Posted: 4/18/2006 8:23:50 PM EDT
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* American Revolution Began at Lexington & Concord April 19, 1775 (over firearm-confiscation) * The first blood of the American Civil War is shed April 19, 1861 * Warsaw Ghetto Uprising begins April 19, 1943 * Bay of Pigs Invasion ended in failure April 19, 1961 * Black Panthers armed with guns take over Cornell Univ. April 19, 1969 * BATF storms Branch Davidians at Waco April 19, 1993 * Oklahoma City Bombing April 19, 1995 * I posted this list April 19, 2006 |
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I was 19, in school. I went to Mr Gatti's for lunch buffet before work that afternoon. I was chowing down on grub, and they showed the building in OKC... I just about dropped my food and my jaw... |
Government should fear the people. |
Ralph Waldo Emerson's "The Concord Hymn", sung in 1837 at the dedication of the obelisk monument at the site of the then-no-longer-existing North Bridge (taken out in 1793, then re-erected, 1875) on the occasion of the Concord Fight of 4-19-1775. The Concord Hymn was put to the tune of the old church hymn, "The Old Hundredth" or "Doxology". Emerson's grandfather was Rev. William Emerson, the chaplain for the Concord Militia in 1775. In the choir in 1837 singing the song, was, among others, a teenaged Henry David Thoreau.
Ummmm...that's Lexington Green, not Concord. It's also an inaccurate pic- the Lexington Training Band (militia, there were no Minutemen in Lexington) had unloaded guns, never got a chance to stand, load and fire- they were gunned and bayonetted to death by the government troops. It was not a heroic stand, but rather a Tien-an-Men style massacre, actually. 
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I was there on Monday, 6 AM, as part of the Redcoats, reenacting the annual event of the fight on Lexington Green. I then changed into my work clothes and went to work at the next place.....
The places are idyllic and unspectacular, but the people there were anything but ordinary. People who were willing to commit murder and treason against their own government to get their freedom back- that takes uncommon valor and faith. 
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Ummmm.....no, it did not. It began over who was going to control Massachusetts: the new military government, or the civilian, locally elected government. The latter had been dissolved by the British government in 1774. It still met anyway, in defiance of imperial law. Massachusetts was the most rebellious of the British colonies. The British King and his ministers were terrified that Britain would lose its hard-fought, hard-won empire if the idea of rebellion spread. They were determined to not let this fire spread, lest Britain go back to being dictated to by the more powerful Spanish and French empires. Britain owned the 13 colonies, and the colonists in Massachusetts saw themselves still as British. That was why they were rebelling- they wanted their civil rights as Englishmen back. Independence and gun rights were the last things on most people's minds. General Thomas Gage, military governor of Massachusetts, head of all British military forces in N. America in 1775, never ordered his men to attempt to confiscate any civilian or militia-owned small arms on or before April 19, 1775. The British expedition's orders were to destroy military arms and supplies, such as cannon, ammunition, food stores, gun carriages. They didn't go BATFE-style, JBT/house-to-house searching, and confiscating guns, and arresting gun owners. That's a myth, folks- it never happened 4/19/1775. Unfortunately, some soldiers disobeyed orders (confirmed at Concord, still not certain who fired first at Lexington hours before) and started shooting anyways. The result was that they ignited a civil war which grew into a revolution, and then a world war, which changed the course of the history of the entire world. Their orders were to leave private people and private property alone, but only to confiscate and destroy crew-served weapons and army supplies which could be used against them in a war. The colonial militias were duly authorized to defend the colonies, and had indeed, been supplied and subsidized by the British government in the past, since militia are cheaper to maintain than standing armies. That they were now being used against their own government's troops was an irony not lost on anybody.  Later on, during the siege of Boston until 3-17-1776, if Bostonians wished to leave British-held Boston to move to the countryside (which was held by the Patriots) they had to turn in all personally-owned and militia weapons, as they left. Surprisingly, quite a few did, but Massachusetts was, as the gun-grabbers say nowadays, "awash in guns" and they could be replaced cheaply. 
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Great quote, but Capt. John Parker never said it. It was the creation of people in the 19th century trying to put a better spin on the utterly shattering defeat of the militia at Lexington Green. What he did say was something akin to "Let the King's troops pass, don't molest them." He was in the midst of dispersing his militiamen when the shooting started. He wasn't going to have his men turn tail and run away as scared individuals, but rather, he dismissed them military fashion, and the men were to go back to their homes and await further orders. However, since Parker was sick with tuberculosis, (he died a few moths later) few men could hear his raspy voice give the order, and most of his 77 men still remained in ranks when the shooting started, very quickly becoming unarmed targets, since they had unloaded their guns by discharging them a few minutes before. They had thought the government troops were not coming, and that the whole thing was yet another false alarm. However the Redcoats had loaded their guns, and also fixed bayonets, since they had heard that thunderous crash of muskets from a couple of miles away. Exhausted, cold, wet, muddy, the scared Redcoats now had itchy trigger fingers on loaded guns. We don't know who fired the first shot at Lexington, but the British light infantry there, the advance guard of the main force, certainly thought THEY were about to be mowed down by unseen enemies in the mist between night and dawn, and reacted accordingly, ignoring their officers' orders to not shoot.
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At the risk of sounding like a curmudgeon, Longfellow's poem is full of crap. Revere was a hero, but not a lone hero. And he didn't say, "The British are coming." Everybody in MA in 1775 was British, and nobody would have understood him. What he and other alarm riders such as William Dawes said was, "Turn out, townsmen- the Regulars are out!"= Assemble, militiamen, the regular army is leaving Boston and is marching out into the countryside. He worked with many other alarm riders, spies and committees to help organize the resistance. And he never made it to Concord- Dr Samuel Prescott did. Revere was almost forgotten when Longfellow created his poem, mostly out of his own imagination. Suppose how different the world would be if Longfellow had written, "Listen my children, whilst I pause, to tell you the story of William Dawes....." For further info, read David Hackett Fischer's Paul Revere's Ride. Still the best account of how 4/19/1775 came about. |
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95thFoot I was hoping you would chime in. I know Parker never said it, but it is nice to allow history a bit of legend. The painting was not from Concord as you noted, but the poem was. I figured "poem for Concord and a painting for Lexington." As to your other comments about the men who were there, I agree. I woke up this morning, and it was a beautiful day, as I imagine it may have been 231 years ago. I tried to imagine what courage those men must have had, especially at Concord, where they fired upon the regulars. As you said, men who were willing to commit treason, and to fire on their own government, for the sake of liberty. It truely was the shot heard 'round the world. |
A finally, a fellow history major? Polticial Science to boot? |