| Battles of Lexington and
Concord On April 18, 1775,
Lieutenant General Thomas Gage, military governor of
Massachusetts, ordered 700 troops under Lieutenant
Colonel Francis Smith to destroy a suspected supply depot
at Concord, Massachusetts, and to arrest Samuel Adams
and John Hancock. Gage's orders were supposed to be
secret, but Dr. Joseph Warren somehow learned of the plan
and sent Paul
Revere and William Dawes to ride to
Lexington to warn the patriots there.
 When a column of British regulars led by Major
John Pitcairn arrived at Lexington in the early dawn of
April 19th, it was met by Captain John Parker and about
75 armed Minutemen. According to most contemporary
accounts, Parker told his men not to fire on or harass
the British unless they themselves were harassed or fired
upon, since he did not believe it wise to take on an
obviously superior force. Someone, no one knows who, did
fire, however, and the both sides ended up in a brief gun
battle. By the time it was over 8 colonists were dead and
another 10 wounded; one British soldier was wounded in
the exchange.
 Parker's men fell back after the brief Battle of
Lexington, and Pitcairn's men reformed and headed on
toward Concord. By the time Pitcairn got to Concord,
however, the townspeople had hidden most of the arms and
munitions. After conducting a house-to-house search of
Concord, the British moved on to Barrett's Farm west of
Concord, where athey found and destroyed a couple of
cannons and a small cache of munitions. Pitcairn and his
men were on their way back to Concord when they
encountered about 500 militiamen at North Bridge. Like at
Lexington, the militiamen had been instructed not to fire
unless provoked. Unlike at Lexington, however, there is
no dispute that the British fired the first shot at the
North Bridge. Whether that shot was meant as a warning or
as a hostile action is not known, but the militiamen
began firing back. The Battle of Concord lasted a little
longer than the Battle of Lexington had, but this time
the colonials prevailed. By the time the British halted
their initial retreat, 5 had been killed and another 19
(including 4 officers and Sargeants) wounded.
From Concord, Pitcairn attempted to
march his men back to Boston in orderly fashion. His
formations were constantly attacked along the way,
however. Although most attacks were made from orderly
formations at strategic locations along the road, there
were also several ambush and sniper attacks. By the time
Pitcairn's army got back to Boston he had suffered 73
killed, 173 wounded, and 26 missing; by comparison, the
colonials suffered 49 killed, 39 wounded, and 5 missing.
Although neither Lexington nor Concord were in any way
strategically important battles, they are universally
considered to represent the first battles of the
Revolutionary War.
 
 
American Revolution.org. http://themaericanrevolution.org/battledetail.aspx?battle=1
British Battles.com. http://www.britishbattles.com/concord-lexington.htm
Samuel Adams
Paul
Revere
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