Chapter Three-The Long Hot Summer
I am indebted to Kinvin Wroth and his fellow editors for the t.i.tle of this chapter; part 3 of volume 1 of their compilation of primary sources in PIR is ent.i.tled "Long Hot Summer: June 18Sept. 28, 1774." The reference to "an attack upon one colony was an attack upon all" is in Edmund Burnett, The Continental Congress, p. 20. Robert Treat Paine, in a 1795 note in the Robert Treat Paine Papers, MHS, recounts how in June 1774 he contributed to Samuel Adams"s plan to prevent Daniel Leonard from interfering with the selection of delegates for the Continental Congress. William Hanna includes an account of the Paine-Leonard incident in his History of Taunton, pp. 100101. Ralph Davol in Two Men of Taunton tells the story of Daniel Leonard, Thomas Hutchinson, and the Tory pear tree, pp. 2089. On Daniel Leonard, see the biography in James Henry Stark, The Loyalists of Ma.s.sachusetts, pp. 32532. Gage"s proclamation dissolving the General Court on June 17, 1774, is in Journals of the House of Representatives of Ma.s.sachusetts, vol. 5 (177374,) p. 291. Thomas Young describes the gathering of "very important and agreeable company" at Joseph Warren"s house in a June 19, 1774, letter cited by Richard Frothingham in his Life of Joseph Warren (LJW), p. 325. In addition to Frothingham"s biography of Warren, there is John Cary, Joseph Warren: Physician, Politician, and Patriot, and Samuel A. Forman, Dr. Joseph Warren (DJW). As in many matters relating to Joseph Warren, I am indebted both to Forman"s book and to my correspondence with Forman since his book"s publication; Forman provided me with input on Warren"s eye color in a March 1, 2012, e-mail. In Paul Revere Esther Forbes writes of Warren, "He had a mobile face ... and the "fine color" so much admired. In his portrait his hair is powdered, but his coloring and even the shape of his face suggest he was very blond" (p. 66). Warren"s account and ledger books (the first for 176368, the second running from May 3, 1774, to May 8, 1775) are at the MHS. The ledger book provides almost a daily record of the patients he saw and what he prescribed for each of them; his first mention of "Miss Mercy Scollay" is on May 30, 1774.
Forman a.n.a.lyzes Warren"s medical practice in DJW, pp. 1078, 33544; he also provides a physician"s perspective on Warren"s possession of "the touch": "that ephemeral human quality enabling [a physician] to connect with patients in a way that, quite aside from treatments we would view as archaic, made people feel at ease, confident and healed. It is much more than the placebo effect of a sugared pill, rather a human and humane interaction depending on communication, compa.s.sion, and a transmittable confidence that a health condition, no matter how grave, could be dealt with in the best possible way" (pp. 8889). J. P. Jewett in The Hundred Boston Orators refers to the position of Warren"s pew ("opposite the old southern door, in the body of the house") at the Brattle Street Meetinghouse; he also mentions that in 1835, when the site of Warren"s house on Hanover Street was excavated, "wired skulls, from his anatomical room, were discovered" (p. 48). Forman in DJW cites William Gordon"s claim that Warren was "judged handsome by the ladies," p. 179; he also speculates that Warren and Hooten"s first child was conceived out of wedlock, p. 182.
Samuel Forman hypothesizes that the John Singleton Copley painting t.i.tled Lady in a Blue Dress at the Terra Foundation for American Art in Chicago is that of Mercy Scollay at age twenty-two (DJW, p. 379). Edward Warren, the son of Joseph Warren"s younger brother John, describes Mercy Scollay as "a woman of great energy and depth of character" in his Life of John Warren, M.D., p. 87. The poem "On Female Vanity" appears in the June 1774 issue of Isaiah Thomas"s Royal American Magazine. In an introduction that precedes the poem, Thomas explains how he came to publish the poem: "I was lately in a company, where the conversation turned to the non-consumption agreement... . One of the company desired a lady to give him a list of the necessaries of life for a fine lady, and she soon sent him an elegant copy of verses; which falling into my hands I enclose to you." "On Female Vanity" appears under the t.i.tle "To the Hon. J. Winthrop, Esq." in Mercy Otis Warren"s 1790 collection Poems, Dramatic and Miscellaneous. My thanks to J. L. Bell for identifying Mercy Otis Warren as the poem"s author. In a September 27, 1774, letter to Mercy Otis Warren, Hannah Winthrop repeats the rumor that the poem was written by Mercy Scollay and that Joseph Warren was "the gentleman who requested it" (in Warren-Adams Letters, 1:33).
The June 2728, 1774, town meeting minutes are in Boston Town Records, 17701777, pp. 17780. Richard D. Brown in Revolutionary Politics in Ma.s.sachusetts includes a detailed account of the town meeting and cites Jonathan Williams"s letter describing the meeting"s first day and the fact that there were "many people just idle enough to attend"; Brown writes, "The test revealed the limits of the Boston committee"s capacity for political leadership ... always resting on continuous public consent rather than any formal, inst.i.tutionalized authority" (pp. 19699). John Andrews"s account of the meeting is in a July 22, 1774, entry in LJA, pp. 33032. See also Stephen Patterson, Political Parties in Revolutionary Boston, pp. 8385. John Rowe writes of the overwhelming vote in favor of the Committee of Correspondence in the June 28 entry of his Diary, p. 277. Gage complains of the "timidity and backwardness" of the loyalists in a July 5, 1774, letter to Dartmouth, in Correspondence of Thomas Gage, p. 359. The June 1774 propaganda sheet inviting the soldiers to desert is in the Gage Papers at the Clements Library. Thomas Hutchinson writes of Gage"s unsettling letter to his wife in an August 20, 1774, entry in his Diary, 1:22324. John Rowe records the arrival of Admiral Graves, General Percy, and the Fifth and Thirty-Eighth regiments in his Diary, p. 277. One of the best portraits of Percy during his time in Boston, even if heightened by more than a few fictional flourishes, is provided by Harold Murdock"s Earl Percy"s Dinner Table. Of note to J. K. Rowling fans, the Percy ancestral estate known as Alnwick Castle in Northumberland served as Hogwarts in the first two Harry Potter films. Lieutenant Williams of the Twenty-Third Regiment writes of the large number of prost.i.tutes in Boston in a June 12, 1775, entry in his Journal: "Perhaps no town of its size could turn out more wh.o.r.es than this could. They have left us an ample sample of them" (p. 5). Mount Wh.o.r.edom appears on several British maps of Boston made during the siege. John Andrews refers to the incident at Mrs. Erskine"s and the violent encounter after that, as well as to Percy"s attempts to see that justice was done, in an August 1, 1774, entry in LJA, pp. 33335.
The many letters chronicling the donations to Boston are contained in "Correspondence, in 17741775, between a committee of the town of Boston and contributors of donations for the relief of the sufferers by the Boston Port Bill," in MHS Collections, 4th ser., 4:1275. John Andrews mentions the donations from South Carolina, Marblehead, and Connecticut and the public works projects in an August 1, 1774, letter in LJA, p. 337; he complains of how "middling people" are the ones on whom "the burthen falls heaviest," in an August 20 letter, p. 344. The Ma.s.sachusetts Government and Justice Acts as they were received by Gage are reprinted in PIR, 1:50619; in a postscript to Gage (also in PIR, 1:51922), Lord Dartmouth appended the recently pa.s.sed (on June 2, 1774) Quartering Act. On the Quebec Act, see chapter 6, "The Problem of Quebec," in Peter Thomas"s Tea Party to Independence: The Third Phase of the American Revolution, pp. 88117. John Andrews describes how Parliament"s punitive acts "encouraged the sons of freedom to persevere ... and confirmed the lukewarm that were staggering" in an August 25 letter; he tells how "every denomination of people" disapproved of Lord North in an August 11 letter; both in LJA, pp. 347, 341. Thomas Young"s August 19, 1774, letter to Samuel Adams about the huge volume of correspondence being received by the committee is cited by Richard Frothingham in LJW, p. 343.
