriots may have had a more solid basis for expecting arrests, possibly from sympathetic people in Britain.

On behalf of the imperial government, the Earl of Dartmouth had written to Gage: “the first & essential step to be taken towards re-establishing Government, would be to arrest and imprison the principal actors & abettors in the Provincial Congress.” That letter didn’t arrive in Massachusetts until 14 April, but it looks like Patriots anticipated it after those Marblehead arrivals.

Most of the rest of the letter from James Warren to his wife Mercy that I’ve been discussing is about that worry—that Gage’s government would start arresting resistance leaders. On 6 April, James wrote from Concord:

The Inhabitants of Boston begin to move. The Selectmen and Committee of Correspondence are to be with us, I mean our Committee, this day. The Snow Storm yesterday and Business prevented them then. From this Conference some vigorous resolutions may grow. . . .

I am with regards to all Friends and the greatest Expressions of Love and regard to you, your very affect. Husband, JAS. WARREN

Love to my Boys. I feel disposed to add to this long letter but neither time nor place will permit it.

Then on 7 April James went back to his letter with more information and a warning:

I am up this morning to add. Mr. [Isaac] Lothrop [another Plymouth delegate] is the bearer of this and can give you an Acct. of us.

The Inhabitants of Boston are on the move. [John] H[ancock] and [Samuel] A[dams] go no more into that Garrison, the female Connections of the first [Lydia Hancock and Dorothy Quincy] come out early this morning and measures are taken relative to those of the last [Elizabeth Adams, who didn’t make it out before the siege]. The moving of the Inhabitants of Boston if effected will be one grand Move. I hope one thing will follow another till America shall appear Grand to all the world.

I begin to think of the Trunks which may be ready against I come home, we perhaps may be forced to move: if we are let us strive to submit to the dispensations of Providence with Christian resignation and phylosophick Dignity.

God has given you great abilities; you have improved them in great Acquirements. You are possessd of eminent Virtues and distinguished Piety. For all these I esteem I love you in a degree that I can't express. They are all now to be called into action for the good of Mankind, for the good of your friends, for the promotion of Virtue and Patriotism. Don’t let the fluttering of your Heart interrupt your Health or disturb your repose. Believe me I am continually Anxious about you. Ride when the weather is good and don’t work or read too much at other times. I must bid you adieu. God Almighty bless you. No letter yet. What can it mean? Is she not well? She can't forget me or have any Objections to writing.

James Warren appears to have gone home to Plymouth a few days later and then immediately gone on to Rhode Island to try to convince that elected government to help prepare a New England army. He was in that colony when word came of shooting at Lexington.

“Concord, where a provincial magazine was kept”

Now we come to the part of James Warren’s 6 Apr 1775 letter to his wife Mercy that I like to quote in talks.

James was in Concord for the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, and he wrote frankly about military preparations:

All things wear a warlike appearance here. This Town is full of Cannon, ammunition, stores, etc., and the Army long for them and they want nothing but strength to Induce an attempt on them. The people are ready and determine to defend this Country Inch by Inch.

Earlier in the letter James alluded to news from London that the imperial government would insist on making Massachusetts obey Parliament’s laws. He told Mercy: “you well know my Sentiments of the Force of both Countrys.” That appears to refer to the strength of Britain and Massachusetts—or perhaps New England or even America. Whatever his “country” was, James expressed confidence that his side would be strong enough to prevail.

All that adds up to a very different picture from how later American historians liked to portray the Patriot cause: as poorly equipped and unprepared for war. For example, in publishing the records of the provincial congress, which are full of references to artillery and other weapons, William Lincoln wrote: “It is not improbable, that in the confusion occasioned by the sudden march of the British troops to Concord, the documents exhibiting the weakness of the province in martial stores, as well as the strength of its patriotism, were destroyed.” The provincials had to be the underdogs in the fight.

I’m not saying James Warren’s confidence was more realistic than those later assessments. He and his colleagues did overestimate their military preparations—how ready for use those cannon were, how much gunpowder was on hand, and so on. But knowing that Warren saw lots of weaponry around him and felt his faction’s force was the stronger helps us to understand his political decisions.

James’s remark about Concord being full of cannon also connects to a passage that Mercy Warren wrote decades later in his history of the Revolution:

When the gentlemen left congress for the purpose of combining and organizing an army in the eastern states, a short adjournment was made. Before they separated they selected a standing committee to reside at Concord, where a provincial magazine was kept, and vested them with power to summon congress to meet again at a moment’s warning, if any extraordinary emergence should arise.

The records of the provincial congress and its committee of safety (the same ones published by William Lincoln) do mention “the gentlemen [who] left congress for the purpose of combining and organizing an army in the eastern states.” The Massachusetts Patriots designated envoys to Connecticut, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island—the last group including James Warren.

But those records don’t mention this “standing committee to reside at Concord.” I’d like to know who they were, what they did when the British column arrived. I’m keeping my eyes open for signs.

TOMORROW: Run away!

James Warren: “News we have”

On 6 Apr 1775, James Warren was in Concord, representing Plymouth in the Massachusetts Provincial Congress.

He started writing home to his wife, Mercy, that day. That letter contains a passage I’ve quoted many times in my Road to Concord talks, but there’s a lot more going on, too.

So over the next few days I’ll analyze of Warren’s whole letter.

