Lexington and Concord: The Shot Heard Round the World, and the Stories Told After

"By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flags to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world."
— Ralph Waldo Emerson, "Concord Hymn"

On the night of April 18, 1775, express riders, Paul Revere among them, rode through the Middlesex County countryside. They did not shout "The British are coming!" as the myth has it; they warned that the King's troops were on the march. Riders and farmers alike were still loyal subjects of King George III, and independence was far from their minds. The minutemen and militia who turned out were defending their rights as they understood them under English law. Within twenty-four hours, more than 70 British soldiers lay dead and many more were wounded, and 49 provincials had died. A raid that was never meant to start a war had started a revolution.

A minuteman monument, photographed by the Detroit Publishing Company. Credit: Detroit Publishing Company Collection, Library of Congress.

One day, two sides

Gen. Thomas Gage, military governor of Massachusetts, sent 700 soldiers on what he thought was a secret mission to destroy the colonists' store of weapons at Concord. The eyewitness accounts show how differently each side saw what followed.

Gage's orders, Boston, April 18, 1775, to Lt. Col. Smith of the 10th Regiment of Foot: having learned that ammunition, provisions, artillery, tents and small arms had been gathered at Concord "for the avowed purpose of raising and supporting a rebellion against his majesty," Smith was to march "with the utmost expedition and secrecy" and seize all military stores — but "take care that the soldiers do not plunder the inhabitants, or hurt private property."

A British officer at Lexington. Lt. John Barker of the 4th Regiment wrote in his diary that at 5 o'clock on the 19th his men found "a number of People, I believe 2 and 300, formed on a Common in the middle of the Town." The British advanced "without intending to attack them, but on our coming near them they fired one or two shots, upon which our Men without any orders rushed in upon them, fired and put 'em to flight; several of them were killed."

A militia colonel at Concord. Col. James Barrett ordered his militia to cross the North Bridge "but not to fire on the King's troops unless they were first fired upon." The troops fired first, he said, killing two men on the spot and wounding others — "the first firing of guns in the town of Concord" — and his men returned fire, killing and wounding several soldiers.

"The Engagement at the North Bridge in Concord": the regulars who fired first (1) and the provincials under Colonel Robinson and Major Buttrick (2). Amos Doolittle, engraving, 1775.

"A View of the South Part of Lexington": Colonel Smith's brigade retreating before the provincials, Earl Percy's brigade coming to meet it, a fieldpiece aimed at the meetinghouse, and houses burning. Amos Doolittle, engraving, 1775.

What really happened to Paul Revere

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "Paul Revere's Ride," published in the Atlantic Monthly in January 1861, gave Americans the heroic memory they wanted: "Listen my children and you shall hear / Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere…" In reality, Revere rode only a short time before he was captured.

Passing through Lexington around midnight, Revere and William Dawes met Dr. Samuel Prescott of Concord, riding home from courting Lydia Mulliken, who agreed to help spread word that "the [British] Regulars were out." The three ran into a patrol of ten mounted British officers ordered to keep the news from reaching Concord. Revere was captured; Dawes escaped back toward Lexington; Prescott jumped his horse over a stone wall and got away. Prescott, not Revere, carried the alarm to Concord and beyond. The British questioned Revere, then let him go but kept his horse, and he walked back to Lexington in time to hear the gunfire on the common at dawn.

"The Country Adjacent with the Road from Boston to Concord," a period map marking militia, provincials and minutemen. Credit: Library of Congress.

The Minute Man

For the nation's centennial, Concord wanted a monument. Ebenezer Hubbard had left the town a thousand dollars in his will for a memorial where the Americans fell on April 19, 1775, and John S. Keyes suggested a young local sculptor and family friend, Daniel Chester French. A town committee formed in 1872 recommended "a statue of a Continental Minute Man," with the first stanza of Emerson's "Concord Hymn" on its base.

(National Park Service)

French borrowed the stance of the ancient Apollo Belvedere: right knee bent, right foot pushing off, left foot planted, suggesting forward motion. His "ideal figure" is a farmer-citizen answering the call — musket in his right hand, left hand on his plow, coat draped across it, eyes fixed ahead. Local legend says French modeled the plow on that of Capt. Isaac Davis of the Acton company, who died at the bridge, the first American officer killed in the War for Independence. For an inexperienced artist, it is a work of exceptional power.

Visiting

Minute Man National Historical Park preserves the North Bridge, the graves of two British soldiers killed in the fighting across the Concord River, French's statue and the shaded Battle Road. The visitor center is at 250 North Great Road, Lincoln, Massachusetts; the park is open daily except January 1, Thanksgiving and December 25.

Sources

Based on "Embattled Farmers and the Shot Heard Round the World: The Battles of Lexington and Concord," a Teaching with Historic Places lesson written by James A. Percoco and edited by Teaching with Historic Places staff, National Park Service; a work of the United States government in the public domain. The lesson draws on the National Register nomination for Minute Man National Historical Park; Allen French, General Gage's Informers (1932); "Diary of a British Soldier," Atlantic Monthly (1877); The Journals of each Provincial Congress of Massachusetts (1838); and sources on French including Margaret French Cresson's Journey Into Fame (1948). Pictures an earlier version of this page left out were restored on 2026-09-26. Amos Doolittle's engravings of 1775 are in the public domain; the Concord Museum supplied the lesson's copies.