Paul Revere’s Ride at 250 (episode 324)

Automatic Shownotes

Chapters

Transcript

Jake:
[0:03] Welcome to Hub History, where we go far beyond the freedom trail to share our favorite stories from the history of Boston, the Hub of the Universe.

Introduction to Paul Revere’s Ride

Jake:
[0:13] This is episode 324, the 250th anniversary of Paul Revere’s ride. Hi, I’m Jake. This week marks the 250th anniversary of our American Revolution, with the first battles taking place in Lexington and Concord on April 19th, 1775. In this week’s episode, I’m going to talk about the night before, when Paul Revere rode from Boston to Lexington on the night of April 18th to warn John Hancock and Sam Adams that the British regulars were coming out that night. Most of us, even those who should know better, have a middle image of a lone rider in the night carrying the bait of the nation and the future of independence with him. A lot of that flawed image comes from the poem The Landlord’s Tale, or Paul Revere’s Ride, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. I thought it might be fun this week to retell the story of Paul Revere’s ride by looking at that poem, alongside two versions of the night’s events that were told by Paul Revere in his own words.

Jake:
[1:19] As we’ll soon see, Revere’s famous ride was successful and incredibly consequential in history. But at the same time, it was in many ways redundant, with other riders seeing even more success in warning the Patriots in Concord about what was coming. But before we talk about the fact and fiction of Paul Revere’s ride, I just want to pause and say thank you to the Patreon sponsors who make this show possible.

Jake:
[1:46] When co-host Emerita Nikki and I started this show nine years ago, I never dreamed that a time would come when 5,000 people would tune in every couple of weeks to hear me talk about Boston history. If you would have told me back then that we’d win a Preservation Achievement Award at about the same time that we got our one millionth download, I would have had to look to see why you were smoking. I never thought that the show would be this popular, and I never expected it to last this long. And at first, I didn’t think much about what it would take to do so.

Jake:
[2:20] As our expenses for things like podcast media hosting, AI and transcription tools, and access to research databases have grown over the years, the sponsors who support the show with $2, $5, or in a few cases $20 or more every month, have allowed us to keep pace. To everybody who’s already supporting the show, thank you. If you’re not yet supporting the show and you’d like to start, it’s easy. Just go to patreon.com slash hubhistory or visit hubhistory.com and click on the Support Us link. And thanks again to all our new and returning sponsors. Now it’s time for this week’s main topic. Before he set out for Lexington and Concord in April 1775, Paul Revere already had a reputation as a reliable express rider who could be counted on to carry the confidential correspondence of Boston’s patriot leaders. After the destruction of the Tea in Boston Harbor in December 1773, Paul Revere was chosen to ride to New York and Philadelphia with news of Boston’s action, inspiring those cities not to accept their own consignments of tea.

Jake:
[3:33] In May of 1774, he rode through Connecticut, the Jerseys, New York, and on to Philadelphia, carrying a copy of the Boston Port Act that shut down Boston’s economy, and a circular letter that rallied the other colonies to the cause of Massachusetts and helped inspire the First Continental Congress. That September, he carried the Suffolk Resolves to that first Congress. Then, in December 1774, he rode through a blizzard to Portsmouth, New Hampshire to warn of a possible powder raid there. We have a whole past episode about Revere’s other rides that you can listen to, which is episode 76. So, the ride to Lexington and Concord was just one of Paul Revere’s many missions as an express rider. And as we’ll soon see, he was just one of many riders who were crisscrossing the countryside between Boston and Concord on the night of April 18th, 1775. We remember his name, however, and not the others, largely because of a poem. Listen, my children, and you shall hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere. On the 18th of April in 75, hardly a man is now alive who remembers that famous day and year.

Jake:
[4:50] Those are the words of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Today, you can be pretty sure that nobody’s alive who remembers the night of April 18, 1775, but when Longfellow wrote those words in 1860, there was at least a slight possibility that somebody might have been. Eighty-five years had passed since the beginning of our American Revolution, and the nation was poised on the brink of another war. A friend of mine has an original copy of the 1863 edition of Longfellow’s Tales of a Wayside Inn, where the poem The Landlord’s Tale first appeared in book form. For good measure, I’ll throw a couple of pictures of the book in this week’s show notes. The poem was first published in the pages of the magazine Atlantic Weekly, and it ran just weeks before the shooting started at Fort Sumter. At that time, Paul Revere’s ride and the lantern signal from Old North Church were nearly forgotten details in the story of the battles of Lexington and Concord.

Longfellow’s Poetic Inspiration

Jake:
[5:54] Details that Longfellow was digging up to use as a signal of the watchful, details that Longfellow was digging up to use as a signal of the watchful symbol. Details that Longfellow was digging up to use as a symbol of the watchful prepare. That our country would need to weather the coming Civil War. Luckily for Longfellow, he could call on two detailed primary source documents to help recreate the events of that famous night, both of which were captured in the words of Paul Revere himself.

Jake:
[6:30] In 1775, just days after the ride itself, Revere gave a sworn deposition to the Provincial Congress describing what had happened that night. At the time, there were conflicting accounts of what had happened on April 19th to cause a shooting war to break out in the Boston suburbs. And there was basically a race between British sources and patriots to collect a comprehensive narrative of events and present that narrative to the king and parliament.