My Dear Mercy,—

Four days ago I had full Confidence that I should have had the pleasure of being with you this day, we were then near closeing the Session. Last Saturday we came near to an Adjournment, were almost equally divided on that question, the principle argument that seemd to preponderate, and turn in favour of sitting into this week was the prospect of News and News we have.

Last week things wore rather a favourable aspect, but alas how uncertain are our prospects. Sunday Evening brought us accounts of a Vessel at Marblehead from Falmouth, and the English Papers etc by her. I have no need to recite perticulars. you will have the whole in the Papers, and wont wonder at my forgoeing the pleasure of being with you. I dare say you would not desire to see me till I could tell you that I had done all in my power to secure and defend us and our Country.

We are no longer at a loss what is Intended us by our dear Mother. We have Ask’d for Bread and she gives us a Stone, and a serpent for a Fish.

That last line is an allusion to Matthew 7:9–11.

The British news that Warren alluded was printed in the Essex Journal of Newburyport before spreading to other papers. “Capts. Barker and Andrews” had sailed from England on 17 February, bringing the latest.

The Essex Journal reprinted a long report on debate in Parliament on 5 April and an even longer one on 12 April. Those two articles don’t agree in all the details, but they’re clear on the basic developments.

For years the Massachusetts Whigs had hoped that their pleas, protests, and persistence would prompt a change in British government policy. Instead, the Lords refused to hear the latest petitions from America.

The Earl of Chatham, formerly William Pitt and still America’s favorite, moved that Parliament repeal the Coercive Acts and remove troops from Boston. Other peers argued for “compelling the Americans to the immediate obedience of the legislature of the mother country.” Ultimately the House of Lords rejected all of Chatham’s proposals by margins like 77 to 18.

Furthermore, on 9 February both houses of Parliament had signed off on an address to the king that declared in part:

…we find that a part of your majesty’s subjects in the province of Massachusetts Bay have proceeded so far to resist the authority of the supreme legislature; that a rebellion at this time actually exists within the said province. . . .

we consider it as our indispensible duty, humbly to beseech your majesty that you will take the most effectual measures to enforce due obedience to the laws and authority of the supreme legislature; and we assure your majesty that it is our fixed resolution, at the hazard of our lives and properties, to stand by your majesty against all rebellious attempts…

The king’s official response was to promise “the most speedy and effectual measure for enforcing due obedience to the laws, and the authority of the supreme legislature.”

And that was just the official record. The London newspapers also threw in comments like “Lord N—h is determined that the Americans shall wear chains.”

TOMORROW: Keeping up spirits, keeping up defenses.

Peering into the Josiah Austin Story

Back in 2020 the Spared & Shared website, which usually presents documents from the U.S. Civil War, published the transcript and scans of an account of events on 19 Apr 1775.

Attributed to Josiah Austin, “formerly of Charlestown now of Salem,” this narrative describes the effort of driving a wagon load of “powder & balls” from Concord as the British army closed in.

Indeed, according to this document, regulars actually found the wagon disabled on the road, only to ignore the men with it as “affrightened ‘Yankees,’ returning from market.”

Earlier this year, Alexander Cain at Historical Nerdery did a fine job of pointing out the holes in this account.

The transcription quotes Austin stating “he was at Concord with Col. Barrett and others on the 18th of April 1775 having in charge ammunition &c.” We know that James Barrett was storing a large amount of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress’s military supplies on his farm—until a couple of days before, when the family and friends started to move that stuff to better hiding-places.

Alex Cain points out that those hiding-places were naturally to the west, further away from Boston and any expedition coming from there. Yet Austin said his wagon went east “toward Lexington.” Why the hell would anyone drive a wagon of secret ammunition toward the military search party?

We also have the names of men employed by the Massachusetts Patriots to help Barrett gather and prepare military supplies. One man was John Austin. None was named Josiah Austin.

The British expedition stopped several young men riding out on the roads on the night of 18–19 April, sometimes detaining them for hours. (One, Asahel Porter, was killed in the shooting on Lexington common.) Cain notes it would therefore be quite odd for some soldiers to come across a wagon in the vicinity of the place they had been ordered to search and pass by without examining the cargo.

Finally, Austin claimed that the British soldiers he met were “pioneers,” but none of those specialized soldiers were assigned to the march to Concord.

I have nothing to add to Alex Cain’s cutting analysis of the document’s content. But I’ll make an observation about its form. The first six lines refer to “Col. Barrett” twice—but only after editing.

Spared & Shared’s scans of the handwritten document show that originally the transcriber wrote another name, possibly “Butler.” Sometime after the original writing, that name was crossed out and replaced with “Barrett.” We don’t know how much later that change was made. We don’t know if someone looking up Barrett’s name in historical sources prompted that change as a correction.

But we do know that whoever first told this story didn’t initially remember the name “Barrett,” even though Josiah Austin was supposed to have worked with Col. Barrett and traveled on the ammunition wagon with Barrett’s son.

That’s just one more reason to deem this account dubious. Josiah Austin might have been telling an exaggerated story to a credulous transcriber, or the entire document might have been concocted.

Heading into Patriot’s Day 2024

With yesterday’s posting, Boston 1775 has entered the Patriot’s Day season for 2024.

It’s hard to find a complete posting of Patriot’s Day events because so many towns and organizations have their own celebrations. But a good place to start is the calendar on the front page of Revolution 250.

