The Freeman 1972 - The Ludwig von Mises Institute

1972 PRELUDE TO INDEPENDENCE 239depot there. These troops were metby colonials at Lexington, someonefired ("the shot heard round theworld," Thomas Paine said), anda small battle took place. It wasenlarged during the course of theday, as riflemen gathered from allsides and threatened to destroythe British forces at one point.Reinforcements arrived, however,and the British were able to returnto Boston. Seventy-three Britishtroops were killed during theday, and a lesser number of colonials.Fighting on a war-likescale had taken place; the resolutionof the British and the Americanswould now be tried by arms.Less than a month after Lexingtonand Concord a Second ContinentalCongress assembled atPhiladelphia (May 10). The FirstCongress had voted its own dissolution,but they provided thata new congress should meet if thedisputes had not been settled. Soit was that a new body was assembledthat would attempt overthe next half dozen years to guidethe affairs of what was not yet theUnited States. Among the membersof the Second ContinentalCongress were some of the mosttalented men ever to grace theAmerican scene, men whose nameswill live as long as the foundingof the Republic is remembered.From Massachusetts came Johnand Samuel Adams along withJohn Hancock who was elected topreside over the· congress, fromPennsylvania came BenjaminFranklin, Robert Morris, andJ ames Wilson, among others, fromConnecticut came Roger Shermanand Oliver Wolcott, from Virginiacame George Washington, RichardHenry Lee, and Thomas Jefferson,and so on through the roll call ofthe signers of Declaration of Independence,as well as many who hadleft the Congress by that time.Some of the most talented followedother pursuits for the statesduring the war so that duringsome of the most trying days itwas not so lustrous a body. But atits inception it contained most ofthe men who would play the leadingroles in guiding America to independence.A Colonial ArmyCongress was confronted withthe task of what to do about thefighting from the moment it met.New Englanders had taken mattersin hand partially already, andon the same day that Congress metin Philadelphia Ethan Allen andBenedict Arnold led a force of colonialsin taking Fort Ticonderogaon Lake Champlain. And on June17 the Battle of Bunker Hill tookplace as a result of a British decisionto drive the Americans froma redoubt on Breed's Hill. Thisbattle pitted a British army