Jake:
[6:58] Revere’s deposition to the revolutionary shadow government that effectively controlled Massachusetts was an important piece of that narrative, one that’s still held by the Massachusetts Historical Society. The other first-person description of that midnight ride also comes from the pen of Paul Revere. This second account is a letter that he wrote to Jeremy Belknap, the founder of the Massachusetts Historical Society. The letter isn’t dated, but Belknap later said that it came from 1798, 23 years after the events took place.

Revere’s Eyewitness Accounts

Jake:
[7:32] The deposition and the letter do match in most important ways, but there are details in each that don’t appear in the other, so we’ll use both documents to compare Paul Revere’s best recollection of his famous ride to the details of Longfellow’s fanciful poem. We’ll start with the 1798 letter, which says, In the fall of 1774 and winter of 1775, I was one of upwards of 30 chiefly mechanics who formed ourselves into a committee for the purpose of watching the movements of the British soldiers and gaining every intelligence of the movements of the Tories. We held our meetings at the Green Dragon Tavern. We were so careful that our meetings should be kept secret that every time we met, every person swore upon the Bible that they would not discover any of our transactions but to Messrs. Hancock, Adams, Dr. Warren, Church, and one or two more.

Jake:
[8:30] There’s a long digression here about Revere’s suspicions that there was a Loyalist spy within their committee. Because Patriot spies heard secret conversations that were supposed to stay within the four walls of the Green Dragon repeated nearly word for word by British General Gage and the royal government of the colony. Paul Revere blamed Dr. Benjamin Church, the Boston physician who was a member of the Provincial Congress, the Committee of Safety, and basically the First Surgeon General as the Director General of the Continental Army’s Surgical Corps. Church was later revealed to be spying for General Gage, so Revere’s suspicions were probably correct.

Jake:
[9:11] The 1798 letter continues, In the winter, towards spring, we frequently took turns, two and two, to watch the soldiers by patrolling the streets all night. The Saturday night preceding the 19th of 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. We likewise found that the grenadiers and light infantry were all taken off duty. From these movements, we expected something serious was to be transacted. On Tuesday evening the 18th, it was observed that a number of soldiers were marching towards the bottom of the common. If we take the Longfellow poem a bit out of order, there’s a passage that corresponds to this part of the letter. Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, wanders and watches with eager ears, to lend the silence around him he hears, the muster of men at the barrack door, the sound of arms, the tramp of feet, and the measured tread of the grenadiers marching down to their boats on the shore.

Jake:
[10:21] Here, Longfellow’s imagination lines up pretty well with Paul Revere’s memory. The British troops were moving down towards the bottom of the common, to the shoreline along today’s Charles Street, where it’d be easy to board the boats that had been launched from the transports. Seeing this movement answered the question not only of when the raid on Concord would begin, but also how it would be carried out. If you listened to episode 321, you know that British General Thomas Gage had sent spies into the countryside around Boston to map the roads that led to Worcester and Concord in February and March. So by mid-April, he knew where his troops could march unobserved and where they might face ambushes. The decision Gage faced was whether to use boats to ferry his troops across the tidal back bay to Cambridge and have them start marching from there, or whether it would make more sense to have them cross the river at one of the bridges at Watertown or Newton by marching out Boston Neck. Until the first bridge connecting Boston to Charlestown was completed in 1786, the town of Boston could only be accessed by water or down the narrow spit of land known as Boston Neck. The Neck was only a couple of hundred feet wide, connecting the Shawmut Peninsula to the town of Roxbury, and lapped by the tides on both sides.

Jake:
[11:47] Since General Gage had taken over as Royal Governor of Massachusetts and commander of all British forces in North America, the defenses at Boston Neck had been beefed up considerably. New walls, taking the form of half of a star fort, bisected the low isthmus, with batteries of cannons on either side of the heavy city gate trained on the road coming in from the countryside. Where the walls ended at a tidal mudflat, rows of sharpened stakes were driven into the ground to keep anyone from skirting around the defenses unobserved, So anyone coming or going from the town of Boston had to submit to an examination by the Redcoats who stood guard at the gate. This quirk of Boston’s geography meant that the occupying Redcoats would be well defended from any potential attack from the countryside. But it also meant that it would add many miles to the march to Concord. So General Gage settled on an amphibious landing on the Cambridge shoreline near a point called Phipps Farm. It also made it very hard for the patriots who watched these British movements to get word out of Boston to the surrounding towns, where Minutemen were ready to march at a moment’s notice.

Jake:
[13:00] Like the Redcoats, our patriots more or less had the options of leaving by the neck and being questioned and possibly detained by the guards there, or rowing out of town, right under the guns of the many British Navy ships that were anchored all around the waterfront, and hoping that nobody on board these mighty ships saw you in your little rowboat.

Jake:
[13:23] Neither of those options sound exactly like foolproof plans on their own, which is why there was redundancy built in. Dr. Joseph Warren was the mastermind behind the Patriot spy network that Paul Revere and William Dawes were both part of. You can learn a lot more about the Roxbury-born physician turned son of liberty in our interview with Warren biographer Christian Despina in episode 103.

The Role of Joseph Warren

Jake:
[13:49] Suffice it to say for now that he was such a popular figure and a charismatic leader that many people have speculated that Joseph Warren would have been the first president of the United States, if that is, he hadn’t been killed at the Battle of Bunker Hill in June 1775.

