Midnight Ride of

Paul Revere

Tensions in Boston, Massachusetts had been building for months. The colonists had grown more and more unhappy about the series of taxes passed by Parliament:

Sugar Act, Currency Act

Quartering Act Stamp Act Townshend Act

Tea Act- led to the Boston Tea Party

The primary goal of the Brittish regulars was to apprehend the leaders of the opposition, Sam Adams and John Hancock. (leaders in the revolt)

There secondary goal was, to take the guns away from the colonist.

Sam Adams John Hancock

SilversmithSon of LibertyBoston Tea PartyOrganized an Intelligence and alarm system that kept track of British Troops

Official courier for the the Massachusetts Committee of Correspondence

On the night of April 18, 177518, 1775, silversmith Paul Revere left his small wooden home in Boston's North End. That home is still standing at 19 North Square and is a national historic landmark.

                                      

                                             

Listen my children and you shall hearOf the midnight ride of Paul Revere,On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;

Hardly a man is now aliveWho remembers that famous day and year. He said to his friend, "If the British marchBy land or sea from the town to-night,Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry archOf the North Church tower as a signal light,--

One if by land, and two if by sea;And I on the opposite shore will be,Ready to ride and spread the alarmThrough every Middlesex village and farm,For the country folk to be up and to arm."

Old North Church

The church sexton, Robert Newman, climbed the steeple and held high two lanterns as a signal for Paul Revere that the British were marching to Lexington and Concord by sea and not by land.

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Revere's two friends rowed him to Charlestown They used pieces of cloth to

muffle the sound of their oars so the British Warships wouldn’t hear them..

10:00

This lantern is at the Concord Museum in Concord, Massachusetts. Revere called his signal lights "lanthorns". This one hung in the steeple of Christ Church, the Old North Church, Boston's tallest building, as a signal: One if by land Two if by Sea

Paul Revere spots two British officers on horseback during his

midnight ride.

11:15The moon shone bright. I had got almost over Charlestown Common... when I saw two Officers on Horseback... I was near enough to see their Holsters & cockades... I turned my horse short about, and rid upon a

full gallop for Mistick Road." -P. Revere

11:00 Paul Revere arrives in Charlestown at night and borrows a horse from a friend.

Paul rides along Mystic Road, alarming all the households he sees.

"The regulars are out!“

11:30 PM: As Paul rides through Medford, he crosses an old plank bridge over the Mystic.

12:00 Midnight: Revere arrives in Lexington. Warns Sam Adams and JohnHancock

Billy Dawes and Dr. Prescott join Revere and continue toConcord.

Revere left Lexington with Billy Dawes and Dr. Prescott to warn the militia at Concord.

The three were stopped by a British patrol Revere was taken prisoner.

Billy Dawes lost his horse, but escaped on foot. Dr. Prescott jumped his horse over a stone wall and made it to Concord.  

I saw four of them, who rode up to me, with their pistols in their hands, said G-d d-n you stop. If you go an Inch further, you are a dead Man...we attempted to git thro them, but they kept before us, and swore if we did not turn in to that pasture, they would blow our brains out . . . (from a statement made by Paul Revere)

Revere was released without his horse and returned to Lexington.

At Lexington he joined Adams and Hancock and fled to safety in Burlington.

Revere returned to rescue valuable papers in Hancock's trunk. When the British arrived on April 19, the minutemen were waiting for them.

Through all our history, to the last,In the hour of darkness and peril and need,The people will waken and listen to hearThe hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,And the midnight message of Paul Revere.