Joseph Warren"s reference to the "glorious stands" appears in the October 7, 1765, issue of the Boston Gazette under the byline "B. W." Following up on an identification provided by Warren"s contemporary Harbottle Dorr, Warren biographer John Cary finds "stylistic characteristics" that confirm the piece as Warren"s, especially the "inordinate number of imperative sentences charging the people to action," in Joseph Warren, p. 43. Frothingham in LJW, p. 405, reprints Warren"s "A Song of Liberty," which was sung to the tune of "The British Grenadier." The loyalist Peter Oliver in OPAR claims that Warren"s earlier financial problems were solved by marrying "a tolerable sum of money; he also took administration on part of a gentleman"s estate which he appropriated to his own use" (p. 128). This is a reference to Warren"s curious role as court-appointed administrator of the estate of the merchant Nathaniel Wheelwright, whose bankruptcy in 1765 proved the financial undoing of many Boston merchants, including John Scollay, father to Mercy. Wheelwright left Boston and died of yellow fever in Guadeloupe in 1766, and in 1767, Warren became administrator of the Wheelwright estate; see J. L. Bell, "A Bankruptcy in Boston, 1765," Ma.s.sachusetts Banker, fourth quarter, 2008, pp. 14, 16, 18, 23. Peter Oliver also makes the claim that by 1774, Warren"s devotion to the patriot cause "had reduced his finances to a very low ebb. He was now forced to strike any bold stroke that offered" (OPAR, p. 128). According to Edward Warren, in Life of John Warren, p. 33, Joseph Warren "was of a free and liberal disposition, and never acquired any rigid notions of economy"; Edward Warren also describes Joseph Warren"s copartnership with James Latham, "surgeon in the King"s or 8th Regiment of foot" to erect a smallpox hospital at Point Shirley in Chelsea (p. 21), adding, "It is certainly curious to see Joseph Warren at this time, July 1774, forming a partnership for 21 years with a surgeon in his majesty"s regiment of foot... . It is very certain that [he did not have] any idea or wish at this time for a separation from the mother country" (pp. 4041). In a letter written to John Hanc.o.c.k on May 21, 1776, Mercy Scollay refers to Warren"s partnership in the hospital as a possible source of income for his now orphaned children, who "might be benefited by their father"s part of the profits" (at CHS). Joseph Warren insists "that nothing is more foreign from our hearts than a spirit of rebellion" in an early June letter to Charles Thompson cited by Richard Frothingham in LJW, p. 332. Mercy Scollay"s sister Priscilla and her husband, Thomas Melvill, were destined to become the grandparents of the novelist Herman Melville, whose father added a final e to the family name.
John Andrews writes of the financial help Samuel Adams received to prepare him for the Continental Congress and the departure of the delegates in the entries for August 10 and 11 in LJA, pp. 33940. On Charles Lee and his visit to Boston in August 1774, see John Richard Alden"s General Charles Lee, Traitor or Patriot? pp. 160. Samuel Adams Drake in Old Boston Taverns writes that the young George Washington stayed at the Cromwell"s Head Tavern in Boston, the same place where decades later Charles Lee stayed (pp. 4445). Lee"s August 6, 1774, letter to Gage is in PIR, 1:59395. William Cutter writes of the legendary exploits of Israel Putnam in The Life of Israel Putnam, pp. 33127. Alden in General Charles Lee cites Thomas Young"s letter to Samuel Adams about Lee"s discussions with British officers and his leave-taking from Boston (p. 59).
John Andrews refers to the Government Act as "a blank piece of paper" while chronicling the news from the western portion of the province during August 1774 in LJA, pp. 34349. Richard Brown also writes of the increasing political activity in the western counties that summer in Revolutionary Politics in Ma.s.sachusetts, pp. 21220. Ray Raphael provides an excellent account of Ma.s.sachusetts"s response to the Government Act during the summer and fall of 1774 in The First American Revolution, insisting that "it was the Ma.s.sachusetts Government Act, not the Boston Port Act, which led common people throughout the colony to take decisive action" (p. 222). John Andrews writes of Daniel Leonard"s problems in Taunton and Gage"s standoff with the Salem Committee of Correspondence over the town meeting issue, as well as the town of Danvers"s outrageous challenge to his authority in the August 24, 25, 26, and 29 entries of LJA, pp. 34648. Gage writes that "conciliating, moderation, reasoning [are] over" in a September 2, 1774, letter to Dartmouth; see Gage Correspondence, pp. 36972. Robert Gross describes the divisions and resource challenges faced by the towns of Ma.s.sachusetts in the first half of the eighteenth century and how resistance to Great Britain brought an unprecedented consensus to the region in The Minutemen and Their World, pp. 60108. On Joseph Hawley"s role in the Northampton controversies in the aftermath of the Great Awakening, see Peter Shaw"s American Patriots and the Rituals of Revolution, pp. 13152. Samuel Quincy"s June 1, 1774, letter to his brother Josiah is in Josiah Quincy"s Memoir of the Life of Josiah Quincy Junior, pp. 16064. John Andrews"s description of Gage and his entourage near the common is in his letter of August 31, LJA, pp. 34950.
Chapter Four-The Alarm
On the history of the militia system in New England, see Fred Anderson, A People"s Army, pp. 2628. Peter Oliver writes of the Indian scalps "waving in the wind" and of "savage" being "convertible" in OPAR, pp. 13233. John Adams and James Otis represented the Marblehead fisherman who harpooned a British officer; see Adams"s Diary, 1:348; see Hiller Zobel"s Boston Ma.s.sacre for a detailed discussion of the case, pp. 11331. David Hackett Fischer writes of New Englanders within twenty miles of the sea bringing their weapons with them to meeting every Sunday in Albion"s Seeds, p. 120. On the importance of gunpowder to the colonies see the chapter "The Value of Gunpowder" in Robert Richmond"s Powder Alarm 1774, pp. 3745. The search for alternative supplies of gunpowder may have been why the patriot merchant John Winthrop Jr. (aka Joyce Junior) was reported to be "strolling in the West Indies" in the spring of 1775; see MHS Proceedings, 2nd ser., 12 (189798): 142. In addition to Richmond"s Powder Alarm, Patrick Johnston provides a helpful a.n.a.lysis of the importance of the Alarm to the events preceding Lexington and Concord in "Building to a Revolution: The Powder Alarm and Popular Mobilization of the New England Countryside, 17741775."
On William Brattle, see Clifford Shipton"s biographical essay in SHG, 7:1023. John Andrews describes how by "chance or design" Brattle"s letter slipped from Gage"s pocket and the repercussions of the letter (which he quotes from) becoming public knowledge in a September 1 letter in LJA, pp. 35051. Richmond reprints Brattle"s letter in Powder Alarm, pp. 5152. John Andrews writes of the "conjectures" about the troop activity in the September 1 entry of LJA, p. 350. On the history of Ten Hills Farm, see C. S. Manegold"s Ten Hills Farm, pp. 3101. Accounts of the British operation to take the powder from the Quarry Hill a.r.s.enal and what came to be called the Powder Alarm appear in the September 5, 1774, Boston Gazette and John Andrews"s September 1, 2, and 3 letters in LJA, pp. 35053. Benjamin Hallowell"s September 5, 1774, letter to Grey Cooper, as well as Thomas Gage"s September 2, 1774, letter to Lord Dartmouth and Thomas Oliver"s September 3, 1774, letter to Dartmouth, are in DAR, 8:18791, 17982, 18284. McNeil"s firsthand account of the Alarm is in Ezra Stiles" Literary Diary, 1:47683. Thomas Young"s September 4, 1774, letter to Samuel Adams is in the Adams Papers at the Ma.n.u.scripts and Archives Division, NYPL, Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations. Joseph Warren"s September 4, 1774, letter to Samuel Adams is reprinted in Frothingham"s LJW, pp. 35557.