Among the new commemorations this year is Tavern Week in Arlington, known as West Cambridge or Menotomy in 1775. The Massachusetts Provincial Congress’s committee on safety and supplies met in the Black Horse Tavern on what’s now Massachusetts Avenue on 18 April. Three members planned to spend the night but bolted out the back door when the redcoat column approached.

The Arlington Historical Society is also offering tours of the Jason Russell House, site of the bloodiest fighting of the day, on Saturday, 13 April, and Monday, 15 April, noon to 4 P.M.

Also on 13 April, Michael Lepage will portray Paul Revere at the Paul Revere House in Boston while the Minute Man National Historical Park hosts its annual big tactical demonstration and reenactment of events along the Battle Road.

Some of the towns planning local Patriot’s Day remembrance events include Billerica, Danvers, Somerville, Hanover, and Lynnfield. Others will send traditional contingents to the event in Minute Man Park.

All outdoor events of course depend on welcoming weather. We had snow last week, and flooding forced the cancellation of an event at James Barrett’s farm in Concord today. So let’s hope for sunshine and cool breezes for the next two weeks!

The British March to the 1/88th of a Mile

So far this month I’ve been looking at the publishing history of Lt. Col. Robert Donkin’s Historical Collections and Remarks, particularly the removal of an incendiary footnote and how that might have affected the publishing schedule.

There are other significant blanks in the book, not made by a knife but left by the author.

On page 170, Donkin discussed the British troops’ march to Concord on 18–19 Apr 1775.

Donkin’s praise for the redcoats’ endurance would have been more impressive if he’d actually stated how long they marched. Instead, he left blanks: “the space of     hours,” “about     miles,” “less than     hours!”

Did Donkin just forget, and Hugh Gaine’s print shop never told him? Did he expect to write those figures in after printing, only to be caught up in the footnote brouhaha and capturing Philadelphia?

However it came about, Donkin didn’t tell readers how long the march to Concord was, in space or time. Just that it was impressive, believe him.

Frank Warren Coburn undertook the measurement in his 1912 study, The Battle of April 19, 1775. He had the advantage of bicycle with a cyclometer that measured distance to the 88th of a mile, or 60 feet. Coburn calculated that the companies who went all the way to James Barrett’s house and back to Bunker’s Hill traveled 39 and 71/88 miles. That’s over five miles more than the troops who stopped in central Concord.

As to time, which was measured less exactly in the eighteenth century, David Hackett Fischer rounded up all the reports and estimates of when things happened in Appendix L of Paul Revere’s Ride (1995), and Derek W. Beck further analyzed those in Appendix 7 of Igniting the American Revolution (2015).

Based on those analyses, the figures Donkin was looking for were:

• the troops were under fire for eight hours, from leaving Concord at noon to reaching Charlestown around 8 P.M.
• on average, the soldiers who went to Concord marched about 36 miles.
• if we time that march as starting in Cambridge at 2 A.M. and ending in Charlestown, then the whole mission took 18 hours.

However, if we start the clock when the troops got into boats to cross the Charles River and end it with those troops coming back across the river from Charlestown, that was about 24 hours.

“His majesty’s troops peaceably marching to and from Concord”

I profiled Maj. Robert Donkin (1727–1821) back in 2021, which was 212 years after someone drew this profile of him as a retired general.

In 1777, Donkin was an officer in the 44th Regiment of Foot, stationed in New York City. He decided that was the right time to publish a collection of short essays and anecdotes on military topics.

Donkin described Military Collections and Remarks as the wisdom of “a late general officer of distinguished abilities, in the science of war”—probably his mentor, Gen. William Rufane. But the major wrote at least some of that material himself since it referred to events after Rufane’s death in 1773.

Donkin cast the project as a charity project. In his preface he wrote of “the bloody massacre committed on his majesty’s troops peaceably marching to and from Concord the 19th April, 1775,” and promised that proceeds from his book would

relieve and support the innocent children and widows of the valiant soldiers inhumanly and wantonly butchered that day, as well as for those that gloriously fell in their country’s cause at Bunker-hill the 17th June following.

The book contains a subscribers’ list eighteen pages long, all military officers or administrators, about 500 of them. At the end of that list is an accounting. Donkin and his agents had collected £422.7.3.

Here are the costs for the 296-page book, printed in New York by Hugh Gaine:

To Paper for 1000 Copies, £37.19.4 1/2
To Printing Expences, 57.13.1 1/2
To folding, sewing, and covering 1000 Copies, 21.1.10 1/2
To Advertisements, 4.19.3 1/2
Expences in England, Scotland and Ireland. 5.5.0
Incidental Charges 5.0.0
[total] Sterling, £131.18.8

The major therefore declared he had “Distributed in Charity, Sterling, £290.8.7.”

But if Donkin and Gaines thought that they were done when they printed those pages, they were fooling themselves.

TOMORROW: Cut it out.

Some Museum Programs for School Vacation Week

Some of greater Boston’s Revolutionary sites have announced special programming for next week, which is a public school vacation in Massachusetts.

Thanks to support from the Highland Street Foundation, the Paul Revere House in the North End will be free to visit on Tuesday, 20 February.

On the two days that follow, the site is offering a drop-in family activity called “Share Your Love of the Written Word,” inspired by vintage postcards from its collection. Participating is free with admission. Regular admission is $6 for adults, $5.50 for seniors and college students, $1.00 for children 5-17, and free for members and North End residents.

