Paul Revere's Ride

by David Hackett Fischer

  Gen. Sir Henry Clinton: William B. Willcox (ed.), The American Rebellion (New Haven, 1954). Clinton did not arrive in America until after the battles, but had interesting comments on Gage’s performance.

  J[ohn?] [Crozier?], master of British transport Empress of Russia: Letters dated April 23, 1775, et seq., in Rockingham Mss., City Library, Sheffield, published as “An Account of Lexington in the Rockingham Mss. at Sheffield,” ed. J. E. Tyler, WMQ3 10 (1953): 99-107.

  Ens. Henry De Berniere, 10th Foot: Narrative, published as Narrative of Occurrences, (Boston, 1779), rpt MHSC2, 4 (1816): 204-15; idem, General Gage’s Instructions (Boston, 1779), a very full account of the reconnaissance missions and the Concord expedition.

  Major Robert Donkin: Military Collections and Remarks (New York, 1777).

  Capt. W. Glanville Evelyn, 4th Foot: Letter, April 23, 1775, published in Memoir and Letters of Captain W. Glanville Evelyn, of the 4th Regiment (“King’s Own”) from North America, 1774—1776, ed. G.D. Scull (Oxford, 1879), 53-55; valuable for the life of a junior officer in Boston.

  Lt. Edward Thoroton Gould, 4th (King’s Own) Foot: Deposition after capture, April 25, 1775, published in AA4, II, 500-501.

  Vice Admiral Samuel Graves, Royal Navy, commanding at Boston: “The Conduct of Vice Admiral Samuel Graves in North America in 1774, 1775 and January 1776,” a defense of his acts, with copious extracts from his papers by his flag secretary, George Gefferina, dated Dec. 11, 1776, and signed Dec. 1, 1777; two ms. vols., British Library, add. m. 14038-39; transcripts in MHS; published in part in NDAR, 1, 193, 206; his official correspondence is in the Public Record office, ADM 1/485.

  Frederick Haldimand: Papers, British Library, add. ms., 21665-97; Gage’s second in command, an exceptionally full and revealing correspondence, Haldimand writing in French, Gage in English. See also Allen French, “General Haldimand in Boston,” MHSP 66 (1942): 91.

  Capt. George Harris, 5th Foot: Stephen R. Lushington, The Life and Services of General Lord Harris, GCB (London, 1840), colorful details.

  John Howe, alleged British spy: Journal, published as The Journal Kept by John Howe, as a British Spy (Concord, N.H., 1827). The authenticity of this source is very doubtful. No use of it has been made in this inquiry.

  Ens. Martin Hunter, 52d Foot: The Journal of General Sir Martin Hunter (Edinburgh, 1894), vignettes.

  Lt. Edward Hull, 43rd Foot: Narrative, MHSP 16 (1878): 155-58.

  Lt.-Col. Stephen Kemble: Deputy Adjutant General to Gage, Journals, published in The Kemble Papers, N-YHS Collections for the Year 1883 (New York, 1884), offers many insights into the operation of Gage’s staff.

  Capt. Walter S. Laurie, 43rd Foot: Letter to Gage, April 26, 1775, published in General Gage’s Informers (Ann Arbor, 1932), 95-98; another letter, dated April 21, in Manuscripts of the Earl of Dartmouth, III, American Papers (London, 1887-96), 292; Historical Manuscripts Commission, Fourteenth Report, Appendix, part 10; a letter about his living arrangements in Boston is in the Copley-Pelham Papers, PRO.

  George Leonard: Loyalist volunteer with Percy’s brigade: Deposition, May 4, 1775, General Gage’s Informers, 57.

  William Lewis: see Gordon.

  Ens. Jeremy Lister, 10th Foot: Narrative, 1782, published as Concord Fight, ed. Harold Murdock (Cambridge, 1931), rpt. Spartanburg, S.C, 1969; rpt. in The Nineteenth of April, 1775, ed. Clement Sawtell (Lincoln, Mass., 1968), a major narrative of the expedition by an officer in the lead company. His account of the battles of Lexington and Concord and other letters are in the Lister Family Papers, Shibden Hall Folk Museum of West Yorkshire, Halifax.

  Lt. Frederick Mackenzie, 23rd Foot, or Royal Welch Fusiliers: Diary, in Regimental Museum, Royal Welch Fusiliers, Caernarfon Castle, Wales, published as A British Fusilier in Revolutionary Boston, ed. Allen French (Cambridge, 1926), the most meticulous of British accounts. The Regimental Museum also has a portrait of Mackenzie, painted on his retirement as lieutenant-colonel.

  Pvt. James Marr, 4th Regiment: Deposition after capture April 23, 1775, published in AA4, II, 500.

  Capt. John Montresor, Corps of Engineers: The Montresor Journals, ed. G. D. Scull, N-YHS Collections for the Year 1881 (New York, 1882).