Peter Oliver writes of Joseph Warren"s youth as "a bare legged milk boy to furnish the Boston market" (OPAR, p. 128). Joseph Warren"s youngest brother John was two years old at the time of their father"s death; John"s son Edward writes in The Life of John Warren, M.D., "The sight of his father"s body borne home to the house, made an impression upon his mind at this early age which was never effaced" (p. 4). Edward Warren even claims that "the fearful scene which he witnessed in childhood" later motivated John Warren to become a doctor (p. 12). Nathaniel Ames records three different performances of Cato "acted at Warren"s Cham[ber]": on July 3, 1758; on July 6 ("to perfection"); and on July 14 ("Cato more perfect than before"); Ames, Diary, p. 14. Samuel Forman in DJW writes of Warren"s speculative involvement with the militia company at Harvard (pp. 4041). J. P. Jewett in The Hundred Boston Orators, pp. 4748, recounts the rainspout incident, as does Samuel Knapp in Biographical Sketches of Eminent Lawyers, Statesmen, and Men of Letters; Knapp claims he was told of the incident by "a spectator of this feat" who "related this fact to me in the college yard, nearly half a century afterwards, and the impression it made on his mind was so strong, that he seemed to feel the same emotion, as though it happened but an hour before" (pp. 1078). Samuel Forman in DJW writes about the s.p.u.n.kers and cites the November 17, 1773, letter of William Eustis (who was one of Joseph Warren"s apprentices) to John Warren, describing how he and fellow s.p.u.n.kers competed with another group of medical students for the body of Levi Ames (pp. 3536). Forman believes that Warren"s rainspout incident may have been related to his s.p.u.n.kers activities; while I"m not sure the evidence warrants that specific speculation, I agree with Forman that Warren"s a.s.sociation with the s.p.u.n.kers "suggests ... a tolerance of illegality and secrecy, if such is in the service of a higher good" (p. 39). John Cary in Joseph Warren writes in detail about Warren"s activities during the 1764 smallpox epidemic (pp. 2123); as does Forman, pp. 5561, who also describes Warren"s activities with the masons (pp. 10925). John Eliot in his Biographical Dictionary writes of how the North End Caucus was "guided by the prudence and skillful management of Dr. Warren"; he also writes of "the secret springs that moved the great wheels" (p. 472). See William Tudor, The Life of James Otis, for yet another account of Warren"s involvement in this secret political group (pp. 46162). Samuel Knapp in Biographical Sketches of Eminent Lawyers, Statesmen, and Men of Letters writes of how Warren had "the wisdom to guide, and the power to charm"; he also writes that Warren "could discern the signs of the times, and mold the ductile materials to his will, and at the same time seem only to follow in the path of others" (p. 111).
In a July 25, 1773, letter to Samuel Danforth, Benjamin Franklin writes of Danforth"s supposed discovery of the Philosopher"s Stone: "I rejoice ... in your kind intentions of including me in the benefits of that inestimable stone, which curing all diseases (even old age itself) will enable us to see the future glorious state of our America... . I antic.i.p.ate the jolly conversations we and twenty more of our friends may have in a hundred years hence on this subject," Memoirs of the Life and Writings of Benjamin Franklin, vol. 2 (London: Colburn, 1818), pp. 1314. The p.r.o.nunciation of Danforth as "Danfurt" is mentioned by Clifford Shipton in his biographical essay in SHG, 14:250. On Benjamin Hallowell, see Sandra Webber"s "Benjamin Hallowell Family and the Jamaica Plain House." In addition to the previously cited letter to Grey Cooper, Hallowell describes being chased back to Boston in a detailed September 8, 1774, letter to Gage (PIR, 1:60912). John Andrews relates that Hallowell, one of the two customs commissioners "born among ourselves," was responsible for the unnecessarily harsh interpretation of the Boston Port Bill in an August 2 letter in LJA, pp. 33637. On Thomas Oliver, see Clifford Shipton"s essay in SHG, 13:33644. Joseph Warren writes of "the little matters in which we are engaged" in his September 4, 1774, letter to Samuel Adams in Frothingham"s LJW, p. 356; Frothingham also reprints Adams"s September 25, 1774, letter to Warren in which he refers to the suspicions concerning New England at the Continental Congress and the fear that Ma.s.sachusetts wants "a total independency" (pp. 37778).
My account of the effect of the Powder Alarm and the Suffolk Resolves on the first Continental Congress in Philadelphia is based in large part on Edmund Cody Burnett, The Continental Congress, pp. 3946, which cites the quotations from Silas Deane and John Adams. Jack Rakove writes insightfully about the Congress"s response to the Suffolk Resolves and the move toward moderation after their endors.e.m.e.nt in The Beginnings of National Politics, pp. 4549. The text of the Suffolk Resolves appears in PIR, 2:91420. On Paul Revere"s role as "the Mercury of the American Revolution," see David Hackett Fischer, Paul Revere"s Ride, pp. 2628; as Fischer states, Revere, whom a loyalist described as a patriot "amba.s.sador," was "less than an amba.s.sador, but more than merely a messenger" (p. 28). John Andrews provides a day-by-day account of the measures Gage took to defend Boston from a possible incursion from the country that includes the anecdotes about the marksmen and giant from the country; Andrews also writes of the outflow of weapons and the stealing of cannons, both by land and water, and Gage"s frustrations with building barracks for his soldiers (LJA, pp. 35574), and of the decision of Admiralty Court that the navy "had no right ... to stop or molest any boats carrying merchandise," in a November 21 letter (p. 386).
Walter McDougall in Freedom Just Around the Corner writes of Americans being on average two inches taller than Europeans (p. 124). Vincent Kehoe in We Were There! points out that "there were few [among the regulars] who were old soldiers enough to be called veterans," and that it had been more than twelve years since any of them had seen action (p. 9). Nathaniel Appleton recounts the conversation between two Louisbourg veterans about the fortifications on the Neck in a November 15, 1774, letter to Josiah Quincy Jr., in Memoir of Josiah Quincy Jr., pp. 2023. As John Galvin writes in The Minute Men, the concept of the minuteman dated back to the French and Indian War (p. 33). The incident involving William Dawes, the cannon, and Joseph Warren was told by Dawes"s granddaughter and is in Henry Holland"s William Dawes and His Ride with Paul Revere, p. 37. William Tudor also speaks of the theft of two cannon from the gun house beside the common in The Life of James Otis, pp. 45255. John Andrews chronicles the sufferings and death of large numbers of British soldiers, specifically commenting on how fatal the rum distilleries proved to be when used as barracks: "the smell of the lees in the cisterns added to their urine, has caused an infectious distemper among "em, whereby two or three have dropped down dead of a day," in LJA, pp. 38993. Major John Pitcairn writes that rum "will destroy more of us than the Yankees will" in a March 4, 1775, letter to Lord Sandwich, printed in Naval Doc.u.ments of the American Revolution (subsequently referred to as NDAR), edited by William Bell Clark, 1:125. Andrews writes of the execution of the soldier on the common and of how repeated whippings meant that "their ribs are laid quite bare," as well as of the fieldpiece in the center of town "to be fired in case of a mutiny," in LJA, pp. 357, 397, 393. Gage tells of his difficulties throughout the fall in letters to Dartmouth, which climax with his plea for an army of twenty thousand men in an October 20, 1774, communication in Correspondence, p. 383.