Nearby, the Old North Church and Historic Site is usually closed to the public during the winter, but it will be open 17–24 February from 11:00 A.M. (12:30 P.M. on Sunday) to 5:00 P.M. Admission tickets, which costs $5 per person, include a self-guided tour of the church’s sanctuary, the current exhibit, and answers from the education staff. For $5 more one can enjoy a self-guided tour of the historic crypt and an audio guide.

Outside the city, the Concord Museum is promising unspecified “special family activities” on Monday, Thursday, and Friday, according to its calendar. That week is also the last chance to see the museum’s exhibit “Interwoven: Women’s Lives Written in Thread.” On Friday, 23 February, educator and reenactor Michelle Gabrielson will present the work of quilting a petticoat.

The Lexington Historical Society’s historic taverns will host special programs for kids of different ages on “Lighting the Way” and “Science and Medicine” during the vacation week. For more details, including the registration cost, visit its events page.

The Hive Symposium, 17–18 Feb.

On the weekend of 17–18 February, Minute Man National Historical Park will host its annual symposium for living history interpreters, The Hive.

Cosponsoring organizations include the Friends of Minute Man, Revolution 250, Freedom’s Way National Heritage Area, and the Massachusetts Army National Guard, which will host the gathering.

Though this series of presentations and workshops is designed primarily for people who participate in the park’s colonial reenactments, including the Battle of Lexington and Concord, they offer valuable information for anyone interested in local Revolutionary history.

The schedule of presentations includes:

Overview of the Minute Man 250 Thematic Framework with Park Rangers Jim Hollister and Jarrad Fuoss: The 250th anniversary of the American Revolution is well underway! The staff at Minute Man have developed an interpretive framework that carry our program through the next several years.

1774: The Empire Strikes Back, and Resistance Becomes Revolution with Prof. Bob Allison of Suffolk University: Parliament responded to Boston’s destroying the tea by closing the port and suspending the 1691 charter. The people of Massachusetts would no longer have control over their municipal governments. Instead of silencing the local resistance, these moves brought the other colonies into an alliance with Massachusetts to begin a revolution against Parliament's authority. Find out what went wrong for the Empire in 1774.

By His Excellency’s Command: General Gage, the British Army and the People of Salem in 1774 with Dr. Emily Murphy: In June of 1774 the newly appointed royal governor of Massachusetts, Gen. Thomas Gage, was eager to escape the political turbulence of Boston. Therefore, he took the drastic step of removing himself and the provincial legislature to the seemingly calmer waters of Salem. Two regiments of British regulars came with him. That summer the people of Salem came into direct contact with a display of royal power on a scale they had never before experienced. What was the social and political landscape of the town like in 1774? How did the people deal with their new neighbors?

Lives of the Embattled Farmers: The Towns of Lexington, Lincoln and Concord in 1775, a panel discussion with Alex Cain, Don Hafner, and Bob Gross: The towns of Lexington, Lincoln and Concord were farming communities. Many of the families who called these towns home had been there for multiple generations. In this panel discussion we will look at the social and economic dynamics of these three towns, their similarities and their differences.

Practical, often hands-on workshops will cover these topics:

• “Techniques for Informal Visitor Engagement” with Park Ranger Jarrad Fuoss
• “Too Clean!: Incorporating Appropriate Levels of Garment Distress into Your Historical Impression” with Adam Hodges-LeCaire
• “A Pressing Matter: Media Literacy & 18th Century Newspapers” with Michele Gabrielson
• “Women’s Hair Styles and Cosmetics” with Renee Walker-Tuttle
• “Men’s Hair Styles” with Neils Hobbs and Sean Considine
• “‘Fitted with the Greatest Exactness’: The Material Culture of Appearance of the 18th-Century British Soldier” with Sean Considine and Niels Hobbs
• “Pinning Gowns & Filling Pockets: How to Wear Women’s Clothing Well & Have Fun Pulling from Your Pockets!” with Ruth Hodges

Plus, the program includes time for sewing circles, infantry drill, consultation on kit, and lunchtime conversations.

The 2024 spring season at Minute Man will includes some events about the crucial year of 1774 in addition to the traditional Patriots Day battle reenactment. That event will be practice for the Sestercentennial in 2025, which may very well be insane.

Register to attend the 2024 Hive symposium through the Friends of Minute Man Park.

Emerging Revolutionary War Bus Tour of Battle Road, 11–13 Oct.

The Emerging Revolutionary War team are planning their fourth annual bus tour of historic places, and this year they’re coming to Massachusetts.

On 11–13 October, historians Phillip Greenwalt, Rob Orrison, and Alex Cain will lead “The Shot Heard Round the World: Battles of Lexington and Concord Bus Tour.”

This tour will consist of:

• an overview lecture on Friday night.
• all-day tour of battlefield sites in Lexington, Concord, and other towns on Saturday.
• a half-day tour of more sites on Sunday morning.

The tour bus and Saturday lunch are included in the $250 cost.

Other meals and lodging are separate, not included in the ticket fee. The host hotel is the Courtyard Marriott in Waltham, with a block of rooms set aside at $239 a night.

Alex Cain is the author of We Stood Our Ground: Lexington in the First Year of the American Revolution and a proprietor of Untapped History.