  Col. Hugh Percy, 5th Foot, commander relief expedition: Letters, ed. C. K. Bolton (Boston, 1902); his report on the battle is in the Public Record Office, London, CO5/92-93; other correspondence is in the Haldimand Papers, BL.

  Major John Pitcairn, Royal Marines: Letters and reports to Admiralty, published in Sandwich Papers, Navy Records Society; report to Gage, published in General Gage’s Informers, 55; correspondence with Col. John Mackenzie in Mackenzie Papers, vol. IV, add. ms. 39190, BL.

  Richard Pope: Narrative, Huntington Library, California, photostat, NYPL. Published as Late News of the Excursion and Ravages of the King’s Troops on the 19th of April (Boston, 1927). The author of this document has not been conclusively identified. French thought him a private or noncommissioned officer, 47th Regiment. Tourtellot believed that he was a Boston Loyalist who marched with the Regulars as a volunteer (Bibliography, 19).

  Lord Rawdon, subaltern in the 5th Foot: Papers in the British Library, London.

  Richard Reever: Letters from America, 1775-77, in the Buckinghamshire Record Office, Aylesbury.

  Earl of Sandwich: The Private Papers of John, Earl of Sandwich. 3 vols. (London, Navy Records Society, 1932—38), the correspondence of the First Lord of the Admiralty.

  Lt.-Col. Francis Smith, 10th Foot: Report to General Gage, April 22, 1775, PRO, CO5/92; printed in MHSP 14 (1876): 350-51; letter to Major R. Donkin, Oct. 8, 1775, Gage Papers, WCL, published in part in General Gage’s Informers, 61.

  Capt. William Soutar, Royal Marines: Narrative, published in part without citations in Hargreaves, Bloodybacks, 219—22.

  Charles Stedman: History of the Origin, Progress, and Termination of the American War. 2 vols. (London and Dublin, 1794). The author was a serving British officer in the American War of Independence. He knew and interviewed many participants; primary materials on Lexington and Concord (I, 116-20). For a critique, see R. Kent Newmeyer, “Charles Stedman’s History of the American War,” AHR 63 (1957-58): 924-34.

  Lt. William Sutherland, 38th Foot: Narrative letter to Kemble, April 27, 1775, Gage Papers, WCL, published in Wroth et al. (eds.), Province in Rebellion (Cambridge, 1975), doc. 721, pp. 2024—29; narrative letter to General Clinton, April 26, 1775, published in Late News of the Excursion and Ravages of the King’s Troops on the Nineteenth of April, 1775, ed. Harold Murdock (Boston, 1927).

  Maj. James Wemyss: “Character Sketches of Gage, Percy and Others,” Sparks Papers, Harvard University, xxii, 214.

  Lt. Richard Williams, Royal Welch Fusiliers: Jane van Arsdale (ed.), Discord and Civil Wars; Being a Portion of a Journal Kept by Lieutenant Williams of His Majesty’s Twenty-Third Regiment While Stationed in British North America During the Time of the Revolution (Buffalo, 1954). Williams arrived after the battles; graphic accounts of Boston, but troubling questions of authenticity.

  American Government Documents

  Among province and colony records, an important source for this inquiry are the records of the Provincial Congress in William Lincoln (ed.), The Journals of Each Provincial Congress of Massachusetts (Colony) in 1774 and 1775, and of the Committee of Safety, with an Appendix (Boston, 1838). A more generous selection of materials pertaining mainly to the Provincial Congresses has been issued in microfiche as L. Kinvin Wroth et al. (eds.), Province in Rebellion; A Documentary History of the Founding of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, 1774—1775 (Cambridge, Mass., 1975).

  Other sources include “Letters and Doings of the Council,” manuscript notebook covering period April g, 1774—April 21, 1776, Massachusetts Archives. The Massachusetts Tax List for 1771 is in the Massachusetts Archives, Columbia Point, and has been published in summary form by Bettye Hobbs Pruitt.

  The Town Records of Boston have been published as Boston Record Commissioners Report, 39 vols. (Boston, 187
6-1909). Specially helpful are vol. 1, Boston Tax Lists, 1674-1675; vol. 18, Boston Town Records, 1770 Through 1777; vol. 24, Boston Births, 1700—1800; vol. 28, Boston Marriages, 1700—1751; vol. 30, Boston Marriages, 1752—1800; and vol. 22, The Direct Tax of 1798.

  Other town records are included with local history, below

  British Government Documents

  In the new Public Record Office, Kew, official materials relevant to this inquiry are mainly to be found in three broad record-groups: the Colonial Office, War Office, and the Admiralty.