Joseph Warren compares the delegates at the Provincial Congress to "an a.s.sembly of Spartans or ancient Romans" in a November 21, 1774, letter in Frothingham"s LJW, pp. 34649. In an October 16, 1774, letter to Samuel Adams, John Pitts writes that he is "informed by a member of the congress that the Boston Committee are by far the most moderate men," Samuel Adams Papers, Ma.n.u.scripts and Archives Division, NYPL, Astor, Lenox, and Tilden Foundations. Joseph Warren"s letters to and from Samuel Adams, in which he seeks his advice about the best course to take that fall (and refers to being "rapacious for the intelligence"), are reprinted in Frothingham"s LJW, pp. 35558, 37578, 38182. Forman in DJW writes of Warren witnessing Josiah Quincy Jr."s last will and testament (p. 100). In his description of Dr. Thomas Young"s exit from Boston, Ray Raphael in Founders cites Young"s letter to Samuel Adams in which he describes his wife"s "terrors" (pp. 14649). J. L. Bell outlines the shadowy circ.u.mstances surrounding William Molineux"s death in "A Bankruptcy in Boston, 1765," in Ma.s.sachusetts Banker, fourth quarter, 2008, p. 26. John Rowe describes Molineux as the "first leader of dirty matters" in an October 24 entry in his Diary, p. 286. In a letter of January 1, 1798, to "the Corresponding Secretary," Paul Revere writes of his memories of Benjamin Church (pp. 10612). John Boyle tells of the bells ringing in Boston to celebrate the return of the delegates from the Continental Congress on November 9, 1774, in his Journal, p. 381.
Chapter Five-The Unnatural Contest
On the taking of the powder and armaments at Portsmouth, see Elwin Page, "The King"s Powder, 1774," pp. 8392; Charles Parsons, "Capture of Fort William and Mary, December 14 and 15, 1774," pp. 1847; and Thomas Kehr"s "The Seizure of ... Fort William and Henry," As David Hackett Fischer writes in Paul Revere"s Ride, "Revere"s intelligence was not entirely correct" (p. 54). Fischer rightly points out that the incident was an embarra.s.sment to Gage. Ultimately, however, it may have worked in Gage"s favor in that the attack came to be perceived by many colonists as an overreaction given that Gage had not yet decided to send troops to Fort William and Mary. As Gage writes to Dartmouth on January 18, 1775, "We hear from New Hampshire that the people who were concerned in the rash action against Fort William and Mary ... are terrified at what they have done, and only anxious to obtain pardon for their office" (Correspondence, p. 390). John Andrews writes of the extraction of Plymouth Rock in an October 6 letter in LJA, pp. 37374; see also my Mayflower, pp. 35051. William Hanna in A History of Taunton writes of how a flag with the slogan "Liberty and Union" was raised on a 112-foot liberty pole on Taunton Green on October 21, 1774, pp. 1045. On Jesse Dunbar and the ox, see Justin Winsor"s History of Duxbury, pp. 12346. Peter Oliver provides a stirring overview of the abuses suffered by the loyalists in the countryside in his OPAR, pp. 15257. See also the article in Rivington"s Gazette, March 9, 1775. On Timothy Ruggles, see James Stark, The Loyalists of Ma.s.sachusetts, pp. 22529.
For the Daniel LeonardJohn Adams newspaper exchange during the winter of 1775, see Tracts of the American Revolution, edited by Merrill Jensen, pp. 277349. Gage"s January 18, 1775, letter to Dartmouth is in Correspondence, p. 390; Gage writes of the encouraging developments in Marshfield in a January 27, 1775, letter, p. 391. Ray Raphael in The First American Revolution writes insightfully about the loss of momentum suffered by the patriots in the winter of 1775: "Once local Tories had been defeated, the patriots ... began to show signs of division," p. 187, and quotes from Ephraim Doolittle"s March 21, 1775, letter to John Hanc.o.c.k, p. 189. In a November 25, 1774, letter to Josiah Quincy Jr., James Lovell writes of how the fortifications at the Neck have been whitewashed and how ""tis boasted they are as strong as those of Gibraltar," in Memoir of Josiah Quincy, pp. 47879. On Frederick Haldimand, see Alan French"s "General Haldimand in Boston," MHS Proceedings, pp. 8095. John Andrew provides a detailed account of Haldimand"s encounter with the coasting boys of Boston and Gage"s response in a January 29 letter in LJA, pp. 39899. John Andrews reports that Gage"s own officers refer to him as "an old woman," in a March 18 letter in LJA, p. 401; he writes of Gage"s coolness to the refugee loyalists in a November 19 letter, p. 386; he writes scathingly of the British marines in a December 30 letter, p. 392.
Gage and Graves"s feuding over the marines is chronicled in NDAR, pp. 12327; Gage"s March 6, 1775, letter to Graves complaining of how his naval blockade turned away provisions intended for the troops is also in NDAR, p. 128. A December 13, 1775, letter published in the January 17, 1776, issue of London"s Morning Post and Daily Advertiser claims that the feud between Gage and Graves "first originated with their wives; both of whom led their husbands," in Letters on the American Revolution (LAR), edited by Margaret Willard, p. 238. Major James Wemyss claimed that Gage "was governed by his wife, a handsome American," in "Character Sketches of Gage, Percy and Others," Sparks Papers, Harvard University, xxii, 214. In his Diary, Lieutenant John Barker tells of Margaret Gage"s subscription "scheme" for the ball in January as well as the February ball attended by both the Gages and the Graveses, pp. 1924; he also writes of the Gage-Graves squabble over the marines, p. 15. Hannah Mather Crocker writes nostalgically of "The Last Queen"s Ball" in Observation on the Real Rights of Women and Other Writings, pp. 16162.
Frothingham writes of Joseph Warren"s role on the Committee of Safety in LJW, pp. 38991. The huge numbers of supplies deposited in Concord are listed in Diaries and Letters of William Emerson, edited by Amelia Forbes Emerson, p. 60. John Andrews reports on how the "quant.i.ties that are barreled up" have contributed to the "dearness of provisions among us" in Boston, in LJA, pp. 39495. Edward Warren in Life of John Warren claimed that Joseph Warren "induced his brothers Eben and John to appropriate a large portion of their small paternal estate" to help purchase gunpowder for the provincial army (p. 33); he includes the letters between Joseph and John during January and February 1775 in which Joseph attempts to convince his younger brother to take out a note of 200 pounds to Dr. Greenleaf (pp. 3436, 4142), and comments, "Like other people of ardent disposition, [Joseph Warren] does not look forward to what might happen even within six months" (p. 42). Samuel Forman in DJW doc.u.ments Warren"s April 4, 1775, purchase of medical supplies from Greenleaf with 20 percent in cash (p. 266). Paul Revere tells of "a gentleman who had connections with the tory part but was a whig at heart" and who acquainted him with the existence of a spy, in "A Letter ... to the Corresponding Secretary," p. 106. On Henry Knox and his involvement in patriot spying efforts, see Mark Puls, Henry Knox, pp. 2023. The January 3, 1775, letter in which Josiah Quincy writes to his son Josiah Jr. in England recounting the intelligence concerning the miserable morale of the British soldiers and sailors is in Memoir of Josiah Quincy, pp. 21215. Paul Revere writes of the spy network he was involved with that met regularly at the Green Dragon Tavern in "A Letter ... to the Corresponding Secretary," p. 106.
Joseph Warren describes Gage being of "honest, upright principles" in a November 21, 1774, letter to Josiah Quincy Jr. in Frothingham"s LJW, p. 395. Samuel Forman writes of how Warren formed an alliance with British traveling masonic lodges so that his own St. Andrew"s could achieve grand lodge status (DJW, pp. 11625). Joseph Warren"s April 20, 1775, letter to Gage, in which he wishes he had "told you all I knew or thought of public affairs," is in PIR, 3:192526.