Jake:
[14:06] Historians have long speculated about which of Warren’s spies was the informant who set the events of that night in motion, but one of the most convincing arguments that I’ve seen comes from Derek W. Beck in the Journal of the American Revolution. He argued that Warren himself probably walked the few minutes from his house to Boston Common to confirm that the Redcoats were preparing to board boats. However the movement was confirmed, it sparked a sense of urgency for Dr. Warren, as Paul Revere’s letter to Jeremy Belknap conveys. About ten o’clock, Dr. Warren sent in great haste for me, and begged that I would immediately set off for Lexington, where Messrs. Hancock and Adams were, meaning Samuel Adams, not John Adams, and acquaint them of the movement, and it was thought that they were the objects. When I got to Dr. Warren’s house, I found that he had sent an express by land to Lexington, a Mr. William Dawes.

Jake:
[15:08] Dawes was a militia officer and a member of the Sons of Liberty who would also act as an express rider on this extraordinary night. By most measures, he had the harder job. William Dawes would ride out through the gates at Boston Neck, just before the city curfew closed them for the night. We don’t know as much about his own midnight ride, because he didn’t leave detailed letters or depositions behind the way Paul Revere did. The version of the story that I like is that William Dawes passed himself off as a drunken farmer, perhaps someone who’d lingered too long at Boston’s taverns after coming into town to sell his wares at the markets here. After slurring and bluffing his way through the guarded gates, he’d have to ride almost twice as far as Paul Revere to achieve the same goals in Lexington and Concord. We’ll meet back up with William Dawes later in the evening, but he would never get as much credit for The Midnight Ride as Paul Revere, inspiring Helen Moore’s 1896 spoof poem, The Midnight Ride of William Dawes. “‘Tis all very well for the children to hear of The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere. But why should my name be quite forgot, who rode as boldly and, well, God what? Why, should I ask, the reason is clear, My name was Dawes, and his Revere.

Jake:
[16:32] J.L. Bell wrote a blog post way back in 2006 outlining the reasons why William Dawes isn’t as well-remembered as Paul Revere. And he basically points to William Dawes’ lack of political connections, rather than the unpoetical nature of his name. As a metalsmith, Paul Revere came from the working class of Boston, but he belonged to the group known as Mechanics. Meaning essentially skilled professional craftsmen. His customers were Boston’s rich and powerful, while his employees were from the laboring classes, giving him social and professional contact with a broad cross-section of Boston’s society. After the war, he would transition from hand craftsmanship to industrial-scale metalwork, earning a small fortune and a reputation in business that made his name still resonate for Longfellow over 40 years after Reverse’s death. While the name Dawes remained obscure, the poem added revolutionary fame to Paul Revere’s reputation as a businessman and a smith. Returning to the poem that makes us remember Paul Revere’s ride, the long second stanza gives us both his goal of spreading the alarm to every Middlesex village and farm, and the now-famous two-f-by-sea lantern signal from Old North that had also been all but forgotten by 1860.

Jake:
[17:56] He said to his friend, if the British march, by land or sea from the town tonight, hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch of the North Church Tower as a signal light, one if by land and two if by sea, and I on the opposite shore will be, ready to ride and spread the alarm through every Middlesex village and farm for the country folk to be up and to arm. Then he said goodnight, and with muffled oars, silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, just as the moon rose over the bay, where swinging wide at her moorings lay the Somerset, a British man of war, a phantom ship with each mast and bar across the moon like a prison bar, and a huge black hulk that was magnified by its own reflection in the tide.

Jake:
[18:46] Returning to Paul Revere’s 1798 letter to Jeremy Belknap, the details align pretty well with Longfellow’s poem, leaving us with little doubt that the poet reviewed the historical record before putting pen to paper.

The Lantern Signal Plan

Jake:
[19:00] The Sunday before, by the desire of Dr. Warren, I’d been to Lexington, to Messrs. Hancock and Adams, who were at the Reverend Mr. Clark’s. I returned at night through Charlestown. There, I agreed with Colonel Conant and some other gentlemen in Charlestown that if the British went out by water, we would show two lanterns in the North Church steeple, and if by land, one, as a signal. For we were apprehensive, it would be difficult to cross the Charles River or get over Boston Neck. I left Dr. Warren’s, called upon a friend, and desired him to make the signals. I then went home, took my boots and shirt out, meaning basically an overcoat, and went to the north part of the town, where I had kept a boat. Two friends rode me across Charles River, a little to the eastward where the Somerset Man of War lay. The real story is hardly less exciting than the poem. Revere dispatched a friend to light the lantern signal, long believed to be Old North Sexton or caretaker Robert Newman, and the lay leader and vestryman, Captain John Pulling Jr.

Jake:
[20:15] While he was waiting for these unnamed friends to light the lantern signal from Old North, Revere proceeded to the North End waterfront, where a small boat was waiting to row him across the narrow mouth of the Charles River to Charlestown on the other side, where his ride would actually begin. It’s somewhat unbelievable that he made it undetected. If you saw this scene in the movie, with a creaky rowboat and its partially muffled oars, rowing directly under the guns of a giant British warship with masts that seemed to scrape the stars above. You’d think that making it undetected would require too much suspension of disbelief. Somehow he made it, though. The sworn deposition that Revere signed in the spring of 1775 basically begins here, saying, I landed near Charlestown Battery, went in town, and there got a horse. While in Charlestown, I was informed by Richard Devins, Esquire, that he met that evening, after sunset, nine officers of the ministerial army. Nine officers of the ministerial army mounted on good horses and armed, going towards Concord. The 1798 letter adds a few colorful and key details to this version. The tide was just starting to rush in, and the moon was rising as Revere crossed.

