Amos Doolittle's engraving of the battle on April 19,1775 at North Bridge, Concord, Massachusetts. Photogravure from the autograph centenary edition of The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson (Boston, 1903).
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We set today a votive stone;
That memory may their deed redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.
Battle Monument at the North Bridge. Photogravure from the autograph centenary edition of The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson.
These are the words of Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Concord Hymn," composed for the July 4, 1837 dedication of the monument erected at Concord's North Bridge to commemorate the battle at that site on April 19, 1775. A limited autograph centenary edition of the complete works of Ralph Waldo Emerson is in the Harry F. Guggenheim Collection in Special Collections & Archives. The edition comprises twelve volumes, each one bound in three-quarter green crushed morocco over marbled boards, with gilt titling and gilt tooling on a spine of six compartments, gilt top edge, marbled endpapers, and a green silk ribbon marker. Harry Guggenheim's set is number 51 of 600 copies with the publisher's (Houghton Mifflin Company) signature in the first volume as well as a manuscript in Emerson's hand tipped in after the half-title. Emerson lived in Concord from 1835 until his death in 1882, so was very familiar with the history of the town. His grandfather, the Reverend William Emerson, who lived at what is now called the Old Manse, left a record of what happened in Concord on that fateful spring day in 1775.
The autograph centenary edition of The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson is bound in crushed green morocco over marbled boards. The limitation statement with the publisher's autograph appears in volume 1.
"The Old Manse." Photogravure from the autograph centenary edition of The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson. This house was the home of the Reverend William Emerson, Ralph Waldo Emerson's grandfather, when the battle of Concord took place.
Ralph Waldo Emerson in 1847 from volume 1 of the autograph centenary edition of The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and the title page of volume 9.
Dr. Samuel Prescott, who had joined Paul Revere and William Dawes in spreading the alarm that British regulars had marched out of Boston to seize the colony's military stores in Concord, was the only one of the three riders to reach the town, arriving around 2 a.m. Soon the courthouse bell rang out in warning and militiamen and minutemen began to assemble at Wright Tavern in the town square. In the fall of 1774, the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts had asked all men between the ages of 16 and 50 to enlist in the militia. It had recommended that one-quarter of this group should be organized in "minute companies" ready to march "at the shortest notice" and that an "alarm list" be formed of men aged 50 to 70, who were to be ready to serve in dire emergency. By some accounts, the Reverend Emerson was the first to muster. Colonel James Barrett supervised moving the cannon, gunpowder, and other supplies to more secure locations and concealing what remained. Dr. Prescott rode out of town to spread the alarm through the countryside. A messenger sent to obtain information on the British troops arrived at Lexington just in time to see the redcoats fire on the militiamen on the green. He immediately spurred his horse back to Concord where he relayed the news to Major John Buttrick. As the sun rose on Concord, minutemen and militia companies from other towns had arrived, determined to face the British regulars.
The Minute Man, the work of sculptor Daniel Chester French (1850-1931). Photogravure from the autograph centenary edition of The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith's column of British light infantry and grenadiers, having regrouped after the bloodletting on Lexington Green, proceeded on their march to Concord, their bayonets glinting in the sun. They arrived in town around 9 a.m. Two bridges spanned the Concord River. Smith ordered one company of light infantry to secure the South Bridge and seven companies, under the command of Lieutenant Lawrence Parsons, to secure the North Bridge and look for military stores at Colonel Barrett's home, about two miles beyond the bridge. Leaving three companies, about 115 men, at the bridge under the command of Captain Walter Laurie, Parsons set off with the other four to search Barrett's property. Meanwhile, Colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn with the grenadiers oversaw the search of individual houses in town. The militia, minutemen, and alarm list, about 500 men, had moved to a hill overlooking North Bridge.
Engraving after Amos Doolittle's engraving of the British regulars in Concord. In the foreground are Major John Pitcairn and Colonel Francis Smith. Major Pitcairn is observing the militia and minutemen on the hill. From Frederic Hudson, "The Concord Fight," Harper's New Monthly Magazine, 50 (May 1875).