On Benjamin Church, see Clifford Shipton"s essay in SHG, 13:38098; and Revere"s "Letter to ... the Corresponding Secretary," pp. 11011. In just about every issue of the Boston Gazette in 1774 Benjamin Church"s auctioneer father ran an advertis.e.m.e.nt. On Benjamin Church as the Indian fighter in King Philip"s War, see my Mayflower, especially p. 358. Alan French was the first to doc.u.ment Dr. Benjamin Church"s role as a spy; see General Gage"s Informers, pp. 147201. French writes that when it came to Gage"s decision to send troops to Salem in February, he "was strongly influenced by his secret information" (p. 25). Although Church does not identify himself as the source of each specific report, his role as a delegate in the Provincial Congress and stylistic similarities to his earlier and later writings have led me to identify him as the author of the reports that are attributed to him in the text. The March 4, 1775, "Intelligence of Military Preparations in Ma.s.sachusetts" is reprinted in DAR, 8:6366. The report filed by Brown and DeBerniere is in an appendix to "The Diary of Lieutenant John Barker," in Journal of the Society of Army Historical Research, pp. 17074. George Nash, in "From Radicalism to Revolution: The Political Career of Josiah Quincy, Jr.," writes of Quincy"s ever-changing views when in London during the fall and winter of 17741775 (pp. 26685), as do Daniel Coquillette and Neil Longley York in Portrait of a Patriot (1:3576), which contains the edition of Quincy"s London Journal from which I quote in the text (1:22369). Concerning North"s "Conciliatory Proposition," Peter Thomas in Tea Party to Independence writes that "North evidently believed that he had found a permanent solution to the imperial crisis" (pp. 199200); Thomas also cites Thomas Hutchinson"s optimistic letter to his son (p. 218). Dartmouth"s January 27, 1775, letter to Gage is in DAR, 3:3741.
My account of Joseph Warren"s Ma.s.sacre Day Oration is based on the following sources: two letters written by Samuel Adams on March 12 and 21, 1775, in Writings, 3:15455, 16062; Thomas Hutchinson"s conversation with Colonel James, who attended the oration, as recorded in Hutchinson"s Diary for Sept. 6, 1775, 1:52829; Lieutenant John Barker"s Diary, March 6, 1775, pp. 2526; Frederick Mackenzie"s Diary, March 6, 1775, pp. 3639; the March 16, 1775, issue of Rivington"s New York Gazetteer; and J. P. Jewett"s biography of Joseph Warren in The Hundred Boston Orators, pp. 5960. Eran Shalev"s "Dr. Warren"s Ciceronian Toga: Performing Rebellion in Revolutionary Boston" provides a useful a.n.a.lysis of the cla.s.sical resonances of Warren"s oration; the ma.n.u.script version is in the John Collins Warren Papers at MHS. The reference to Warren"s "true puritanical whine" is in Thomas Bolton"s "Oration." Samuel Forman in DJW writes that Warren"s description of the fallen husband and father was "recalled for him from his father"s untimely death" (p. 62); Forman also points out that the dramatic paragraph in which Warren refers to "fields of blood" was "written as an insertion on a separate piece of paper" (p. 234). According to David Hackett Fischer in Paul Revere"s Ride, "In the New England dialect with its lost postvocalic r"s, "Fie! Fie!" sounded like "Fire! Fire!" " (p. 70).
Thomas Ditson"s account of the events leading up to and including his tarring and feathering by the soldiers appears as a footnote in JEPC, pp. 13133. When it came to the complaints about Ditson, John Andrews recorded that Gage was "greatly disgusted with their remonstrance (being a very spirited one) but finally dismissed them with every a.s.surance of protection from danger"; March 18, 1775, letter in LJA, p. 400, which also contains Andrews"s description of Bolton"s oration. A ma.n.u.script version of Bolton"s "Oration" is at MHS. Bolton wasn"t the only one pointing out the moral duplicity of the patriots; in Bodies Politics: Negotiating Race in the American North, John Wood Sweet cites a British play performed during the Boston occupation in which a black prost.i.tute named Fanfan "rebukes ostensibly chaste Sons of Liberty, for their hypocrisy: "Tho" in public you scoff, / I see many a spark, / Would tink me sweet pretty / Girl in the Dark" " (p. 149). John Rowe complains of being mentioned in Bolton"s "Oration" in a March 15, 1775, entry of his Diary, p. 290. John Andrews writes of his "irascibility rising" in a March 18, 1775, letter in LJA, p. 401. Sanborn C. Brown writes about Mary Dill Thomas"s affair with Benjamin Thompson and quotes her claim that "she would roast in h.e.l.l rather than give him up" in Benjamin Thompson, Count Rumford, pp. 3536.
Robert Brand Hanson, editor of Nathaniel Ames"s Diary, published in 1998, was the first to make the link between Warren"s "incognita pregnans" and Sally Edwards (p. 278). Samuel Forman in DJW expands upon that identification by noting that Mercy Scollay later referred to Sally Edwards as a "little hussy" and "vixen" in letters written to Mrs. Dix on July 27, 1776, and November 26, 1776 (CHS, pp. 185, 189). Having independently identified that a Sally Edwards who turned thirteen in 1774 later married the eldest son of Paul Revere (which is not mentioned in Forman"s book), I asked Forman if he had explored that connection, and he generously shared with me that he had indeed made the possible identification, in a personal communication, February 23, 2012. Whether or not she was the same Sally Edwards who eventually married a son of Paul Revere, it appears almost certain that at some point in September 1774, Joseph Warren got a young woman named Sally Edwards pregnant. An alternative explanation could be that Warren had arranged obstetrical care for a friend. Maintaining the unwed mother and child on Warren"s account after his death might have been a way to shield the ident.i.ty of the true father, who was not Warren. My description of medical practices in the colonial era depends on Lester King, The Medical World of the Eighteenth Century, and Forman in DJW, pp. 4553. Forman points out that ipecac had uses in the eighteenth century beyond treatment for poisoning, since it was "a common prescription for reducing pathologic levels of the humor choler by way of the gastrointestinal tract" (p. 49). When it comes to why Warren prescribed ipecac to Scollay in September 1774, he writes, "I cannot identify the disease ent.i.ty in modern terms, though it involved close follow-up and hands-on care" (p. 394), including the application of a neck plaster the day after Scollay visited Warren twice in a single day.
John Barker writes of the March 30 expedition with Percy"s brigade in his Diary, pp. 2728. Frothingham tells of the reaction to Percy"s expedition in LJW, pp. 44647. Joseph Warren tells of the incident in an April 3, 1775, letter to Arthur Lee, LJW, pp. 44748. The Provincial Congress"s March 30 resolve regarding "artillery and baggage" is cited in John H. Scheide, "The Lexington Alarm," p. 60. As early as March 30, 1775, Gage was receiving intelligence reports about "several grand debates ... in this committee such as fixing a criterion for a.s.sembling the militia together, the manner how the alarm is to be given, and the place where the counties are to a.s.semble" (PIR, 3:1976); on April 3 he learned that "should any body of troops, with artillery and baggage march out of Boston, the country would instantly be alarmed and called together to oppose their march to the last extremity" (p. 1977).