Jake:
[21:39] Colonel Conan had seen the lantern signal, and the horse was loaned by Deacon Larkin. Revere’s letter also reiterates the warning that he got from Richard Devins about nine British officers on horseback riding toward Concord. Revere would have to be on the lookout for armed patrols, who were in turn on the lookout for, well, somebody like him. The fourth stanza of Longfellow’s poem dramatizes Newman and Pulling’s climb up into the Tower of Old North to hang the lanterns, ending with a nice line about seeing the British below in a line of black that bends and floats on the rising tide like a bridge of boats.

Jake:
[22:23] But the next stanza is where things really start going off the rails, historically speaking. Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride Booted and spurred with a heavy stride On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere Now he patted his horse’s side Now he gazed at the landscape far and near Then impetuous stopped the earth And turned and tightened his saddle girth But mostly he watched with eager search The belfry tower of the Old North Church As it rose above the graves on the hill, lonely and spectral, and somber and still. And lo, as he looks on the belfry’s height, a glimmer and then a gleam of light. He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns, but lingers and gazes, till full in his sight, a second lamp in the belfry burns.

Jake:
[23:18] We’ve already heard from Revere that he was the one who arranged the lantern signal, and he knew well that the British were boarding the longboats to cross to Cambridge and start their march from there. The lantern signals were sent from Paul Revere, so Paul Revere had no need to pace impatiently on the Charlestown shore while waiting on a lantern signal to Paul Revere. Here, the letter to Jeremy Belknap is a bit anticlimactic in comparison to the poem.

The Start of the Midnight Ride

Jake:
[23:48] I set off upon a very good horse. It was then about eleven o’clock and very pleasant. After I had passed Charlestown Neck and got nearly opposite where Mark was hung in chains, I saw two men on horseback under a tree. Before we talk about the two horsemen under the tree, what does Paul Revere mean when he uses the place where Mark was hung in chains as a landmark? This is a reference to one of the most brutal punishments ever meted out by the courts of Massachusetts. We have an entire past episode where you can hear about the two enslaved women who were executed by burning at the stake in this commonwealth, which is episode 27. It’s one of those early episodes that I need to re-record at some point, because, while I stand by the research, the writing, and my delivery aren’t up to today’s standards.

Jake:
[24:43] Both women who suffered this extreme punishment were convicted of rebelling against their enslavers. In 1681, a woman named Mariah burned the home in Roxbury, where she was enslaved, and perhaps might have killed a child. Then in 1755, a woman named Phyllis was convicted of poisoning her enslaver in Charlestown. At the time, men who were convicted of capital crimes would generally be hanged, though soldiers convicted in courts martial would have to face a firing squad. Within the traditions of the English legal system, torture, drawing, and quartering were considered immodest when used on a woman. Hanging was also seen as too revealing of a woman’s body, as the condemned was likely to dance and writhe in the air as the noose tightened, potentially allowing onlookers to glance up her petticoats or glimpse the outline of her body through her dress. Burning somebody alive was unspeakably cruel, but at least the condemned woman would be remembered as chaste.

Jake:
[25:49] In both these cases, where a woman was burned at the stake in Massachusetts, male accomplices were also convicted and sentenced to death. Both men were hanged, but as black men convicted of killing their enslavers, both faced additional humiliations after death.

Jake:
[26:07] In 1681, a man named Jack was sentenced to be hanged, and then his body was to be burned in the fire where Mariah was burned at the stake. In the 1755 case, a man named Mark was convicted alongside Phyllis. Their fates were recorded in the Boston Evening Post on September 18, 1755. Thursday last in the afternoon, Mark, a Negro man, and Phyllis, a Negro woman, both servants to the late Captain John Cobman of Charlestown, were executed at Cambridge for poisoning their said master. As mentioned in this paper some weeks ago. The fellow was hanged, and the woman burned at a stake about ten yards distant from the gallows. They both confessed themselves guilty of the crime for which they suffered, acknowledged the justice of their sentence, and died very penitent. After execution, the body of Mark was brought down to Charlestown Common and hanged in chains on a gibbet erected there for that purpose. The practice of gibbetting a body was well-established in England and North America at the time. After execution, the body of the condemned would be hung from a gallows-like structure, either in a cage or wrapped up in iron chains, as a deterrent to future crime.

Jake:
[27:32] Such bodies were often coated with tar as a preservative, and the chains a body was wrapped with helped keep the parts together as they decomposed.

Jake:
[27:42] A physician who passed through Charlestown in 1758 reported that Mark’s body barely showed signs of decomposition after three years, and research from a Dr. Josiah Bartlett concludes that his body hung there, quote, until a short time before the Revolution, making the spot a familiar landmark for Paul Revere to reference 20 years after the execution to point out where he spotted two British officers lurking in the shadows.