Phil Greenwalt and Rob Orrison are coauthors of A Single Blow: The Battles of Lexington and Concord and the Beginning of the American Revolution, April 19, 1775. (I wrote the foreword to that book.)

For more information, check out Emerging Revolutionary War. To sign up, go to this page.

Preparing for the Battle Road Sestercentennial

The staff at Minute Man National Historical Park is already planning for the Sestercentennial of the Battle and Lexington and Concord in 2025.

And that means planning for the battle anniversary in 2024.

The park is alerting Revolutionary reenacting groups who want to participate in 2025 that they must sign up for and participate in the 2024 so they’ll know how to navigate the park and its rules before the crowds get huge.

Furthermore, in order to maintain the Battle Road standards for accuracy, units must register for the 2024 event between this month and 13 January.

The park explains here:

Q: Does my group really need to attend Battle Road prior to the 250th in order to attend in 2025?

A: Yes. Battle Road is unique for its complexity and physical demands. Also, in 2025 we are expecting possibly tens of thousands of visitors and even a Presidential visit. Park volunteers and staff can expect large crowds and even heavy traffic getting to the site. It is important for units to experience Battle Road in a more quiet year so they know where they need to go and what is expected of them so to avoid confusion in 2025. . . .

The entire unit does not have to participate in the 2024 event. Three or four members, preferably officers and NCOs, can attend and adequately represent a unit with the assumption that they can report back to the other members and help them make sense of the important information.

Q: I can't make it to the inspection, how do I get approved?

A: In 2024, the Battle Road Muster will be held on Saturday, March 30th. The main purpose of the muster is, primarily, to provide safety briefings, to drill and rehearse the tactical demonstrations. Also, it is a good opportunity to get eyes on participants and identify any last minute, hopefully minor, issues with drill, clothing, or equipment and take steps to correct them before the event on Saturday, April 13th.

However, in 2023 we learned that for groups with multiple or major issues, identifying these at the muster is too late. Therefore, we will open registration for 2024 in September of 2023 and will close it on January 13, 2024. Units must submit photographs no later than January 13th. New units may be asked to also provide a drill video if requested.

If sending group photos, please have the unit formed in one rank and provide front and rear photographs and a list of names (from right to left) of those in the photo. Any member not present must submit a photograph solo, through their unit commander, to the committee no later than January 13th.

Note the date for the 2024 commemoration: Saturday, 13 April. There will, of course, be a plethora of other events around that date, and an even larger number of celebrations, or even larger celebrations, in 2025.

(The image above is a screen capture of Grayson1Video’s recording of the 1975 parade, filmed on Super 8. It’s not meant to show current standards.)

Obelisks Being Repaired

The National Park Service is preparing for the Sestercentennial, which means sites with Revolutionary roots are being spruced up.

The agency maintains a list of “deferred maintenance” projects with a total cost that’s now more than $22 billion.

The 250th anniversary of the Revolution, and the crowds that’s expected to bring to those parks, has sent some money toward those maintenance projects. That’s a Good Thing.

There is an immediate downside, however: In the next couple of years that work might affect access to or views of some sites.

At Minute Man National Historical Park, for instance, the obelisk erected at the site of Concord’s North Bridge in 1863 and the nearby Minute Man Statue were recently conserved, shrouding them briefly.

A larger and longer project has started at the Bunker Hill Monument. Restoring the upper exterior of that stone tower means putting up lots of scaffolding, which will surround the monument and affect the views from its windows.

For safety, the area immediately around the tower and lodge are fenced off, though both buildings are still open to the public. I believe one of the small cannon traced in The Road to Concord is still on display in the lodge.

That work is scheduled to be done by the end of this year, keeping the tower in good shape for its spotlight in 2025.

Folks eager to see a towering Revolutionary obelisk this summer and fall might instead take a trip to the Saratoga Monument in Victory, New York. It will be open on weekends from 12 August to 15 October.

The Saratoga Monument is 155 feet tall, with 188 steps, compared to the Bunker Hill Monument’s 221 feet and 294 steps. However, it also offers more decoration to look at, including statues of Continental leaders Horatio Gates, Philip Schuyler, and Daniel Morgan on three of its four sides.

“Unable to be at the expense of removing themselves”

On Monday, 1 May 1775 the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, having declared that Loyalists could move into Boston, turned to the bigger question of how to handle families who wanted to move out of the besieged town.

The previous day, the congress had named five members to a committee to consider that issue. After seeing that group’s report in the morning, the body added four more delegates to revise the plan.

In the afternoon, having meanwhile codified the language for commissioning officers in the new army, the congress approved the enlarged committee’s amended report:

IN PROVINCIAL CONGRESS, Watertown, May 1, 1775.