Chapter Six-The Trick to See It
Joseph Warren"s April 8, 1775, letter to Arthur Lee, in which he recounts how he used the information in Lee"s December 21, 1774, letter to shake the Provincial Congress out of the "state of security into which many have endeavored to lull them," is in LJW, pp. 44748. Samuel Knapp in Biographical Sketches writes of how Warren had been preparing himself "for several years ... to take a conspicuous rank in the military" (pp. 11516). Edward Warren in Life of John Warren tells of how Warren"s father insisted that his son Joseph not be "a coward" (p. 2). Knapp writes of Warren choosing "to be where wounds were to be made rather than where they were to be healed," in Biographical Sketches, p. 117; Knapp also writes of Warren"s "versatility" (p. 111). J. P. Jewett in Boston Orators relates William Eustis"s account of Warren"s outraged response to the taunts of the British soldiers as well as their nighttime visit to Cornhill (pp. 4849). Thomas Hutchinson writes of Warren"s ambition to "become the Cromwell of North America" in "Additions to Thomas Hutchinson"s "History of Ma.s.sachusetts Bay," " edited by Catherine Barton Mayo, Proceedings of the AAS 59, pt. 1 (1949): 45. Peter Oliver in OPAR writes of Warren"s determination to "mount the last round of the ladder or die in the attempt" (p. 128). General Hugh Percy tells of the provincials" determination "either to set [Boston] on fire ... or to ... starve us out" in an April 8, 1775, letter to Thomas Percy, in his Letters, p. 48.
John Andrews writes of how Boston"s residents were "afraid, mad, crazy, or infatuated" and began leaving the city in droves in LJA, p. 402. Thomas Hutchinson records the account of Samuel Cooper"s tense meeting with Joseph Warren during a Sunday service in April 1775 (which had been told him by Harrison Gray) in the August 15, 1777, entry of his Diary, 2:156. According to Cooper"s own Diary, he was in Weston by April 10, "having received several menaces and insults, particularly at Mrs. Davis, having a scurrilous song offered me by an officer," cited by Charles Akers in The Divine Politician, p. 195. Clifford Shipton writes of Joseph Warren "knowing that a warrant for his arrest was in Gage"s pocket" in SHG, 14:521; Shipton also writes of how Warren a.s.sisted Isaiah Thomas in getting his printing press and type out of Boston (p. 520). A transcript of Warren"s brief April 10, 1775, letter about moving his family and personal effects to Worcester appeared in a lot description in a June 9, 1999, Christie"s auction cited by Samuel Forman in DJW, pp. 39495. Robert Hanson in a note to The Diary of Dr. Nathaniel Ames records that Ames began billing Joseph Warren"s account on April 8, 1775 (p. 278). Daniel Leonard"s comparison of patriot leaders to a "false guide" who leads a traveler to the brink of an abyss first appeared in December 19, 1774, and is reprinted in Tracts of the American Revolution, edited by Merrill Jensen, p. 279. King George"s November 18, 1774, letter to Lord North insisting that "blows must decide" whether the American colonies "are to be subject to this country or independent" is in CKG, p. 153. As Peter Thomas writes in Tea Party to Independence, both sides read each other incorrectly when it came to the outbreak of the American Revolution: "Congress was bluffing, confident that Britain would again back down, as in 1766 and 1770... . This time Britain did not do so, and called the colonial bluff... . The War of Independence was not a heroic enterprise but the result of a political miscalculation" (pp. 17475). John Andrews tells of General Percy"s praise of his wife"s drawing in an April 11, 1775, letter in LJA, p. 403. Percy writes of the weather in Boston in an April 8, 1775, letter in Letters, p. 49.
The April 7, 9, 15, and 18, 1775, espionage reports addressed to General Gage appear in PIR, 3:197883. Allen French discusses the contents of these letters and the fact that they were written by an insider in the Provincial Congress (who was proven to be Benjamin Church by subsequent letters he wrote to Gage), as well as how the letters influenced the general"s decision making relative to the expedition to Concord, in General Gage"s Informers, pp. 1833. Many historians cite an account by the British spy John Howe (History of Middles.e.x County, vol. 2, edited by D. Hamilton Hurd, pp. 57984), who claimed to have advised Gage to send troops to Concord instead of Worcester, but I have doubts about the reliability of the Howe narrative and have therefore not cited it; see D. Michael Ryan"s argument that the Howe account is nothing but an "embellished "plagiarism" " in Concord and the Dawn of Revolution, p. 53. Admiral Samuel Graves writes of moving the Somerset "exactly in the ferry way between the two towns," in his "Narrative" in NDAR, 1:179. Dartmouth"s January 27, 1775, letter to Gage is in DAR, 8:3741. Allen French carefully a.n.a.lyzes Gage"s orders to Colonel Francis Smith, the originals of which (including an early draft) are at the Clements Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and concludes that "Gage did not plan to seize Hanc.o.c.k and Adams," in General Gage"s Secret Informers, p. 33. Lieutenant Barker writes of Gage"s April 15 orders to the grenadiers and light infantry being "by way of a blind" in his Diary, p. 29. Paul Revere writes of how on the "Sat.u.r.day night preceding the 19 April, about 12 o"clock at night, the boats belonging to the transports were all launched, and carried under the sterns of the men of war," as well as other events preceding and including his famous ride to Lexington, in "A Letter ... to the Corresponding Secretary," pp. 10610. Ellen Chase in The Beginnings of the American Revolution (BAR), vol. 2, lists the height of the steeple of Christ Church as 191 feet (p. 326). The detailed description of the military stores in Concord made on April 18, 1775, is in PIR, 3:198283.
According to William Gordon, Warren learned of Gage"s expedition to Concord "by a mere accident ... just in time to send messengers over the neck and across the ferry," in his History of the American Revolution, p. 477; Gordon"s reference to "a daughter of liberty, unequally yoked in point of politics" (p. 476) is often cited as a possible reference to Margaret Gage as Warren"s informer; however, the unnamed female informant Gordon refers to sent a message not to Warren but to Samuel Adams-several days before April 19. Charles Stedman tells of Percy overhearing the townspeople gathered on Boston Common talking about the impending expedition to Concord in his History of the American War, 1:119. In an interview with me at the Gage estate in Firle, Suss.e.x, in March 2011, Lord Nicholas Gage (a direct descendant of Thomas and Margaret Gage) insisted that there was no family tradition concerning an estrangement between the Gages-an a.s.sertion that seems borne out by the portraits of Thomas and Margaret, painted after their return to England from Boston in 1775, that still bracket a fireplace mantel at the Gage estate. J. L. Bell in his blog "Boston 1775" does a masterful job of demonstrating why it"s highly unlikely that Margaret Gage revealed any secrets about her husband"s planned expedition to Concord; see postings for April 12 and 13, 2011, Another possibility is that Warren"s informant was none other than Benjamin Church. In the weeks ahead, Warren would turn a blind eye to some highly suspicious behavior on the part of Church, perhaps because the doctor had earned Warren"s trust by acting as a double agent on the night of April 18.
In an October 25, 1775, entry in his journal, Jeremy Belknap records various accounts he"d heard of events in Boston on the evening of April 18, including the appearance of a light infantryman in a shop and the conversation between two officers on Long Wharf (pp. 8486). Ellen Chase includes this evidence as well as Samuel Drake"s account of the man who spoke with the groomer in the stables of Province House, along with an account of the officers dispatched to guard the roads to Concord, in BAR, 2:32031. The essential illegality of Warren"s decision to send out the alarm on the night of April 18, 1775, is discussed by John Scheide in "The Lexington Alarm," pp. 5961; by John Cary in Joseph Warren, p. 183; and by Clifford Shipton in his biography of Warren in SHG, 14:52021. Seemingly in his own defense, Warren writes Joseph Reed on May 15, 1775: "I verily believe that the night preceding the barbarous outrages committed by the soldiery in Lexington, Concord, etc. there were not 50 people in the whole colony that ever expected any blood would be shed in the contest between us and Great Britain" (LJW, p. 486). This statement appears to be at complete odds with what Warren knew to be the truth, especially since as recently as April 3, 1775, he had written to Arthur Lee that if Percy"s March 30 foray into the countryside had resulted in the destruction of any military stores "not a man of them [Percy"s brigade] would have returned to Boston" (LJW, p. 448). "Was he," as Clifford Shipton so rightly asks concerning Warren"s decision to send out the alarm, "deliberately creating an incident which would a.s.sure war?" (p. 521). We"ll never know for sure, especially since, according to some accounts, many of Warren"s papers were destroyed after his death. Did these papers include incriminating doc.u.ments that might have indicated just how deliberate Warren"s decision to send out the alarm really was? Once again, we"ll probably never know for sure.