Jake:
[28:09] With all the imaginary drama that Longfellow inserted into his description of the midnight ride, he actually misses this moment of real historical drama, when Paul Revere was nearly caught by the British right there in Charlestown before his ride had really even begun. In his 1775 deposition, Paul Revere described an encounter that took place just moments after he mounted his horse to ride toward Lexington. I saw two officers on horseback standing under the shade of a tree in a narrow part of the road. I was near enough to see their holsters and cockades. One of them started his horse towards me, the other up the road, as I supposed to head me should I escape the first. I turned my horse short about and rode upon a full gallop from Mystic Road. He followed me about three hundred yards. and finding he could not catch me, returned. In the 1798 letter, Revere adds the detail that the second officer who chased him tried to head him off at the pass by cutting a corner, but his horse got slowed down by the mud around a small pond, allowing the patriot to give him the slip.

The Chase Begins

Jake:
[29:23] Longfellow skips this whole encounter, instead blathering on about how the fate of the nation was riding alongside Revere. The poet then proceeded to outline the timeline of Revere’s ride to Lexington, with a bit of foreshadowing of the bloodshed that would follow at daybreak. It was twelfth by the village clock when he crossed the bridge into Medford Town. He heard the crowing of the cock and the barking of the farmer’s dog, and felt the damp of the river’s fog that rises after the sun goes down. It was one by the village clock when he galloped into Lexington. He saw the gilded weathercock swim in the moonlight as he passed, and the meeting-house windows, blank and bare, gazed at him with a spectral glare, as if they already stood aghast at the bloody work they would look upon.

Jake:
[30:18] The timing in Paul Revere’s 1798 letter is less exact, but the sequence of events is basically correct. He wrote, I went through Medford, over the bridge, and up to Monotomy. Monotomy being the old section of Arlington. In Medford, I awaked the captain of the Minutemen, and after that, I alarmed almost every house till I got to Lexington. I found Messrs. Hancock and Adams at the Reverend Mr. Clark’s. I told them my errand and acquired for Mr. Dawes. They said that he had not been there. I related the story of the two officers and supposed that he must have been stopped, as he ought to have been there before me. After I had been there about a half an hour, Mr. Dawes came in. After we refreshed ourselves, we set off for Concord to secure the stores there. Reverend Mr. Clark was Jonas Clark, a Harvard-educated minister who took over as pastor of Lexington’s Christ Church after the previous minister, named John Hancock, retired. This John Hancock was an uncle to our founding father, John Hancock. And our familiar John Hancock actually lived in this home for a few years when he was a small child, after his father died and before he went to live with his other uncle, the wealthy Thomas Hancock, from whom he inherited a mansion on Beacon Hill and a sprawling business empire.

Jake:
[31:43] In the spring of 1775, our John Hancock was staying in this familiar home along with Samuel Adams as a guest of Reverend Clark. The two leaders had been delegates to the Provincial Congress that had been meeting in Concord. They rightly felt that it wasn’t safe for them to return to Boston between that body’s meeting and their trip to Philly, where they’d serve as delegates to the Second Continental Congress that declared independence 15 months later.

Jake:
[32:11] As Dawes and Revere started toward Concord to warn the rest of the Provincial Congress about this potential raid, they ran into Samuel Prescott, a young Concord physician who was on his way home from Lexington, where he was probably courting a young lady who’d soon become his wife. Revere’s 1798 letter describes how the young doctor joined their mission for the next leg of that midnight ride. We were overtaken by a young Dr. Prescott, whom we found to be a high son of liberty. I told them of the ten officers that Mr. Devins met, and that it was possible we might be stopped before we got to Concord.

Encountering British Officers

Jake:
[32:48] For I supposed that after night they divided themselves, and that two of them had fixed themselves in such passages as were most likely to stop any intelligence going to Concord. I likewise mentioned that we had better alarm all the inhabitants till we got to Concord. The young doctor much approved of it, and said that he would stop with either of us, for the people between there and Concord knew him and would give them more credit to what we said. We had got nearly halfway. Mr. Dawes and the doctor stopped to alarm the people of a house. I was about 100 rods ahead when I saw two men in nearly the same situation as those officers were near Charlestown.

Jake:
[33:28] Saying that they were nearly in the same situation as the officers near Charlestown means that there were two more redcoats in horseback and they were hiding in the shadows along the road. Unfortunately for the three riders, Revere had missed the other redcoats who were hiding nearby. In his 1775 deposition, he swore, I called to my company to come up, saying here was two of them. In an instant, I saw four of them who rode up to me with their pistols in their hands and said, God damn you, stop! If you go an inch farther, you are a dead man! Immediately, Mr. Prescott came up, and we attempted to get through them. But they kept before us, and swore if we did not turn into that pasture, they would blow our brains out. They had placed themselves opposite to a pair of bars, and had taken the bars down.

Jake:
[34:19] Here, Revere’s saying that the British officers had taken down a section of rail fence to create an impromptu gate into a roadside pasture. I can’t quite tell from his description, but they might have used the rails to help block the road. Either way, the Patriot riders were suddenly outnumbered and split up. Dawes wheeled his horse away, while Revere and Prescott were forced to turn into the pasture after failing to break through the British line. The deposition continues, They forced us in. When we had got in, Mr. Prescott said, Put on. Meaning, basically, hit the gas or step on it. He took to the left, I to the right towards a wood at the bottom of the pasture, intending, when I gained that, to jump off my horse and run afoot. Just as I reached it, out started six officers who seized my bridle, put their pistols to my breast, and ordered me to dismount, which I did.