Of the three companies of light infantry at the North Bridge, two were on the west bank of the river and one on the east. Seeing smoke rising from the center of town, the New Englanders began to march down the hill. The two forward companies of light infantry moved back across the bridge. Several shots rang out from the British side, then a ragged volley, which killed Captain Isaac Davis and Abner Hosmer, both of Acton. At this point, Major John Buttrick of Concord shouted, "Fire, fellow-soldiers! for God's sake, fire!" The militia fired at the compact formation of light infantry, hitting four officers, killing three soldiers, and wounding nine. The regulars broke and ran back to town. Colonel Barrett sent Buttrick's minutemen across the bridge, where they took up a defensive position on a hill behind a stone wall. Colonel Smith marched the grenadiers to within 200 yards of the minutemen, beyond musket range, then fell back to town. The companies at Barrett's farm, hearing musket fire, hurried back to the bridge. Seeing their fallen comrades, they began to run for fear of being cut off from the main body. The New Englanders, however, held their fire.
"The Struggle on Concord Bridge," engraving after the painting by Alonzo Chappel (1828-1887) from Robert Tomes, Battles of America by Sea and Land (New York, 1861).
"Retreat of the British from Concord," engraving after the painting by Alonzo Chappel (1828-1887) from Henry B. Dawson, Battles of the United States by Sea and Land (New York, 1858).
By 11:30 a.m., all the regulars were back in the center of Concord, but for some reason Colonel Smith waited another half hour before marching out of town to return to Boston. In the Reverend Emerson's words, "the enemy, by their marches and counter-marches, discovered great fickleness and inconstancy of mind...till, at length they quitted the town." By this time, more and more militiamen were gathering to oppose the British troops. They harried the regulars on their march back to Lexington. At Meriam's Corner, the British fired a volley at militia companies that had gathered for attack. The New Englanders returned fire, killing at least two soldiers and wounding an officer. Engagements occurred again at the Bloody Curve, Parker's Revenge (Hardy's Hill), and Fiske Hill. Smith was wounded in the thigh at Parker's Revenge, where Captain John Parker's Lexington militia company, avenging its earlier encounter with the regulars, opened fire on the advance guard of the British column. At Fiske Hill, the militia wounded and unhorsed Major Pitcairn, whose frightened steed ran away with his silver-mounted pistols. As the troops approached Lexington, they saw the reinforcements General Gage had sent out under Hugh, earl Percy. Percy had two field guns with him that he used to scatter the militia. He would later write to his father, "I had the happiness...of saving them [Colonel Smith's column] from inevitable destruction." After giving the light infantry and grenadier companies time to regroup, Percy ordered the regulars to resume the march to Boston. All along the route, they were surrounded by militia, who kept up a persistent fire. Percy wrote, "We retired for 15 miles under an incessant fire, which like a moving circle surrounded and followed us wherever we went." By sunset, the exhausted regulars were in Charlestown, where the wounded were ferried back across the Charles River to Boston.
"Merriam's [sic] Corner, on the Lexington Road" from Frederic Hudson, "The Concord Fight," Harper's New Monthly Magazine, May, 1875.
Hugh, earl Percy (1742-1817) from James Murray An Impartial History of the Present War in America (Newcastle upon Tyne, 1779-1780).
The British lost 73 killed, 174 wounded, and 26 missing; the militia lost 49 killed, 41 wounded, and 5 missing. News of the bloodshed at Lexington and Concord sped rapidly throughout the colonies. Massachusetts ensured that it's version of what had happened reached England before General Gage's official report. Many were shocked, and a number of individuals, who had not thought of independence from Britain prior to April 19, now considered it the only course. On May 10, the Second Continental Congress would convene in Philadelphia. In June, the delegates would create the Continental Army and in October the Continental Navy. The Rubicon had been crossed.
"'Burning Bush'--The Two Monuments" from Frederic Hudson, "The Concord Fight," Harper's New Monthly Magazine, 50 (May 1875). The Minute Man statue is located near the spot where Captain Isaac Davis and Abner Hosmer fell in battle with British light infantry at the North Bridge on April 19, 1775. According to Hudson, for many years the spot was marked by a bush, which Ralph Waldo Emerson referred to in his remarks at the dedication of the Battle Monument as "the little bush that marks the spot where Captain Davis fell. 'Tis the burning bush where God spake for his people."
Sources:
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1903. PS1600.F03 1903-1904b
Fischer, David Hackett. Paul Revere's Ride. New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. F69.R43F57 1994
Frothingham, Richard. History of the Siege of Boston, and of the Battles of Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill. 2d ed. Boston: Little and Brown, 1851. E231.F93 1851
Hudson, Frederic "The Concord Fight," Harper's New Monthly Magazine, 50 (May 1875): 777-804.
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