William Munroe describes Paul Revere"s arrival at the Jonas Clarke house on the night of April 18 in an affidavit recorded on March 7, 1825, in Elias Phinney"s History of the Battle of Lexington (subsequently referred to as Phinney), p. 33; Phinney provides the detail about Hanc.o.c.k responding, "Come in, Revere. We are not afraid of you" (p. 17). William Gordon appears to have spoken in great detail with Samuel Adams about the night of April 18 and morning of April 19; in his History of the American Revolution, vol. 1, he records, "Mr. Adams inferred from the number [of British regulars] to be employed that [the stores in Concord] were the objects, and not himself and Mr. Hanc.o.c.k, who might be more easily seized in a private way by a few armed individuals, than by a large body of troops that must march, for miles together, under the eye of the public" (pp. 47677). Probably the best way to visualize Lexington Common or Green (both terms were used in eighteenth-century accounts) in 1775 is by looking at the relevant engraving in the series by Amos Doolittle, all of which are based on sketches made at the sites within weeks of the events in 1775. My description of John Parker is based on Elizabeth Parker"s "John Parker," pp. 47, 6061, and BAR, 2:34546. Lexington militia company clerk Daniel Harrington reported that 130 militiamen answered the first call that night in William Gordon"s "Account of the Commencement of Hostilities" in AA4, 2:627. The number of Munroes, Harringtons, Smiths, Reeds, and Tidds on the Lexington militia rolls is in BAR, 2:380.
As explained in Mary Babson Fuhrer"s "The Revolutionary Worlds of Lexington and Concord Compared," Lexington had not experienced the divisions that had plagued Concord primarily because it was a younger town and had a history of strong and open-minded ministers. Fuhrer writes of how liberty in the eighteenth century had an entirely different meaning than it would have in the nineteenth century, citing the example of John Parker"s abolitionist grandson Theodore Parker, who believed "that liberty is an inalienable right of personhood, not as his forefathers had believed, of property" (p. 118). Levi Preston was the militiaman who said, "We always had been free, and we meant to be free always"; Mellen Chamberlain, "Why Captain Preston Fought," pp. 6870, and cited in BAR, 3:56, and David Hackett Fischer, Paul Revere"s Ride, p. 164. For information on Prince Estabrook, see George Quintal"s Patriots of Color, pp. 9798; also present on the Lexington Common that morning were two more "men of color," Eli Burdoo and Silas Burdoo (pp. 6971). The reference to the coercive tactics of the patriots ("everyone bends") was made by General Frederick Haldimand, second in command to Gage in Boston; in Allen French"s "General Haldimand in Boston," pp. 9091. Lieutenant Frederick Mackenzie writes in his Diary of how the militiamen frequently called out "King Hanc.o.c.k forever" during the British retreat to Boston that day (p. 57). On November 21, 1822, William Sumner recorded Dorothy Quincy"s memories of the morning of April 19 in the Clarke parsonage, which included Adams"s insistence that "we belong to the cabinet" ("Reminiscences by Gen. William H. Sumner," p. 187).
David Hackett Fischer provides an excellent description of the uniforms and equipment of the British grenadiers and light infantrymen in Paul Revere"s Ride, pp. 11823. According to Samuel Abbot Smith, West Cambridge 1775, a townsman from Menotomy was awakened that night "by the rattle of the pewter plates on his dresser, jarred, as they were, by the measured tramp of the soldiers" (p. 17); Smith also relates Deacon Ephraim Cutter"s account of how he heard later in the day "the measured tread of the soldiers as of one man" (pp. 2627). According to Frank Coburn in The Battle of April 19, 1775, "the moon was shining sufficiently bright" for the soldiers to read signs along the road; Coburn also recounts how Mrs. Timothy Tufts looked out her window in Cambridge"s Beech Street and "saw from her bed the gun-barrels shining in the moonlight" (pp. 4850), and how the widow Rand and her bullet-casting neighbor saw the soldiers" footprints in the dirt of the road through Cambridge (p. 49). Lieutenant Jeremy Lister writes of how "the country people began to fire their alarm guns, light their beacons" as the regulars marched out of Menotomy in Vincent Kehoe, We Were There! (subsequently referred to as Kehoe), p. 115. Lieutenant Sutherland writes of hearing "several shots being fired ... between 3 and 4 in the morning (a very unusual time for firing)" in Kehoe, p. 140. Colonel Smith"s account of how they "found the country had intelligence or strong suspicion of our coming, and fired many signal guns, and rung the alarm bells repeatedly" is also in Kehoe, p. 73. Samuel Abbot Smith relates how the Committee of Safety members fled the Black Horse Tavern in West Cambridge 1775, pp. 1617.
My description of the approach of the British advance guard to Lexington Common is based, in large part, on the accounts of Sutherland, Smith, Pope, Pitcairn, and Marr, all of which are in Kehoe (pp. 73, 76, 110, 13889, and 155). BAR, vol. 2, contains descriptions of the capture of Porter, Richardson, and Wellington (pp. 36061). Paul Revere writes in detail of his conversation with Major Mitch.e.l.l and his officers in "A Letter ... to the Corresponding Secretary," p. 109. For a description of the dress and training of the provincial militiamen, see David Hackett Fischer"s Paul Revere"s Ride, pp. 14962; Doolittle"s engravings clearly indicate the differences in dress between the militiamen and the regulars. William Munroe testified to seeing two hundred cartridge papers lying on the ground in Phinney, p. 34. According to Reverend Jonas Clarke, A Brief Narrative, "After all this precaution, we had no notice of [the regulars"] approach, till the brigade was actually in the town" (p. 4). Paul Revere recounts overhearing John Parker"s order to "let the troops pa.s.s by and don"t molest them, without they being first," in a deposition taken April 24, 1775, in Paul Revere"s Three Accounts of his Ride, p. 22. Robert Dougla.s.s"s account of hearing a militiaman say, "There are so few of us, it would be folly to stand here" (to which Parker replied, "The first man who offers to run shall be shot down"), is in Ezra Ripley"s A History of the Fight at Concord, p. 52. John Robbins"s testimony that one of the British officers cried out, "Throw down your arms, ye villains, ye rebels," is in A Narrative of the Excursion and Ravages of the King"s Troops, p. 8. Ezra Stiles records a secondhand description of Major Pitcairn"s activities at Lexington, in which Stiles recounts how Pitcairn "struck his ... sword downwards with all earnestness as the signal to forbear or cease firing," in his Diary, 1:6045. Paul Revere describes "a continual roar of musketry," in "A Letter ... to the Corresponding Secretary" (p. 110). The testimonies of John and Ebenezer Monroe concerning what happened that morning, including how Joshua Simons was prepared to blow up the open cask of powder in the attic of the Lexington Meetinghouse with his gun, are in Phinney, pp. 3537. The death of Jonathan Harrington is recounted in BAR, 2:370. In an October 8, 1775, letter to R. Donkin, Colonel Smith writes of how he prevented the regulars from attacking the provincials inside the buildings on Lexington Common, in Kehoe, pp. 75, 14142. Lieutenant Barker writes in his Diary that the light infantrymen "were so wild they could hear no orders" (p. 32).