Whereas, the inhabitants of the town of Boston have been detained by general Gage, but at length, by agreement, are permitted to remove, with their effects, into the country, and as it has been represented to this Congress that about five thousand of said inhabitants are indigent, and unable to be at the expense of removing themselves:

Therefore, Resolved, That it be, and it is hereby recommended to all the good people of this colony, and especially to the selectmen, and committee of correspondence most convenient to Boston, that they aid and assist such poor inhabitants of said town (with teams, waggons, &c.,) as shall procure a certificate from the committee of donations, that they are unable to remove themselves;

and it is further recommended to the selectmen of the several towns specified in the schedule annexed, to provide for said inhabitants in the best and most prudent way and manner, until this, or some future congress, shall take further order thereon, and that the said selectmen receive, support and employ their proportion of said inhabitants assigned them in said schedule, and no other; and render their accounts to this, or some future congress, or house of representatives, for allowance, which reasonable accounts shall be paid out of the public treasury:

and it is further recommended, to the committee of donations, to apply said donations for the removal of said inhabitants, and for their support whilst removing; and in case that is insufficient, it is further recommended to said committee of donations, that they make up said deficiency, and lay their accounts before the Congress for allowance, which reasonable expense shall be paid out of the public treasury of the colony:

and it is further Resolved, that the inhabitants of Boston thus removed shall not, in future, be considered as the poor of said town into which they remove; and it is to be understood, that if the number of the poor who shall be removed in consequence hereof, should surpass, or fall short of the number herein calculated, the distribution of them shall be increased or diminished, in proportion according to this regulation: …

There followed a list of towns in Suffolk, Middlesex, Plymouth, Bristol, Berkshire, Hampshire, and Worcester Counties with the number of refugees each was thought capable of supporting, from 4 in Leverett to 129 in Rehoboth.

Essex and Barnstable Counties had no allotment, nor did any seacoast towns elsewhere. Likewise, the towns along or close to the siege lines weren’t on the list, though the congress did ask them to supply teams and wagons for moving people. Presumably the authorities thought those communities were already stretched thin supporting the military and maintaining their coastal defenses.

The Maine counties and the islands were also left off, probably because those would be too hard for refugees to get to.

In all, the congress found space, at least theoretically, for 4,903 poor war refugees. That was nearly a third of Boston’s prewar population.

Other families came out by their own means and went to places left off the congress’s list. I discussed Abigail Adams’s July struggle to host George Trott’s family on her farm in Braintree back here. In this article Katie Turner Getty reports that Concord eventually housed “as many as 130 Bostonians” though its initial allotment of poor refugees was 66.

COMING UP: The agreement breaks down.

A Few More Tidbits from Along the Way

Here are a few more observations on the sources I examined in my hunt for traces of Dr. Samuel Prescott this month.

First, in 1835 Lemuel Shattuck, probably relying on local and family traditions in Concord, wrote that when Prescott met Paul Revere and William Dawes, he “had spent the evening at Lexington,…and having been alarmed, was hastening his return home.”

In other words, Dr. Prescott had left his fiancée, Lydia Mulliken, because he had heard about the approaching regulars. Given the timing, that news had probably reached Lexington when the Boston men arrived at the Lexington parsonage. By the time the riders met on the road, Revere and Dawes didn’t need to tell Prescott.

If Dr. Prescott had indeed already heard the alarm, that helps to explain two details:

• why he left the Mulliken house—because he wanted to get back to his home town and prepare for any necessary military or medical action. He may therefore have planned to spend the night.
• how Revere and Dawes quickly learned that Prescott was a “high Son of Liberty.” They were probably all talking about what the army might be up to.

Second, in The Road to Concord, I wrote that James Barrett’s family and friends probably took the four cannon stolen from Boston to Stow and hid them near the house of Henry Gardner, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress’s reciever-general (equivalent of treasurer).

I based that on a statement in a Bicentennial-era history of Stow citing a local tradition. I wished I had a stronger source, but I presented it only as a possibility.

In the 24 Apr 1824 Concord Gazette and Middlesex Yeoman article I quoted this month I spotted this sentence:

Five pieces of cannon, a quantity of ammunition had been previously conveyed to Stow, and put under the care of Mr. GARDNER.

That’s still an unsourced statement from a newspaper story published forty-nine years after the event. Nonetheless, it’s gratifying to find people in Concord believed that was true.


Finally, in the 14 Feb 1778 article from the Providence Gazette where I found Dr. Prescott’s name among the men who had died in Halifax prison, another name is “Samuel Dyre.”

Samuel Dyer (whose name was spelled other ways as well) was the subject of the two articles I wrote for the Journal of the American Revolution published earlier this month.

Early in those articles I noted how hard it is to trace that Samuel Dyer since he was a sailor, thus transient and unlikely to leave a mark on institutional records, and since there were other men with the same or similar names.

Therefore, I resist the temptation to say that sailor Samuel Dyer from 1774–75 was the same man who died in Halifax in late 1776 or early 1777, most likely after being captured on a privateer.

After all, the last time my Samuel Dyer definitely appears in the historical record, he had been working for the royal authorities as a trustie inside the Boston jail. Would he really have enlisted aboard an American privateer after that?

All I can say is, given my Samuel Dyer’s habit of switching sides and telling powerful men what they wanted to hear, I can’t rule out that possibility.

Scrounging for Clues about Dr. Samuel Prescott

In 1835, as quoted yesterday, Lemuel Shattuck wrote that Dr. Samuel Prescott was captured on a privateer and died as a prisoner of war in Halifax.

After Henry W. Longfellow’s 1860 poem made Paul Revere an American icon, authors look for more information about his fellow riders, including Prescott.

Or at least confirmation of what Shattuck wrote.

Anything, really.

And almost nothing came to light.

As I said earlier this month in answering a question at an online presentation, we knew little about Prescott. Since Shattuck’s writing, only two additional sources had surfaced, and they both bring a lot of questions.