Jake:
[35:18] Paul Revere managed to draw the attention of most of the British officers, who were too preoccupied with dragging him off his horse at gunpoint to stop William Dawes from galloping off. Dawes’ family legend says that two redcoats chased him, but he led them into the front yard of a farmhouse and started yelling about springing the trap that he had laid for them. A century after the events, Dawes’ granddaughter remembered what he had told people about this bit of subterfuge. He thought himself pursued by two horsemen who were following him, and rode rapidly up to a farmhouse, slapping his leather breeches and stopping so suddenly that his watch was thrown from his pocket, and shouting, Hello, my boys! I’ve got two of them! His pursuers turned their horses and rode off, but he did not stop to pick up his watch, though he found it there some days afterwards in safekeeping.

Jake:
[36:11] Samuel Prescott also used the distraction that Revere caused to make good his escape. A footnote that was added to a draft of his 1775 deposition, also by Revere, notes, I found since that he knew the ground, for he lived within three or four miles. He jumped his horse over the wall and got to Concord.

Revere’s Capture

Jake:
[36:33] So with William Dawes on the run and Paul Revere in custody, the crucial message that the Redcoats were on the march would be carried to Concord by Samuel Prescott. Today, Paul Revere’s capture site is a waypoint along the Battle Road Trail that you can visit for the 250th anniversary season.

Jake:
[36:52] Now, this is where Longfellow’s poem completely departs from reality. We know from the details that he included earlier that he had reviewed at least one of Paul Revere’s first-hand accounts of the night’s events, Probably that 1798 letter. But apparently having the protagonist get captured doesn’t make for good poetry, because the fictional Paul Revere has no problems with redcoats forcing him into a pasture. It was two by the village clock when he came to the bridge in Concord Town. He heard the bleeding of the flock and the twitter of birds among the trees and felt the breath of the morning breeze blowing over the meadows brown. And one was safe and asleep in his bed Who at the bridge would be the first to fall Who that day would be lying dead Pierced by a British musket ball.

Jake:
[37:48] Despite what Longfellow wrote, Paul Revere himself never made it to Concord. However, if you thought that Revere’s famous ride was over just because he’d been captured by British officers and held at gunpoint, you would be mistaken. The deposition that he dictated and swore to in 1775 continues, One of them, who appeared to have the command there and much of a gentleman, asked me where I came from. I told him. He asked what time I left it. I told him. He seemed surprised and said, Sir, may I crave your name? I answered, My name is Revere. What, said he, Paul Revere? I answered, yes. The others abused much, but he told me not to be afraid. No one should hurt me. I told them that they would miss their aim. He said they should not. They were only awaiting for some deserters they expected down the road. I told him that I knew better. I knew what they were after. That I had alarmed the country all the way up. That their boats were catched aground, and I should have 500 men there soon. One of them said that they had 1,500 coming. He seemed surprised and rode off into the road and informed them who took me.

Jake:
[39:10] It was evident that the Redcoats knew the name Paul Revere. So the first officer who questioned him rode back to his commanding officer, a major, and told him who the patrol had captured. In the 1798 letter, Paul Revere’s account continues, All five of them came down upon a full gallop. One of them, whom I afterwards found out to be Major Mitchell of the 5th Regiment, clapped his pistol to my head, called me by name, and told him he was going to ask me some questions, And if I did not give him true answers, he would blow my brains out.

Jake:
[39:46] The Major had also heard the name Revere, and he also had questions for the Patriot Express rider. In his 1775 deposition, Paul Revere basically says that he stood tall, told the British exactly what he was doing on the highway that night, and barely stopped short of laughing in the Major’s face. I told him I esteemed myself a man of truth, that he had stopped me on the highway and made me a prisoner. I knew not by what right. I would tell him the truth. I was not afraid. He then asked me the same questions that the other did, and many more, but was more particular. I gave him much the same answers.

Jake:
[40:29] Satisfied that the capture of their high-value prisoner would disrupt the ability of the express riders to call out the militia, the band of redcoats prepared to fall back to Lexington, where they were to link up with the main column of troops as they were passing through on their way to Concord. His 1775 deposition describes the precautions that the officers took in moving Revere, as well as his surprise when four more prisoners suddenly materialized out of the darkness. He then ordered me to mount my horse. They first searched me for pistols. When I was mounted, the Major took the reins out of my hand and said, By God, sir, you are not to ride with reins, I assure you, and gave them to an officer on my right to lead me. He then ordered four men out of the bushes and to mount their horses. They were countrymen, which they had stopped to her going home, then ordered us to march. He said to me, We are now going towards your friends, and if you attempt to run or we are insulted, we’ll blow your brains out. When we had got into the road, they formed a circle and ordered the prisoners into the center and to lead me in the front.

Jake:
[41:41] It’s not 100% clear in the deposition, but the four men who came out of the bushes were likely also express riders. Paul Revere and William Dawes were far from the only horsemen roaming the countryside that night.

