The Concord men had warning,[1]
And flew from all their farms,
Long hours before the daybreak,
To save the colony’s arms.
And, days before the warning,
Our Salem Congress, too,
Had known their stores were menaced,
And here had left but few.[2]
Yet these to drag and bury[1]
Or hide in woods and rills,
Men flock’d to town and from it,
Like ants about their hills.
But soon, when came the morning,
The “red-coats”[3] rose in sight,
With guns above them flashing
Like surf in seas of light.
Then, one by one, escaping
What could but bode them ill,
The farmers cross’d the river,
And climb’d, anon, a hill.[4]
To the hill there came from Bedford,[4]
And Littleton, and Carlisle,
And Lincoln, Chelmsford, Westford,
More men through each defile.
To the hill there came a rumor[5]
How Lexington had fared,
But no one spoke of yielding,
And all for strife prepared.
From the hill they watch’d the village,[6]
Where every house to scout,
Like busy bees the red-coats[3]
Went bustling in and out.
Despite our wives protesting,
Their hostile blows would shower,
Till scores of barrels, bursting,
Beclouded all with flour.[7]
Ere long, they spiked our cannon,
And fill’d our pond with balls,[7]
And piled the cannon’s wagons
To block the roads like walls.
And then this foe that fear’d it,
Our “liberty-pole” cut down,[7]
And burn’d it with the wagons
That yet might burn the town.
Soon seem’d our court-house burning,[7]
With none the flames to stay;[8]
But “Justice,” cried our leader,
“Will house in heaven to-day.
“Now wait we till these troopers
Of luck have had their fill,
And part of them drift hither,
Or all assault our hill.
“The hill, if they move up it,
Their lines can never take;
Like waves that dash at headlands,
Their wavering ranks will break.”
Just then, they most had started,
Though some were plundering still,
To seize two bridges crossing
The stream beneath the hill.[9]
To seize them was to sever
Our women from our men,
Our homes from those who own’d them,
And what would follow then?
“The north bridge,”—argued Hosmer[10];
“Keep back from it the foe!”
“No man of mine from Acton,”
Said Davis,[10] “fears to go.”
And then our leader Barrett[11]
The order “Forward!” gave,
Where moved the men of Acton[11]
Behind their captain brave.
With arms beside them trailing,
In double file and slow,[12]
Not daunted by the danger,
These farmers faced their foe.
The British ran to ruin
The bridge, and then retire.[13]
“Hold!” cried our Major Buttrick[14];
They answer’d but to fire.
Dead Davis fell, and Hosmer.[15]
“In God’s name,” Buttrick[16] cried,
“Fire, fire!”—and two fell dying
Upon the British side.
Thus Heaven, where hung the purpose
A grander man to mould,
Had Saxon hurl’d on Saxon,
The new world on the old.
Our foe in haste retreated.[17]
Their colonel, where they sped,
March’d forth to reinforce them;
Then all for Boston led.[18]
But now our men from Reading[19]
And Sudbury hurried out,
And Woburn, wild to flank them:
Their march became a rout.[19]
We had but half their number[20];
But, wrongs avenging thus,
Their red coats had been safer
With Spanish bulls than us.
Though guards at every turning,
Would cover well their flanks;
Our smoke, from ambush leaping,[21]
Shot, ghost-like, through their ranks.
From Dedham, Essex, Danvers,
From Chelsea, Marblehead,
From Dorchester, and Brookline,[22]
Our men to meet them sped.
Back slunk their line before us,
A weary, wounded snake:
Up hill, down dale, round river,
It wound and bled and brake.
The whole reserve in Boston[23]
Pour’d out to help them back;
But all the trees and houses
Were haunting now their track.
They turn’d to shoot our mothers;
They turn’d our babes to kill;
Our vengeance rose at Cambridge,[24]
And raged at Prospect Hill.[25]
Down sweeping, Heath and Warren
A charge to break them led;
Then Pickering’s men from Salem[25]
Burst, flood-like o’er their head.[26]
Full night had known its fullest,
Ere all their fears were still’d;
Full ninescore had we wounded,
And more than threescore kill’d.[27]
Nor, till they touched the river,[28]
And by the fleet had pass’d,
Our eyes that faced the danger
Were once behind us cast.
And then, alas to view it!
Hot, bitter tears we shed;
Full thirty found we wounded,
And wellnigh sixty dead.[27]
Our wives had lost their husbands;
Our mothers lost their boys;
Our homes were fill’d with mourning,
And gone were all our joys.
Yet, when we clasp’d those corpses,
As over Huns of old,
It seem’d the skies were filling
With souls for ours enroll’d.
Our prayers when all were buried,
Were vows to Heaven o’erhead,
From hearts that hail’d the glory
Of joining there their dead.
Then, too, we held our weapons;
Had foil’d the British aims;
And held our homes:—our women[29]
Had quench’d the court-house flames.
Our men had met the army,
And fought, and from that hour
They all had grown to soldiers,
Who knew and felt their power.
And so, despite the anguish
That fill’d the morrow’s morn,
The voice that wept betoken’d
A nation, newly born.
“And I,” said Samuel Adams,[30]
“Thank God this day to see!”
“And I,” came back from Hancock[30];
“It makes the new world free!”