American Revolution · 19 April 1775
Lexington and Concord: How the American Revolutionary War Began
In short
- Gage sent about 700 regulars to destroy colonial military supplies at Concord on 19 April 1775.
- No one knows who fired first at Lexington; at Concord's North Bridge militia fired on the king's troops under orders.
- The bloody retreat to Boston turned a police action into a war, and both sides raced to win the argument over who started it.
At first light on 19 April 1775, some seventy men stood in two thin lines on the village green at Lexington, Massachusetts, as hundreds of British soldiers came up the road. Their captain told them to disperse. Then a shot rang out, and no one has ever proved who fired it.
Two governments
By the spring of 1775, Massachusetts had two governments. General Thomas Gage held Boston with about 4,000 soldiers. Outside it, a Provincial Congress collected taxes, drilled the militia and stockpiled weapons. Many towns trained special companies, the minutemen, to turn out at a moment's notice.
In April a letter from London urged Gage to act firmly. He decided to send about 700 soldiers on a night march to Concord, some 18 miles away, to destroy the cannon, powder and supplies hidden there. He hoped surprise would mean no bloodshed.
The riders
The patriots had informers in Boston. On the night of 18 April, Dr Joseph Warren sent Paul Revere and William Dawes by different routes to warn the countryside. Two lanterns hung in the steeple of the Old North Church told patriots across the river in Charlestown that the troops were crossing by water.
Revere did not gallop through the night shouting “The British are coming!”. Most people around him still thought of themselves as British; one witness, recalling the night decades later, said Revere warned that “the regulars are coming out”. Revere was captured on the road to Concord, and a young doctor riding with him, Samuel Prescott, escaped and carried the alarm on. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's 1860 poem made Revere the lone hero of a night that involved dozens of riders.
Lexington Green
Around five in the morning, the advance companies under Major John Pitcairn reached Lexington, where Captain John Parker had mustered roughly 70 to 80 militiamen. Parker, badly outnumbered, ordered his men to disperse. Some had begun to leave when a shot was fired. Each side swore the other fired first; it may have been a bystander, or a nervous soldier.
The British fired volleys and charged with bayonets before their officers regained control. Eight Lexington men were killed and ten wounded. One British soldier was hurt.
The bridge at Concord
In Concord the British found that most of the supplies had been moved or hidden. As soldiers burned gun carriages, militiamen on a hill above the North Bridge saw smoke rising and feared the town was on fire. About 400 of them advanced on the bridge. The British fired; the militia, ordered to fire back, killed three regulars and lost two of their own.
This is the moment Ralph Waldo Emerson called “the shot heard round the world”. The line comes from his Concord Hymn, written in 1837 for a monument at the bridge, sixty-two years after the fight.
A running battle
The march back to Boston became a running fight. Militia from dozens of towns, thousands of men in all, fired from behind walls, trees and houses. At Lexington the column was rescued by a relief brigade of about 1,000 men with two cannon under Lord Percy, and it fought its way to Charlestown after dark.
The British lost about 73 killed and more than 170 wounded; the Americans 49 killed and about 40 wounded. Within days, some 15,000 militiamen had Boston under siege.
Racing the news
Both sides knew opinion mattered. The Provincial Congress collected sworn statements from militiamen, Captain Parker's among them, and sent them to London on a fast ship. They arrived about two weeks before Gage's official report, so Britons first read the patriots' version of who had started the war.
In their own words
“…upon their sudden approach, I immediately ordered our militia to disperse, and not to fire. Immediately said troops made their appearance, and rushed furiously, fired upon and killed eight of our party, without receiving any provocation therefor from us.”
Captain John Parker, Deposition taken for the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, 25 April 1775
Published in 1775 in A Narrative of the Excursion and Ravages of the King's Troops, the patriots' collection of depositions. It was gathered as evidence for one side; British officers swore that the militia fired first.
Why it happened
- The Coercive Acts placed Massachusetts under a military governor.
- Patriots stockpiled cannon, powder and supplies at Concord.
- Orders from London pushed Gage to act before the colonists grew stronger.
What happened next
- Militia from across New England besieged the British army in Boston.
- In June 1775 the Second Continental Congress created a Continental Army and chose George Washington to command it. Read the story →
- Congress still hoped for reconciliation and sent the king a final petition before turning to independence. Read the story →
Why it still matters
Patriots' Day, the third Monday in April, is a public holiday in Massachusetts and Maine. The Boston Marathon is run on it, and before dawn re-enactors still muster on Lexington Green to play out a skirmish whose first shot no one can identify.
Key people
- Thomas Gage
- British commander in North America and military governor of Massachusetts, who ordered the march on Concord
- Paul Revere
- Boston silversmith and express rider, one of many who carried the alarm on 18–19 April
- John Parker
- Captain of the Lexington militia company on the green
- Joseph Warren
- Boston physician and patriot leader who sent out the riders; killed at Bunker Hill in June 1775
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
- Poet whose 1837 Concord Hymn coined “the shot heard round the world”
Key terms
- Minutemen
- Picked militia companies pledged to turn out at a moment's notice.
- Regulars
- Professional, full-time soldiers of the British army, as opposed to part-time colonial militia.
- Provincial Congress
- The assembly Massachusetts patriots set up in 1774 to govern outside royal control.
- Deposition
- A sworn written statement; the patriots collected dozens to prove the British fired first.
Test yourself
What was the British column ordered to do at Concord?
- Arrest Samuel Adams and John Hancock
- Dissolve the Provincial Congress
- Recover the tea taken from the ships
- Destroy hidden military supplies
Show the answer
Destroy hidden military supplies. Gage's orders were to destroy the cannon, powder and stores the colonists had collected at Concord. Revere warned Adams and Hancock in Lexington, but arresting them was not part of the column's written orders.
The full lesson in the app ends with 5 questions like this one.
Connected stories
- From the Stamp Act to the Tea Party: The Coercive Acts and Gage's military government set up the confrontation.
- The Declaration of Independence: Bloodshed in Massachusetts pushed Congress, slowly, from protest toward independence.
Frequently asked questions
Why did the British march to Lexington and Concord?
The Coercive Acts placed Massachusetts under a military governor. Patriots stockpiled cannon, powder and supplies at Concord. Orders from London pushed Gage to act before the colonists grew stronger.
What happened after Lexington and Concord?
Militia from across New England besieged the British army in Boston. In June 1775 the Second Continental Congress created a Continental Army and chose George Washington to command it. Congress still hoped for reconciliation and sent the king a final petition before turning to independence.
What was the British column ordered to do at Concord?
Destroy hidden military supplies. Gage's orders were to destroy the cannon, powder and stores the colonists had collected at Concord. Revere warned Adams and Hancock in Lexington, but arresting them was not part of the column's written orders.
What is the main primary source for “Lexington and Concord: The First Shots”?
Captain John Parker, Deposition taken for the Massachusetts Provincial Congress (25 April 1775). Published in 1775 in A Narrative of the Excursion and Ravages of the King's Troops, the patriots' collection of depositions. It was gathered as evidence for one side; British officers swore that the militia fired first.
Sources
- David Hackett Fischer, Paul Revere's Ride (1994)
- Rick Atkinson, The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775–1777 (2019)
- Massachusetts Provincial Congress, A Narrative of the Excursion and Ravages of the King's Troops under the Command of General Gage (1775)
Images are credited under each picture. Paintings and photographs come from public collections via Wikimedia Commons; scenes with no surviving image are marked as illustrations.
