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KF5JRV > TODAY 19.04.19 12:33l 58 Lines 3138 Bytes #999 (0) @ WW
BID : 34771_KF5JRV
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Subj: Today in History - Apr 19
Path: IW8PGT<IR2UBX<SR1BSZ<OK0NBR<OK2PEN<N3HYM<KF5JRV
Sent: 190419/1132Z 34771@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA BPQ6.0.18
At about 5 a.m., 700 British troops, on a mission to capture Patriot
leaders and seize a Patriot arsenal, march into Lexington to find 77
armed minutemen under Captain John Parker waiting for them on the town’s
common green. British Major John Pitcairn ordered the outnumbered
Patriots to disperse, and after a moment’s hesitation the Americans
began to drift off the green. Suddenly, a shot was fired from an
undetermined gun, and a cloud of musket smoke soon covered the green.
When the brief Battle of Lexington ended, eight Americans lay dead or
dying and 10 others were wounded. Only one British soldier was injured,
but the American Revolution had begun.
By 1775, tensions between the American colonies and the British
government approached the breaking point, especially in Massachusetts,
where Patriot leaders formed a shadow revolutionary government and
trained militias to prepare for armed conflict with the British troops
occupying Boston. In the spring of 1775, General Thomas Gage, the
British governor of Massachusetts, received instructions from England to
seize all stores of weapons and gunpowder accessible to the American
insurgents. On April 18, he ordered British troops to march against the
Patriot arsenal at Concord and capture Patriot leaders Samuel Adams and
John Hancock, known to be hiding at Lexington.
The Boston Patriots had been preparing for such a military action by the
British for some time, and upon learning of the British plan, Patriots
Paul Revere and William Dawes were ordered to set out to rouse the
militiamen and warn Adams and Hancock. When the British troops arrived
at Lexington, Adams, Hancock, and Revere had already fled to
Philadelphia, and a group of militiamen were waiting. The Patriots were
routed within minutes, but warfare had begun, leading to calls to arms
across the Massachusetts countryside.
When the British troops reached Concord at about 7 a.m., they found
themselves encircled by hundreds of armed Patriots. They managed to
destroy the military supplies the Americans had collected but were soon
advanced against by a gang of minutemen, who inflicted numerous
casualties. Lieutenant Colonel Frances Smith, the overall commander of
the British force, ordered his men to return to Boston without directly
engaging the Americans. As the British retraced their 16-mile journey,
their lines were constantly beset by Patriot marksmen firing at them
Indian-style from behind trees, rocks, and stone walls. At Lexington,
Captain Parker’s militia had its revenge, killing several British
soldiers as the Red Coats hastily marched through his town. By the time
the British finally reached the safety of Boston, nearly 300 British
soldiers had been killed, wounded, or were missing in action. The
Patriots suffered fewer than 100 casualties.
The battles of Lexington and Concord were the first battles of the
American Revolution, a conflict that would escalate from a colonial
uprising into a world war that, seven years later, would give birth to
the independent United States of America.
73 de Scott KF5JRV
Pmail: KF5JRV@KF5JRV.#NWAR.AR.USA.NA
email: KF5JRV@GMAIL.COM
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