  Colonial Office records on military affairs in CO5/92-93 are especially rich on events of 1774-75, and include the official reports on the battles from Smith, Percy, and Gage. Also helpful are Colonial Office records on admiralty matters in CO5/120-21. Orders in Council are in CO5/29-30, and letters to the secretary of state from Massachusetts are in C05/769. Instructions to Provincial Governors of Massachusetts, 1631-1775, available to American readers in eight volumes of transcripts at the MHS.

  Military records in the Public Record Office include Secretary at War. In-Letters W01; Out-Letters, W04; Commander in Chief, WO3; Marching Orders, W05; Headquarters Papers, WO28, and Troop Movements, WO379. The Amherst Papers, WO34, contain much on America, but little about Lexington and Concord. Service records of officers and printed Army Lists are in WO 65, are on open shelves in the Public Record Office; they include officers of the Royal Marines for this period. American Rebellion Entry books, WO 36, include orders for the Boston garrison from June 10, 1773, to Jan. 10, 1776, Gage’s orderbook from July 10, 1774, to Dec. 9, 1774, is in N-YHS. His orderbook from Dec. 10, 1774, to June 6, 1775, is at BPL. For individual regiments, the surviving Monthly Returns, W017, hold much material before 1773 and after 1783, but very little in between.

  Another record-group in the Public Record Office of special importance for the battles of Lexington and Concord is a large collection of regimental rosters, muster books, and paylists (WO12). They are nearly complete for the British regiments in Boston during the period Nov. 1774—Oct. 1775. These are huge red-bound elephant folios with separate sheets for each company in every regiment. They identify by name, rank, and record of service for this period virtually all British troops who served in Boston and fought at Lexington and Concord. The important materials are in Wo 12/2194 (4th Foot); 2289 (5th Foot); 2750 (10th Foot); 3501 (18th Foot); 3960 (23rd Foot); 5171 (38th Foot); 5561 (43rd Foot); 5871 (47th Foot); 6240 (52nd Foot); 6786 (59th Foot); 7313 (64th Foot); and 7377 (65th Foot).

  Some official British military records have found their way into other archives. Summaries of monthly returns by regiment for January and April 1775 are to be found (filed under later dates) in the British Library, add. ms., 29259/I-L. The records of the 52nd Foot, later the Oxfordshire Light Infantry, for the period 1775-1822, are in the Bodleian Library. Orderly Books of the 10th and 23rd Foot are in WCL.

  Douglas Sabin, historian of the Minuteman National Historical Park, with the endorsement of the British Military Attache in Washington, wrote to every regimental association and museum for units present at Lexington and Concord. Virtually no manuscript material was turned up by this inquiry, but a generous file of photocopies from published regimental histories was forthcoming. The material is in the Library of the Minuteman National Historical Park, Concord, Massachusetts.

  Admiralty Records in the Public Record Office include Admirals Dispatches, North America, ADM 1/484-90. Among the more important ships’ logs for these events are those of HMS Canceaux, ADM 51/4136; HMS Kingfisher, ADM 51/506; HMS Preston, ADM 51/720; HMS Scarborough, ADM 51/867; and HMS Somerset, ADM 51/906. Fragmentary records of the Royal Marine battalions serving with the army are in Muster Books and Pay Lists, ADM 96/153. Records of individual Marine officers appear in ADM 157, 159, 192/2, 196/1, and 196/68.

  Documentary Collections

  Peter Force (ed.), American Archives, 4th series., 6 vols., March 7, 1774, to Aug. 21, 1776, and 5th series, 3 vols., May 3, 1776, to Dec. 31, 1776 (Washington, D.C., 1837-53), a vast compilation in nine large folio volumes of primary materials, many of which are relevant to this inquiry, and some of which have been lost since Force published them.

  Vincent J. R. Kehoe (ed.), “We Were There!” 2 vols, (mimeographed typescript, Chelmsford, 1975). This is a full collection of primary materials on the fighting at Lexington and Concord, April 19, 1775, compiled with great care and attention to detail. One volume is devoted to “The American Rebels” and another to “British Accounts.” Complete sets are nonexistent in academic libraries, and very rare in other institutions, but may be found at the Watertown Public Library, the Arlington Public Library, and the Library of Minuteman National Historical Park.

  Benson J. Lossing, Hours with Living Men and Women of the Revolution (New York, 1889). Frank Moore (ed.), The Diary of the American Revolution. 2 vols. (New York, 1858, rpt. 1967), consists mostly of extracts from newspapers. Margaret Wheeler Willard (ed.), Letters on the American Revolution, 1774-1776 (Boston, 1925), includes many relevant epistolary materials.

  Newspaper Accounts

  Boston newspapers of general interest in the period 1774-75 include Isaiah Thomas’s Massachusetts Spy and Benjamin Edes’s and John Gill’s Boston Gazette, both strongly Whig; the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston News-Letter, a moderate Tory paper; the Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post Boy, a strong Tory paper; and the Boston Evening Post, which tried to remain neutral.