The Spread of the Alarm

Jake:
[41:54] In a past blog post, J.L. Bell explored the possibility that Revere was only a backup rider for a different express rider who was captured in Charlestown while starting on the ride to Concord after the lantern signals. And certainly as Dawes and Revere warned militia officers along the way to Lexington and Concord, they also activated a larger Patriot alarm network. More riders, perhaps dozens or more, fanned out from the routes that Revere and Dawes took, carrying the warning further in all directions across eastern Massachusetts and even eventually into southern New Hampshire. So that by sunrise, town militias from all over the region were on the march toward Concord in response to the British march and Joseph Warren’s signal. While the word was spreading, our most famous rider was still in British custody, with a letter to Jeremy Belknap relating how Revere received at least the third threat to blow his brains out that evening.

Jake:
[42:52] When we got to the road, they turned down toward Lexington. When we had got about one mile, the major rode up to the officer that was leading me and told him to give me to the sergeant. As soon as he took me, the Major ordered him that if I attempted to run or anybody insulted them, to blow my brains out.

Jake:
[43:12] As the five prisoners and their escort of British officers approached Lexington, the Redcoats started to get nervous. There had already been much more activity on the roads that night than they were comfortable with, and now they could tell that Lexington was not sleeping as peacefully as its reputation, both today and in 1775, would have indicated. The militia had mustered on the town common the evening before, but then when the British didn’t come, they were tired to Buckman’s Tavern to have a few drinks and get a little sleep.

Jake:
[43:45] Now, in the normally silent hours before dawn, Revere’s deposition notes that the British patrol was spooked by an unexpected sound. When we got within about a half mile of the meeting house, we heard a gun fired. The major asked me what it was for. I told him to alarm the country. He ordered the four prisoners to dismount. They did. Then one of the officers dismounted and cut the bridles and saddles off the horses and drove them away and told the men they might go about their business. I asked the major to dismiss me. He said they would carry me, let the consequence be what it will. He then ordered us to march.

Jake:
[44:29] When we got within sight of the meeting house, we heard a volley of guns fired, as I supposed at the tavern, as an alarm. The major ordered us to halt. He asked me how far it was to Cambridge, which I just want to interject here that this major had clearly not seen the report and map that Henry D. Bernier and William Brown created on their spy mission to Concord just weeks before which you can hear more about in episode 321. He asked me how far it was to Cambridge and many more questions which I answered. He then asked the sergeant if his horse was tired. He said yes. He ordered him to take my horse. I dismounted. The sergeant mounted my horse. They cut the bridle and saddle off the sergeant’s horse and rode off down the road.

Jake:
[45:20] With that, Paul Revere was free again, but on foot. In his 1798 letter, he describes how he made his way back to Lexington, where he had awakened Samuel Adams and John Hancock a little while earlier.

Jake:
[45:34] I went across the burying ground and some pastures and came to the Reverend Mr. Clark’s house, where I found Messrs. Hancock and Adams. I told them of my treatment, and they concluded to go from that house towards Woburn. I went with them and a Mr. Lowell, who was a clerk to Mr. Hancock. When we got to the house where they intended to stop, Mr. Lowell and myself returned to Mr. Clark’s to find what was going on. When we got there, an elderly man came in. He said he had just come from the tavern, that a man had come from Boston who said that there were no British troops coming. Mr. Lowell and myself went towards the tavern when we met a man on a full gallop who told us that the troops were coming up the rocks. This messenger was Thaddeus Bowman, one of several scouts from the Lexington militia who had been dispatched to watch for the British approach. The British had landed in Cambridge around midnight, but by the time they unloaded all their gear and got assembled into a marching column, it was 2 a.m. Now the scout Bowman had spotted them on the road near Lexington at about 4.15 a.m.

Jake:
[46:42] Revere’s 1775 deposition says that the Redcoats were within two miles at this point. His 1798 letter continues, We afterwards met another who said that they were close by. Mr. Lowell asked me to go up to the tavern with him to get a trunk of papers belonging to Mr. Hancock. We went up to the chamber, and while we were getting the trunk, we saw the British very near. upon a full march.

The British Approach

Jake:
[47:08] Having seen the British column outside with their own eyes, the two men moved quickly. John Hancock and Samuel Adams knew that they were wanted men and would likely hang if they fell into British hands. A few months later, after the war was fully underway, General Gage offered any rebels a pardon for laying down their arms and turning themselves in, but he was careful to exclude Hancock and Adams. They would be given no quarter. The 1775 deposition describes how John Hancock’s aide and Paul Revere managed to slip out of town just moments before the advance guard under Major John Pitcairn arrived outside and started assembling on the town common. We made haste and had to pass through our militia, who were on a green behind the meeting house, to the number, as I supposed, about 50 or 60. I went through them. As I passed, I heard the commanding officer speak to his men to this purpose. Let the troops pass by and don’t molest them without they begin first.

Jake:
[48:12] The commanding officer of the Lexington Militia was Captain John Parker, a veteran of the Seven Years’ War and the Siege of Louisbourg that we discussed back in Episode 132. In the spring of 1775, Parker was suffering from advanced tuberculosis, which had rendered his voice very quiet and very hoarse. So you can imagine a tense hush falling over the few dozen militia as they leaned forward and strained to hear their captain’s words. Parker’s order is remembered on a granite monument on Lexington Green as Stand your ground. Don’t fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here.

Jake:
[48:55] Moments later, a shot rang out. It’s remembered as the shot heard round the world for its role in launching the American Revolution, but nobody knows for sure which side fired first. In his deposition, Revere says that he turned his head immediately after hearing that first shot and saw that the smoke was coming from the British side.