One is an entry in Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War, a monumental state-funded listing of all the names in surviving records, extracted from the original documents and alphabetized. The pertinent entry is:

PRESCOT, “SALL.” Lists of men appearing under the heading “Hartwell Brook the first Everidge;” said Prescot appears among men in service at Ticonderoga in 1776; name preceded by “Dr.”

Was “Dr. Sall Prescot” also the alarm rider Dr. Samuel Prescott?

Searching those volumes for the phrase “Hartwell Brook the first Everidge” shows that document (or documents?) listed many other men who served in many places and times. Those listings rarely include the usual helpful information about commanding officers, dates of service, and so on.

Which Hartwell Brook does this document refer to? What does “the first Everidge” mean? Dr. Samuel Johnson’s dictionary offers this first definition of “average”: “In law, that duty or service which the tenant is to pay to the king, or other lord, by his beasts and carriages.” Was “the first Everidge” thus a record of how men had served their duty to the state of Massachusetts?

In this case, it seems likely “Dr. Sall. Prescot” was among some short-term Massachusetts troops sent out to Fort Ticonderoga to hold that position in 1776. (Not, as some writers assumed, part of Henry Knox’s mission there, which actually started in 1775.) Then he could have returned to eastern Massachusetts and enlisted on a privateer. If in fact this was Dr. Samuel Prescott.

Another tantalizing statement appears in D. Michael Ryan’s Concord and the Dawn of Revolution in 2007. Ryan wrote:

Among family papers of a Jacob Winter (Windrow) of Ashburnham, Massachusetts, was found a letter claiming that he had been a prison mate of a Dr. Prescott from Concord who apparently died in miserable conditions in 1777.

Alas, there’s no other information: who wrote this letter, when, where it is now, and what exactly it says. (A slightly different statement appeared in Ryan’s original magazine article from 2001, but no additional citation.)

Ezra S. Stearns’s 1887 history of Ashburnham lists Jacob Winter among that town’s casualties in the Revolutionary War, saying he died a prisoner at Halifax in the fall of 1777. So it’s conceivable Winter overlapped with Dr. Prescott there and wrote home about it. But other scenarios are all too conceivable as well.

Joseph Ross’s Continental Navy site offers a primary source mentioning Jacob Winter. His name appears on a list apparently compiled by Dr. Samuel Curtis as he treated fellow prisoners from the Continental Navy’s frigate Hancock. That document even gives an exact date for Jacob Winter’s demise: 29 Aug 1777.

Fortunately, following Jacob Winter’s trail led me to a new, and contemporaneous, source about Prescott.

TOMORROW: Where and when the doctor died.

Why Samuel Prescott and Lydia Mulliken Never Married

A couple of days ago, I quoted an 1824 Concord newspaper saying that on 18 Apr 1775 Dr. Samuel Prescott had been out on “a visit to the lady who afterwards became his wife.”

Folks who’ve read about Prescott no doubt perked up at that because it contradicts one of the few facts in the history books about him.

That fact first surfaced in a footnote in Lemuel Shattuck’s history of Concord:

Samuel was taken prisoner on board a privateer afterwards, and carried to Halifax, where he died in jail.

No other details or source notes came with this statement, alas.

Authors were therefore left with little to work with. Some dwelled on the sad story of Lydia Mulliken’s brother Nathaniel and Samuel Prescott’s brother Abel both dying on dysentery (camp fever) in the first year of the war, followed by Samuel dying a prisoner.

In November 1782, the Haverhill town records recorded that Joseph Burrill of that town and Lydia Mulliken of Lexington intended to marry. On 18 Mar 1783, the Lexington vital records say, that wedding took place. (This is listed only under Burrill’s name.)

Some have taken that timing to say Lydia held out hope that Samuel was still alive until near the end of the war and only then agreed to marry someone else. But of course we don’t know what she was thinking or when she and Joseph Burrill met.

Lydia died in 1789 after having two children who both died young. Joseph remarried to Susanna Mulliken, a cousin of his first wife. That couple had several more children and lived into the 1830s.

There are, however, a couple of other sources that might complicate or confirm the local lore of Dr. Samuel Prescott’s death in a Halifax jail.

TOMORROW: Marching west, sailing east?

“Mr. Mulliken, to whose daughter he was paying his addresses”

Around the fiftieth anniversary of the Battle of Lexington and Concord, more details about Dr. Samuel Prescott came into print.

As I quoted yesterday, in 1824 a local newspaper stated that when Dr. Prescott started to spread the alarm about regulars on the march he “was returning from Lexington before day light…from a visit to the lady who afterwards became his wife.”

That detail about Prescott spending the evening with a lady was significant because it wasn’t necessary to excuse his being on the road that night. As a doctor, Prescott could have been out late after making a house call.

The following year, Edward Everett came to Concord to deliver a historical oration. As he would do on many occasions (most famously at the dedication of the Gettysburg National Cemetery in 1863), he consulted published and local sources in order to retell the event he was commemorating.

Everett didn’t add anything to the historic record, but he brought together sources:

After staying a short time at Lexington, Messrs Revere and Dawes, at about one o’clock of the morning of the nineteenth of April, started for Concord to communicate the intelligence there. They were soon overtaken on the way by Dr. Samuel Prescott of Concord, who joined them in giving the alarm at every house on the road.

