Bloody News \u2013 This town has been in a continual alarm since Mid-day\u2026 the attack began at Lexington (about 12 miles from Boston) by the regular troops, the 18th Inft., before sunrise\u2026 From thence they proceeded to Concord where they made a general attack\u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The British had attacked: the Battles of Lexington and Concord began the fighting between Great Britain and its 13 American colonies that led to the Revolutionary War and the founding of a new nation.<\/p>\n The reports continued to be published in Colonial newspapers<\/a> up and down the coast. The newspapers printed them all \u2013 and the New Hampshire Gazette<\/em><\/a> and Historical Chronicle<\/em> added: \u201cThe foregoing is the different accounts we have receiv\u2019d, but how far and what part is authentic, presume not to determine.\u201d<\/p>\n This reads like any breaking news story today \u2013 when the reporters read every detail as the \u201craw news\u201d comes in over the satellite feeds.<\/p>\n The British had attacked and the committees of safety from colony to colony were responding and getting the word out \u2013 through the newspapers \u2013 that it was time to act.<\/p>\n Thanks to GenealogyBank\u2019s Historical Newspaper Archives<\/a> we can read the same newspapers our American colonial ancestors read and feel the impact of the news as they lived it. No other site has the depth of coverage found on GenealogyBank \u2013 spanning the news from 1690 to today.<\/p>\n In his long-famous poem, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote of that day:<\/p>\n The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere Listen my children and you shall hear He said to his friend, \u201cIf the British march Then he said \u201cGood-night!\u201d and with muffled oar Meanwhile, his friend through alley and street Then he climbed the tower of the Old North Church, Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead, Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride, A hurry of hoofs in a village street, It was twelve by the village clock It was one by the village clock, It was two by the village clock, You know the rest. In the books you have read So through the night rode Paul Revere; Related Articles:<\/strong><\/p>\n An article by Thomas Jay Kemp showing how newspapers broke the news of the Revolutionary War\u2019s Battle of Lexington on 19 April 1775.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30729,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12235],"tags":[1902,2139,2020],"class_list":["post-10081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-history","tag-american-revolutionary-war","tag-battle-of-lexington","tag-newspaper-archives"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/photo-0416-2018-featured-graphic-battle-of-lexington.png","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10081"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10081\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"article](\"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/04\/new-hampshire-gazette-and-historical-chronicle-newspaper-0421-1775-front-page.png\" "\\"new-hampshire-gazette-and-historical-chronicle-newspaper-0421-1775-front-page\\"")
<\/a><\/a><\/a>
\nby Henry Wadsworth Longfellow<\/p>\n
\nOf the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
\nOn the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;
\nHardly a man is now alive
\nWho remembers that famous day and year.<\/p>\n
\nBy land or sea from the town to-night,
\nHang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
\nOf the North Church tower as a signal light,
\nOne if by land, and two if by sea;
\nAnd I on the opposite shore will be,
\nReady to ride and spread the alarm
\nThrough every Middlesex village and farm,
\nFor the country folk to be up and to arm.\u201d<\/p>\n
\nSilently rowed to the Charlestown shore,
\nJust as the moon rose over the bay,
\nWhere swinging wide at her moorings lay
\nThe Somerset, British man-of-war;
\nA phantom ship, with each mast and spar
\nAcross the moon like a prison bar,
\nAnd a huge black hulk, that was magnified
\nBy its own reflection in the tide.<\/p>\n
\nWanders and watches, with eager ears,
\nTill in the silence around him he hears
\nThe muster of men at the barrack door,
\nThe sound of arms, and the tramp of feet,
\nAnd the measured tread of the grenadiers,
\nMarching down to their boats on the shore.<\/p>\n
\nBy the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread,
\nTo the belfry chamber overhead,
\nAnd startled the pigeons from their perch
\nOn the sombre rafters, that round him made
\nMasses and moving shapes of shade,\u2013
\nBy the trembling ladder, steep and tall,
\nTo the highest window in the wall,
\nWhere he paused to listen and look down
\nA moment on the roofs of the town
\nAnd the moonlight flowing over all.<\/p>\n
\nIn their night encampment on the hill,
\nWrapped in silence so deep and still
\nThat he could hear, like a sentinel\u2019s tread,
\nThe watchful night-wind, as it went
\nCreeping along from tent to tent,
\nAnd seeming to whisper, \u201cAll is well!\u201d
\nA moment only he feels the spell
\nOf the place and the hour, and the secret dread
\nOf the lonely belfry and the dead;
\nFor suddenly all his thoughts are bent
\nOn a shadowy something far away,
\nWhere the river widens to meet the bay,\u2013
\nA line of black that bends and floats
\nOn the rising tide like a bridge of boats.<\/p>\n
\nBooted and spurred, with a heavy stride
\nOn the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.
\nNow he patted his horse\u2019s side,
\nNow he gazed at the landscape far and near,
\nThen, impetuous, stamped the earth,
\nAnd turned and tightened his saddle girth;
\nBut mostly he watched with eager search
\nThe belfry tower of the Old North Church,
\nAs it rose above the graves on the hill,
\nLonely and spectral and sombre and still.
\nAnd lo! as he looks, on the belfry\u2019s height
\nA glimmer, and then a gleam of light!
\nHe springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,
\nBut lingers and gazes, till full on his sight
\nA second lamp in the belfry burns.<\/p>\n
\nA shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark,
\nAnd beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark
\nStruck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet;
\nThat was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light,
\nThe fate of a nation was riding that night;
\nAnd the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight,
\nKindled the land into flame with its heat.
\nHe has left the village and mounted the steep,
\nAnd beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep,
\nIs the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides;
\nAnd under the alders that skirt its edge,
\nNow soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge,
\nIs heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.<\/p>\n
\nWhen he crossed the bridge into Medford town.
\nHe heard the crowing of the cock,
\nAnd the barking of the farmer\u2019s dog,
\nAnd felt the damp of the river fog,
\nThat rises after the sun goes down.<\/p>\n
\nWhen he galloped into Lexington.
\nHe saw the gilded weathercock
\nSwim in the moonlight as he passed,
\nAnd the meeting-house windows, black and bare,
\nGaze at him with a spectral glare,
\nAs if they already stood aghast
\nAt the bloody work they would look upon.<\/p>\n
\nWhen he came to the bridge in Concord town.
\nHe heard the bleating of the flock,
\nAnd the twitter of birds among the trees,
\nAnd felt the breath of the morning breeze
\nBlowing over the meadow brown.
\nAnd one was safe and asleep in his bed
\nWho at the bridge would be first to fall,
\nWho that day would be lying dead,
\nPierced by a British musket ball.<\/p>\n
\nHow the British Regulars fired and fled,
\nHow the farmers gave them ball for ball,
\nFrom behind each fence and farmyard wall,
\nChasing the redcoats down the lane,
\nThen crossing the fields to emerge again
\nUnder the trees at the turn of the road,
\nAnd only pausing to fire and load.<\/p>\n
\nAnd so through the night went his cry of alarm
\nTo every Middlesex village and farm,
\nA cry of defiance, and not of fear,
\nA voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
\nAnd a word that shall echo for evermore!
\nFor, borne on the night-wind of the Past,
\nThrough all our history, to the last,
\nIn the hour of darkness and peril and need,
\nThe people will waken and listen to hear
\nThe hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,
\nAnd the midnight message of Paul Revere.<\/p>\n\n