The Shot Heard ‘Round the World

Jake:
[49:19] This version of events obviously best supports the Patriot claims that ministerial troops fired on the colonial militia with no provocation. However, Paul Revere’s version of events in his 1798 letter, long after it ceased to truly matter who shot first, is more ambivalent. When we had got about 100 yards from the meeting house, the British troops appeared on both sides of the meeting house. In their front was an officer on horseback. They made a short halt when I saw and heard a gun fired, which appeared to be a pistol. Then I could distinguish two guns, and then a continual roar of musketry.

Jake:
[50:01] Reverend Jonas Clark stayed behind while Paul Revere helped Lowell get the trunk belonging to Hancock and Adams out of the parsonage. So the minister stood witness to the bloodshed that followed. Clark’s diary entry for April 19th, 1775 says, Clear. Regulars fired upon our men in Lexington. Killed ten of this town and thirty of other places and wounded many. Burned houses. While it strays far from a faithful retelling of the midnight ride, the description of that morning in Longfellow’s poem still evokes a stirring of patriotism. You know the rest, in the books you have read. How the British regulars fired and fled. How the farmers gave them ball for ball, from behind each fence and farmyard wall. Chasing the redcoats down the lane, then crossing the fields to emerge again. Under the trees at the turn of the road, and only pausing to fire and load.

Jake:
[51:06] The gathering militias turned the British raid back from Concord and pursued the column all the way back to Charlestown, while the Redcoats were ferried back to the Boston side of the river. By the end of the day, over a hundred were dead and two hundred wounded on both sides.

Revere’s Post-Ride Life

Jake:
[51:22] The colonial militias would surround Boston while the British were trapped inside, launching an 11-month siege that ended with a British evacuation on March 17, 1776.

Jake:
[51:36] Paul Revere would go on to serve with the Massachusetts Train of Artillery during the war, with disastrous results that you can hear about in our episode 25. He would gain great renown for his copper rolling mill and bronze foundry as Boston rapidly industrialized in the decades after the war. April 19th didn’t mark the end of his work as an express rider, however. Especially in the weeks immediately after the battles at Concord and Lexington, the Committee of Safety that was coordinating the siege of Boston used Paul Revere as their favorite courier. Revere submitted an invoice to the legislature, quote, for riding for the Committee of Safety from April 21st, 1775 to May 7th. He billed them for his time and trouble, for his expenses and those of his horse, and for the expense of keeping two horses belonging to the province fed. The grand total came to £8.01. And amazingly, you can actually see the handwritten invoice at the Commonwealth Museum, which is right next to the UMass Boston campus in Dorchester, in an exhibit that will only be on display through June 17, 2025.

Resources and Further Reading

Jake:
[52:50] To learn more about Paul Revere’s ride, check out this week’s show notes at hubhistory.com slash 324. I’ll have links to the text of the Longfellow poem, to Paul Revere’s 1775 deposition about his ride, and to a 1798 letter to Jeremy Belknap about that night, both of which are at the Mass Historical Society. I’ll link to the invoice that Paul Revere submitted for his rise immediately following that famous ride, and to the exhibit where you can see it at the Commonwealth Museum.

Jake:
[53:24] Along with those, you’ll find links to the text of the spoof poem about William Dawes’ ride, and an article from J.L. Bell about that poem, to Derek W. Beck’s article speculating that Joseph Warren didn’t have an informant on the night of Paul Revere’s ride, and to a video from Jamie Crumley, a researcher for Old North, about the execution of Mark, who was gibbeted in Charlestown. There will be pictures that I took of Reverend Jonas Clark’s diary entry about the battle on Lexington Green, and my friend’s original edition of Tales from a Wayside Inn that includes The Landlord’s Tale, plus a map and illustration of the fortifications on Boston Neck from the Leventhal Map Collection at the Boston Public Library. Plus, I’ll link to past episodes that include Paul Revere’s less famous rides, Paul Revere’s court-martial for cowardice after the American defeat at Kenebeck, the first bridge over the Charles River in Boston, the life of the forgotten Patriot hero Joseph Warren, and, of course, our recent episode about the British spies who scouted the roads to Concord in the weeks before Paul Revere’s ride.

Jake:
[54:33] If you’d like to relive the night of April 18th, there are a lot of events scheduled in Boston on the anniversary this year, including a visit with Paul Revere at his house, a play about the decision to hang two lanterns in the steeple of Old North, Paul Revere’s Row Across the Charles, and more. You can find all the details at oldnorth.com slash 250th, which, of course, I’ll also have a link to in the show notes.

Closing Remarks and Contact Information

Jake:
[55:00] If you’d like to get in touch with us, you can email podcast at hubhistory.com. I still have profiles for Hub History on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, and I’ll respond to your messages there. But lately, I mostly post and interact with listeners on Blue Sky. You can find me on Blue Sky by searching for hubhistory.com. I haven’t been quite as active on Mastodon, but you can find me there as at hubhistoryatbetter.boston. If you’ve unplugged from the social media machine, just go to hubhistory.com and click on the Contact Us link. While you’re on the site, hit the Subscribe link, and be sure that you never miss an episode. If you subscribe on Apple Podcasts, please consider writing us a brief review. If you do, drop me a line, and I’ll send you a Hub History sticker as a token of appreciation.

Jake:
[55:55] That’s all for now. Stay safe out there, listeners.