The Concord newspaper hadn’t named Paul Revere and William Dawes. Revere’s account and Elias Phinney’s book about the fighting on Lexington common hadn’t included Prescott’s full name. But here all three riders were together in one recounting at last.

The Rev. Ezra Ripley’s 1827 History of the Fight at Concord stated:

Nothing very interesting occurred in the march of the British from Lexington to Concord. Intelligence had been given by Mr. Samuel Prescott, who had passed the evening at Lexington, and had seen and escaped the British officers on the road…

This book added little to the printed record about Prescott, but it showed that Ripley, the long-time town minister, accepted that he “had passed the evening at Lexington” and wasn’t just riding out on errands.

In 1835 Lemuel Shattuck was finally unabashed enough to drop a surname into his Concord history:

They [Revere and Dawes] had not travelled far before they were overtaken by Dr. Samuel Prescott of Concord, who had spent the evening at Lexington, at the house of Mr. Mulliken, to whose daughter he was paying his addresses; and having been alarmed, was hastening his return home. All rode on together, spreading the alarm at every house.

“Mr. Mulliken” was Nathaniel Mulliken, a well-known clockmaker. He died in 1767, but his widow and sons were carrying on that business in 1775. Their house was close to the road. British regulars were accused of looting and burning it on their return to Boston.

All that means there was a lot of documentation about the Mullikens. By the Bicentennial authors wanted this woman’s full name, and in the published town records they found an unmarried daughter who would be the right age for Dr. Samuel Prescott’s attention: Lydia Mulliken. The published town records say she was born in 1753 and baptized in 1752 (I’m pretty sure one of those figures is an error).

Back in 1824, the local newspaper assured readers that Dr. Samuel Prescott visiting his fiancée into the very early hours of 19 April “was the custom on such occasions in those days.” Lots of subsequent authors included similar comments. They read like either wink-wink-nudge-nudge hints those young people were canoodling or prim denials that they weren’t.

At his blog Historical Digression, Patrick Browne expressed some skepticism about the story of Dr. Prescott’s visit to his fiancée because it didn’t surface until decades after the event. That detail also fit easily into Colonial Revival sentimentality.

Browne noted an inaccuracy in Lemuel Shattuck’s history to show he wasn’t always reliable. However, that example shows Shattuck boosting Concord over another town, a typical flaw of local chronicles. That same closeness to Concord suggests Shattuck actually had reliable sources about Dr. Prescott and Mr. Mulliken’s daughter.

Furthermore, we now have the 1824 newspaper as an earlier source on the doctor visiting his betrothed.

In fact, Shattuck was more accurate about the fate of Samuel Prescott and Lydia Mulliken’s relationship than that article.

TOMORROW: Torn apart by war.

“Returning from Lexington before day light”

When Paul Revere described his ride with William Dawes to the Rev. Jeremy Belknap in 1798, he wrote: “We were overtaken by a young Docter Prescot, whom we found to be a high Son of Liberty.”

Revere wrote nothing about why Dr. Samuel Prescott was out on horseback in west Lexington after midnight.

In his 1824 History of the Battle of Lexington, Elias Phinney quoted Elijah Sanderson on how British army officers “attempted to stop a man on horseback, who, we immediately after understood, was Dr. Prescott’s son.”

Again, no reason given for young Prescott being out on the road at that time.

The first printed explanation for Prescott’s late night that I’ve found appeared that same year in the 24 Apr 1824 Concord Gazette and Middlesex Yeoman. In a 49th-anniversary retrospective on the opening battle of the Revolutionary War, that hometown newspaper stated:

The approach of the British army from Lexington, was known to the people of Concord at an early hour of the morning. This information was brought by Dr. SAMUEL PRESCOTT who was returning from Lexington before day light, (as was the custom on such occasions in those days) from a visit to the lady who afterwards became his wife.

He was met by the British advance guard near Mr. [Ephraim] HARTWELL’s in Lincoln, and in attempting to stop him a scuffle ensued, during which he had the reins of his horse’s bridle cut off; but being acquainted with the way, he jumped his horse over the fence, adjusted the bridle and came to Concord. Others who endeavored to get to Concord for the same purpose were stopped by the enemy.

Those unnamed ”others” included Revere, Sanderson, and their companions.

In recounting the British army search of Concord, the same article states:

One party went down the road to the house owned by the late ASA HEYWOOD, then occupied as a tavern. Suspicions were excited that young Dr. PRESCOTT was in the house; and as they considered him the principal cause of defeating the execution of their plan to take the town by surprise, they sought his life. He was aware of their intentions and secreted himself in a hole beside the chimney in the garret, and eluded their search. They broke the windows of the house and left it.

That anecdote is obviously based on the experience of Samuel Prescott’s older brother Abel, as recounted here. Both brothers had been physicians and impromptu alarm riders who died decades earlier, so it’s understandable for local lore to conflate them.

(I’m not sure if Asa Heywood, who had died earlier in 1824, ever owned the house where Jonathan Heywood’s widow Rebecca was living in 1775, or whether it was then a tavern, but I’m just not up to sorting through real estate records of Heywoods in Concord.)

There were other errors in the newspaper’s account, such as a claim that Lt. Col. Francis Smith was wounded in the fight (true) and “died in a few days” (false).

Nonetheless, this article is significant as the earliest statement that Dr. Samuel Prescott was out late visiting his fiancée on 18 April.

TOMORROW: More details emerge.