Across the fence: Boston: April 18, 1775

It’s been nearly 10 years since I was last in Boston, Mass. For more than a year I flew from Denver to Boston every-other weekend and spent each two-week stretch working as an independent consultant for Philips Medical Systems. On my off weekends, when I wasn’t flying back to Denver, I immersed myself in the rousing history of the Colonies. Although I found the breakneck pace of life on the east coast to be a little too hectic for my Kansas blood I was spellbound by its history.

At Plymouth Rock I stood upon the shore where the first pilgrims landed after their long and perilous voyage. I walked the deck and climbed the riggin’ of an exact Mayflower replica that was built in the shipyards of England and sailed across the Atlantic to be permanently anchored in Plymouth Harbor. The ship’s log clearly indicated that the re-enacted voyage was one of the most frightful the crew had ever experienced. I ducked under the beams of a five-and-one-half-foot ceiling where hand-hewn timbers supported the second story of the Sparrow House, built in1640. And I walked through cemeteries where lichen covered headstones, worn by centuries of coastal wind and weather, grudgingly revealed the eroded dates of men born in the late 1500’s.

In Boston Harbor I strolled the pier where, more than two hundred years before, Boston’s famous, clandestine tea party was held under cover of darkness. At the Charlestown Navy Yard I stood humbly on the polished decks of The USS Constitution and gazed in amazement at the towering masts, massive yardarms and spider-webbed rigging. Below decks I ran my hands along the oak railings where countless others had done the same until the tight-grained wood shone with the luster of time and touch. I slapped the breech of one of the massive cannon held securely to its caisson by ropes thicker than my arm. And I could not resist the temptation to grip the brass bannister around the ships compass and then watched, in childish shame, as a white-gloved Marine stepped forward to wipe away my fingerprints.

In Boston proper, I visited the home of Paul Revere and stood in the courtyard of the Old North Church under Cyrus Dallin’s statue of Revere and his steed and I imagined the glow of two bright lanterns hung in the steeple. I crossed the Charles River to Cambridge and walked for several miles along the path that Paul Revere had ridden to Lexington. The trail passed beneath a dark canopy of branches as dense stands of trees lined each side.

In Lexington I stood upon the Commons Green and imagined the long rows of pompous British soldiers as they took aim against a handful of patriots. I climbed the stairs and stood in the rooms where John Hancock and Samuel Adams were sleeping when Paul Revere finally arrived to give warning. And I stood on the bridge at Concord where a rag-tag group of farmers and merchants, who were the American militia, gained their first victory at the beginning of America’s War for Independence.

Most everyone knows the story and the history of the midnight ride of Paul Revere. But, I believe the time is appropriate for a brief retelling.

By 1775 tensions between the American colonies and the British government had risen to the boiling point and the pent up steam of revolution blew the lid off the kettle. Under the leadership of Samuel Adams and John Hancock the colonies had formed a revolutionary shadow government and organized a militia of like-minded colonists. Confrontations between British soldiers and residents of Boston had reached explosive and deadly proportions and British Parliament feared an uprising.

For months, the Patriots had been preparing for the possibility of a military action. Adams and Hancock were in hiding in Lexington and the Patriots had formed a cohesive militia and devised an intricate plan of rapid communication should the British forces execute a military offensive. In Concord, the militia had accumulated and stockpiled a hidden cache of weapons and ammunition in preparation for the unwelcome possibility of open conflict. It should be remembered that most of the colonists, including Adams and Hancock, considered themselves to be loyal British subjects. They did not want a war against Britain but rather were seeking reform that would give the colonists the ability to self-govern while remaining loyal to the crown.

In the early spring of 1775, General Thomas Gage the governor of the Massachusetts colony, received orders from Great Britain to assemble a military force and march against the townships of Lexington and Concord. The directive they were to achieve was to confiscate, by whatever means necessary, all sources of weapons and ammunition available to the American insurgents. In other words, total disarmament of the American colony. General Gage was also ordered to arrest Adams and Hancock.

(Perhaps there is some irony in the fact that these orders, to disarm the American colonists, were given on April 18, 1775. Two hundred and thirty-eight years later, April 18, 2013 the U.S. Senate upheld the rights of the American people and would not pass a law that would further restrict the rights of Americans to obtain arms and ammunition.)

When information of General Gage’s order was received the plan to alert the colonists was rapidly implemented. If British troops were to march out of Boston on the peninsula, called Boston Neck, one lantern would be hung in the Old North Church steeple. If troops crossed the Charles River into Cambridge, two lanterns would be hung. When one, then another lantern shone from the highest point in Boston, Paul Revere took a rowboat and crossed the Charles River. Crossing undetected among several ships of the British fleet, Revere secured a horse in Charleston and began his famous ride. Unlike the famous words we were taught in grade school history, Revere did not shout, “The British are coming!” In fact, at the first dwellings he reached he quietly tapped on the darkened windows until someone wakened and came to answer--it was after 11 p.m.

“The Regulars are out.” Revere spoke in brusque tones of urgency as hundreds of American militia, Minutemen, were alerted and armed themselves to oppose the advancing British soldiers.

William Dawes also rode that night and alerted the colonists along a second route. At Lexington, Revere and Dawes met each other and together warned Adams and Hancock. Continuing toward Concord, British troops intercepted the two messengers. Dawes escaped on foot and walked back to Lexington. Revere was detained for more than an hour but was finally released though his horse was kept by the British troops. Revere also walked back to Lexington and arrived very shortly after the battle at Lexington Green.

British Major John Pitcairn had arrived in Lexington around 5:00 a.m. on April 19 and approached the house from where Adams and Hancock had recently fled. Approaching from the east, Major Pitcairn dispersed his 700 British troopers into their usual rigid battle lines. On the west end of the Green, between the guarded house and the British troops a 77-man militia of American colonists stood in defiance. With muskets raised, Pitcairn ordered the militia to disperse. There was a long and breathless silence as men stared down the length of their barrels. Slowly the outnumbered militia began to lower their rifles when the silence was shattered by a single blast. Who fired that deadly “shot heard ‘round the world” is not known but soon the Green was filled with the echo of gunfire and the smoke of gunpowder.

When the firing ceased, eight Americans lay dead and ten more wounded. Of Pitcairn’s men, only one British soldier was wounded. From that point there was no turning back, the American Revolution had begun.

Pitcairn’s troops continued their march toward Concord where they found and destroyed the arms and ammunition that the militia had accumulated and cached there. However, the British were soon under attack from a large group of Minutemen who inflicted heavy casualties. The British withdrew and were ordered to regroup and return to Boston without engaging the American militia. The march back to Boston took the troops once more through Lexington where Captain Parker’s militia took quick and lethal revenge for the morning’s battle. On the 16-mile march back to Boston the militia continued to harass the British column with Indian-style attacks of strike and run as the Red Coats marched onward offering little effective defense against the unorthodox tactics of the militia. During the first day of battle, the American militia had suffered nearly 100 casualties. The British command reported 300 men killed, wounded or missing.

In light of this past week, we would do well to remember the resolve and tenacity of those who fought for our precious freedoms. And also give honor to the people of Boston and beyond who will not shrink in the face of terror but who stand tall and proud in defense of our families, our communities and our nation.

M. Timothy Nolting is an award winning Nebraska columnist, freelance writer, poet and entertainer. To contact Tim, email; [email protected]