  Specially helpful were the Salem Gazette, April 21, 1775; Salem’s Essex Gazette, April 25, 1775; (Worcester) Massachusetts Spy, May 3, 1775; (Portsmouth) New Hampshire Gazette, April 21, 28, 1775; New York Journal, May 25, 1775; New York Gazetteer, April 27, 1775; New York Weekly Gazette and Mercury, April 1775.

  Anniversary Sermons and Orations

  Every year on the day of the battle, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress sponsored sermons to mark the event. Some were delivered by eyewitnesses, and included primary material. Those published during the War of Independence included: Jonas Clarke of Lexington, The Fate of Blood-thirsty Oppressers and God’s Tender Care of His Distressed People (Boston, 1776); Samuel Cooke of Cambridge, The Violent Destroyed and Oppressed Delivered (Boston, 1777); Jacob Cushing of Waltham, Divine Judgments (Boston, 1778); Samuel Woodward of Weston, The Help of the Lord, in Signal Deliverances and Special Salvation, to be Acknowledged and Remembered (Boston, 1779); Isaac Morrell of Wilmington, Faith in Divine Providence (Boston, 1780); Henry Cummings of Billerica, A Sermon Preached in Lexington, on the 19th of April, 1781 (Boston, 1781); Phillips Payson of Chelsea, A Memorial of Lexington Battle and of Some Signal Interpositions of Providence in the American Revolution (Boston, 1782); Zabdiel Adams of Lunenberg, The Evil Designs of Men Made Subservient by God to the Public Good, particularly illustrated in the Rise, Progress and Conclusion of the American War (Boston, 1783).

  Military Manuals

  These works are indispensable for a study of formations and tactics used by both sides on April 19, 1775. Some of the relevant works are as follows: Gentleman’s Compleat Military Dictionary (18th ed., Boston, 1759); The Manual Exercise, as Ordered by His Majesty in 1764 (Boston, n.d. [late 1774 or early 1775?]); William Windham, Plan of Discipline Composed for the Use of the Militia of the County of Norfolk (London, 1759); Humphrey Bland, A Treatise of Military Discipline (7th ed., London, 1753); William Brattle, Sundry Rules and Directions for Drawing Up a Regiment, Posting the Officers, etc. (Boston, 1773); Richard Draper, “A Plan of Exercise for the Militia of the Province of Massachusetts-Bay,” Extracted from the Plan of Discipline for the Norfolk Militia (Boston, 1772); Phineas Lyman, General Orders of 1757, ed. William S. Webb (New York, 1899); Timothy Pickering, Jr., Easy Plan of Discipline for a Militia (Salem, 1775); Thomas Simes, The Military Guide for Young Officers (3rd ed., London, 1781).

  Material Artifacts

  Any student of Paul Revere’s life has much to learn from his silver, and that of his father. The major public collections are in the Boston Museum of Fine Arts, the Wo
rcester Art Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and at Yale University. Their work contains many clues to character and personality, as well to the culture within which they lived. There is today much fashionable interest in the study of “material culture,” but scholars have so far had little success in moving beyond an academic antiquarianism and linking material culture to large historiographical questions. With imagination and creativity, important work can be done, but here is an interpretative problem that remains to be solved. Paul Revere offers many possibilities.

  The Revere House itself is a primary source, much altered through the years, but still the building speaks to us of Paul Revere’s world; as also do Old North Church, Fanueil Hall, the Old Boston State House, Copp’s Hill Burying Ground, and the streets of the North End. Of the wooden buildings that stood along the Battle Road in 1775, a remarkable number survive, some still bearing the scars of the conflict more than two centuries later. The Lexington Historical Society maintains the Hancock-Clarke house (with a very strong collection of original furnishings), the Buckman Tavern and the Munroe Tavern, and welcomes many thousands of visitors each year.

  For the battles of Lexington and Concord, many material artifacts have survived. With others of the period, they may be studied in the British National Army Museum, and in regimental museums, as well as in the Concord Museum and the Museum of Our National Heritage (Lexington, Mass.).

  Terrain Studies

  The historian of any battle must attend carefully to the ground. The scene of the events of April 18 and April 19, is today much changed. All of it lies within metropolitan Boston, and most of the Battle Road is today a busy suburban highway. I was fortunate to be able to tour the road with Douglas Sabin, historian of the Minuteman National Historical Park, who himself has written a detailed history of the battles. It is still possible today to observe major terrain features at the North Bridge, Ripley’s Ridge, Revolutionary Ridge, Meriam’s Corner, Brooks Hill, the Bloody Curve, Nelson Road, and Parker’s Hill, Fiske Hill, and Concord Hill. A not entirely successful attempt was made some years ago to restore the Nelson Road area to something like its appearance in 1775