John Galvin discusses the problems created by Gage"s decision to go with a "motley mixture of units"-specifically "a loose command structure" that required company commanders "to operate with new procedures under unfamiliar leaders"-in The Minute Men, p. 103. Lieutenant Mackenzie in his Diary tells how Colonel Smith"s officers tried to convince him "to give up the idea of prosecuting his march and to return to Boston" (p. 63). William Heath"s criticism of the Lexington militia is in his Memoirs, p. 6. Harold Murdock in The Nineteenth of April 1775 argues that Samuel Adams must have been the one pulling the strings at Lexington that morning (pp. 2325), as does Arthur Bernon Tourtellot in Lexington and Concord (originally t.i.tled William Diamond"s Drum), 79, 112, 12527. But as the testimony of William Munroe makes clear (in which he recounts Hanc.o.c.k"s insistence that "if I had my musket, I would never turn my back upon these troops"), it was Hanc.o.c.k they were listening to (Phinney, p. 34). See J. L. Bell"s May 19, 2008, entry, "Who Really Wanted to Fight at Lexington?" in his blog Boston 1775, for a balanced a.s.sessment of Adams"s and Hanc.o.c.k"s influence (if any) on what happened at Lexington Green. William Gordon recounts the exchange between Samuel Adams and John Hanc.o.c.k, in which Adams describes the day as "glorious," in his History, 1:47879. Hanc.o.c.k"s description of the Lexington militia being only "partially provided with arms, and those they had were in most miserable order" is in "Reminiscences by Gen. William Sumner," p. 187.
Chapter Seven-The Bridge
Mary Hartwell"s account of the regulars pa.s.sing her house on the way to Concord is in A. E. Brown"s Beneath Old Roof Trees, p. 221. Colonel Smith writes of how his column marched "with as much good order as ever troops observed in Britain or any friendly country," in his October 8, 1775, letter to R. Donkin, cited in Vincent Kehoe, We Were There! p. 75. Thaddeus Blood"s account of the Concord fight is in the Boston Daily Advertiser, April 20, 1886 (subsequently referred to as his Narrative). D. Michael Ryan in Concord and the Dawn of Revolution cites an article in the July 16, 1888, Boston Transcript that tells of an Emerson family tradition that "an English banner with "Union and Liberty" inscribed in white letters" flew from the Concord liberty pole (p. 71). Lemuel Shattuck in A History of Concord quotes Reverend Emerson as saying, "Let us stand our ground" (pp. 1056). Ezra Ripley in A History of the Fight at Concord describes how Colonel Barrett ordered the provincials to march over the North Bridge to Punkata.s.set Hill (p. 16). BAR contains an account of the activities at the Barrett farm in antic.i.p.ation of the arrival of the British soldiers (3:67); some of this account is drawn from the interview Benson J. Lossing had with Colonel Barrett"s grandson James in 1848, which is referred to in Lossing"s Pictorial Field-book of the Revolution, 1:551. Parson"s search of the Barrett farm under the watchful eyes of Mrs. Barrett is described in BAR, 3:2324, 46. Robert Gross in The Minutemen and Their World writes of Lieutenant Joseph Hosmer"s p.r.i.c.kly personality and his role as Concord"s "most dangerous man" (pp. 6465). On the history of the Bedford flag, see Sharon Lawrence McDonald"s The Bedford Flag Unfurled, pp. 813, 3339, 5258. On the New Englanders" uneasy relationship with their region"s native history and how "a white man in Indian costume could envision himself as an American ideal, both civilized and free," see Benjamin Carp"s Defiance of the Patriots, pp. 14757, as well as my Mayflower, pp. 35758. In 1850 Amos Baker (then known as "the last survivor" of the Concord fight) described James Nichols"s conversation with the regulars at the North Bridge and his decision not to partic.i.p.ate in the fight in his "Affidavit of the Last Survivor," printed in Joel Parker"s Address to the Students of the University of Cambridge, pp. 13335. See also Michael Ryan"s "Mysterious Militia Man Deserts at Old North Bridge," Concord Magazine, March/April 2001, available at about Isaac Davis"s actions on April 19 are in Josiah Adams, Letter to Lemuel Shattuck, pp. 1420; Ellen Chase provides a useful distillation of this material in BAR, 3:2428. See also Michael Ryan"s "The Concord Fight and a Fearless Isaac Davis," Concord Magazine, May 1999, available at Ryan also writes about the tune the fifer in Davis"s company was reputedly playing in "White c.o.c.kade: A Jacobite Air at the North Bridge?" available at ~hafner/lmm/music-articles/white_c.o.c.kade_ryan.html. Lemuel Shattuck tells of Joseph Hosmer "earnestly" inquiring, "Will you let them burn the town down?" in History of Concord, p. 111. In Gage"s official account of April 19, 1775, the townspeople of Concord are described as "sulky"; JEPC, p. 680. Martha Moulton"s testimony appears in Richard Frothingham"s HSOB, p. 369; Ellen Chase provides a good account of the activities of the British regulars in Concord in BAR, 3:1921. George Bancroft writes that the Concord schoolmaster "could never afterwards find words strong enough to express how [Davis"s] face reddened at the word of command"; Bancroft also repeats Davis"s famous words, "I have not a man that is afraid to go," in his History of the United States, 2:302. Lieutenant Jeremy Lister"s claim that the militiamen marched "with as much order as the best disciplined troops" is in Kehoe, p. 116. John Galvin describes how Laurie"s street-firing maneuver should have worked in The Minute Men, pp. 15051. Lieutenant Sutherland"s description of what happened at the North Bridge is in Kehoe, pp. 14243. Amos Doolittle"s engraving of the scene is t.i.tled "The Engagement at the North Bridge in Concord." My thanks to William Fowler for his input regarding the muzzle velocity of a musket in a personal communication. Amos Barrett"s memory of how "their b.a.l.l.s whistled well" is in his Narrative in Journal and Letters of Henry True, p. 33. Amos Baker"s statement that "we concluded they were firing jack-knives" can be found in his "Affidavit of the Last Survivor." D. Hamilton Hurd in History of Middles.e.x County describes the death of Isaac Davis: "The ball pa.s.sed quite through his body, making a very large wound, perhaps driving in a b.u.t.ton of his coat. His blood gushed out in one great stream, flying, it is said, more than 10 feet, besprinkling and besmearing his own clothes ... and the clothes of Orderly Sergeant David Forbush and a file leader, Thomas Thorpe" (1:261). Captain David Brown is credited with crying out, "G.o.d d.a.m.n them, they are firing b.a.l.l.s!" in Frederic Hudson, "The Concord Fight," p. 797.
According to Reverend Emerson"s great-granddaughter Phebe Ripley Chamberlin, Emerson"s wife told her "that she felt hurt because [her husband] did not stay more with her [on April 19] and once when he was feeding the women and children with bread and cheese she knocked on the widow and said to him that she thought she needed him as much as the others," in Diaries and Letters of William Emerson, p. 73. According to William Gordon in a May 17, 1775, letter, Emerson "was nearer the regulars than the killed" when the firing began at the North Bridge; Gordon also writes that Emerson was "very uneasy till he found that the fire was returned," AA4, 2:630. Emerson"s March 13, 1775, sermon is in his Diaries and Letters, p. 65. Frederic Hudson writes that Major b.u.t.trick cried, "Fire, fellow soldiers, for G.o.d"s sake, fire!" in "The Concord Fight," p. 797; Thaddeus Blood tells how "the fire was almost simultaneous with the cry" in his Narrative. Lieutenant Lister"s description of how the regulars crumbled before the provincial fire is in Kehoe, p. 116. Amos Barrett"s memory of how the regulars retreated, "running and a hobbling about," as well as how he and other provincial soldiers lay behind a stone wall on the hill overlooking the North Bridge with their "guns c.o.c.ked expecting every minute to have the word-fire," is in Journal and Letters of Henry Tr