History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts - citizen hylbom blog

sacrifice to the lawless oppression of Great Britain,
had on a former occasion perilled his life in her
defence, having served in the French War, and
been standard-bearer at tlie capture of Louisburg.
Harrington's was a cruel fate. He fell in front of
his own house, on the north of the Common. His
wife at the window saw him fall, and then start up,
the blood gushing from his breast. He stretched
out his hands towards her, as if for assistance, and
then fell again. Rising once more upon his hands
and knees, he crawled towards his dwelling. She
ran to meet him at tlie door, but it was to see him
expire. Samuel Hadley and John Brown were
killed after they left the Common, and Caleb Har-
rington in attempting to escape from the meeting-
house. Asahel Porter of Woburn was not under
arms. He had been captured on the road by the
Britisli that morning on their approach to Lexing-
ton, and in attempting to make his escape, about
the time the firing commenced, was shot down a
few rods from the Common.
The Lexington men killed on or near the Common
in tlie morning, were Ensign Robert Munroe,
Jonas Parker, Samuel Hadley, Jonatiian Harring-
ton, Jr., Isaac Muzzy, Nathaniel "Wyman, Caleb
Harrington, and John Brown, — eight in number
and the wounded were Ebenezer Munroe, Jr.,
John Tidd, John Robbins, Solomon Pierce, Joseph
Comee, Thomas Winship, Nathaniel Farmer, Jede-
diah Munroe, and a colored man called Prince.
Francis Brown was wounded in the afternoon, and
Jedediaii Munroe was wounded in the morning and
killed in the afternoon. John Raymond was killed
in the afternoon. Here is a heavy loss ! The num-
ber of ten killed and ten wounded of the Lexing-
ton men is a larger proportion than the loss in the
most deadly battles recorded in iiistory. In the
famous battles of Napoleon, where the enemy were
defeated, overwhelmed, and destroj-ed, twelve or
fifteen per cent would cover their loss. In this
case, if we should allow that Lexington had a
liundred men in the field that day, which is a high
estimate, her loss would be twenty per cent.
After the British had driven the Americans from
the place of parade, and pursued them as far as
they deemed expedient, they drew up on the Common
and gave three cheers as a token of rejoicing
at their supposed success. They then commenced
their march to Concord, to which the intelligence
of their killing some half a dozen men at Lexing-
ton had preceded them, as appears from the depo-
sitions of John Hoar and eleven others of Lincoln,
;
LEXINGTON. 23
and Captain Nathan Barrett and sixteen otliers of
Concord, who testified that they had assembled
near the meeting-house in Concord, in consequence
of the approach of the British, who, they learned,
iiad fired upon the citizens of Lexington and killed
six of their men.
Expresses were sent forth in every direction, and-
considering the state of the roads at that day, it
is remarkable that intelligence of the attack upon
the militia at Lexington coidd have reached dis-
tant places in so short a time. The intelligence
reached Newburyport at 1^ m. on the 19tii, and
Portsmouth, N. H., early on the 20th; Worcester
before noon on the 19th; Newport, R. I., on the
20th ; Fairfield, Conn., at 8 a. m. on the 22d
New York, at 12 m. on the 2:3d; Philadelphia, at
12 M. on the 26th ; Baltimore, at 10 a. m. on the
27th, and so on. Every town witliin ten or fifteen
miles of Lexington must have had the intelligence
of the slaughter at Lexington before nine o'clock
that day. The military operations in Lexington
in the morning being in almost every respect dif-
ferent from what occurred in the afternoon, we will
embrace the interval between them, when Smith
is absent at Concord, to state some incidents which
occurred in Lexington, and to review the scenes
of the morning.
After the British left Lexington in the morning,
several of their soldiers who had strayed from the
main body, and probably had entered some of the
;
houses in search of refreshments (for in the then
existing state of things, every house near the Common
was open and in a state of confusion), were
captured and delivered over to James Reed of Bur-
lington, who, in his deposition, admits that five or
six were entrusted to his care in tlie morning, and
a larger number in the afternoon. These prisoners
were sent the next morning to Chelmsford for safe
keeping. Another prisoner, who from fatigue or
other cause, was found resting by the wayside near
the Viles Taveni in Lexington, was taken soon
after the main body had passed. His gun is be-
lieved to be the one given to Captain Parker, and
by his grandson, the late Theodore Parker, pre-
sented to the Commonwealth, and is now in the
senate chamber at the state house at Boston,
among the relics of the Pievolution, kept as me-
morials of the patriotism and valor of our fathers,
— an example well worthy of imitation.
The men of Lexington had declared, two years
before, their trust in God to prejjare them to sacri-
fice property and life in the cause of the country