The enemy formed for action, and when the Americans were within a few rods of the river, they were fired upon by some of the regulars. The first shots were ineffectual, but others that followed were fatal. One of the Acton company was wounded, * and Captain Isaac Davis and Abner Hosmer, of the same company, were killed. "Fire, fellow-soldiers! for God's sake, fire!" shouted Buttrick, on seeing his companions fall, and immediately a full volley was given by the provincials. Three of the British were killed, and several wounded and made prisoners. Some other shots were fired, but in a few minutes Lawrie ordered a retreat, and the provincials took possession of the bridge. Two of the British soldiers killed were left on the ground, and were buried by the provincials. Their graves are a few feet from the monument. Another, who was not yet dead, was dispatched by a blow from a hatchet in the hands of a young provincial who had more zeal than humanity. This circumstance gave rise to the horrible story sent abroad by the British and Tories, that the militia "killed and scalped the prisoners that fell into their hands." Colonel Smith, in the village, on hearing the firing at the bridge, sent a re-enforcement. These met the retreating detachment of Lawrie, but, observing the increasing force of the militia, wheeled, and joined in the retreat. In the mean time, the party under Captain Parsons returned from Colonel Barrett's, and were allowed by the provincials to cross the river at the North Bridge, where the skirmish had just occurred, unmolested. It may be asked why the militia did not cut them off, which they might easily have done. It must be remembered that war had not been declared, and that the people had been enjoined to make Great Britain the aggressor, they acting only on the defensive. The militia at Concord had not yet heard of the deaths at Lexington; their volley that had just slain three of the king's troops was fired purely in self-defense. The point from which the sketch was made is upon an elevation a little north of that where the militia assembled under Colonel Barrett. The stream of water is the Concord, or Sudbury River. The site of the North Bridge is at the monument seen in the eenter of the picture. The monument stands upon the spot where the British were stationed, and in the plain, directly across the river from the monument, is the place where Davis and Hosmer, of the American militia, were killed. The house, the roof and gable of which are seen in the distance, just on the left of the largest tree, was the residence of the Reverend Dr. Ripley (afterward a chaplain in the army) at the time of the skirmish. It is upon the road leading to Concord village, which lies nearly half a mile beyond.
* He was a fifer, named Blanchard. One of the Concord minute men, named Brown, was also slightly wounded. The ball that wounded them passed under the arm of Colonel Robinson, who, by request, accompanied Major Buttrick.
** This plan I have copied from Frothingham's interesting work, History of the Siege of Boston, p. 70.
* Explanation of the Plan.—1. Lexington Road; 2. Hills and high land where the liberty pole stood; 3. Center of the town, and main body of the British; 4. Road to the South Bridge; 5, 5, 5. Road to the North Bridge and to Colonel Barnett's, two miles from the eenter of the town; C. High ground a mile north of the meeting-house, where the militia assembled; 7. Road along which they marched to dislodge the British at North Bridge; 8. Spot where Davis and Hosmer fell; 9. Reverend Air. Emerson's house; 10. Bridges and roads made in 1793, when the old roads with dotted lines were discontinued; 11. The monument. The arrows show the return of Captain Parsons, after the firing at the North Bridge; 12 is the plaee where re-enforcements met him.
Retreat of the Enemy from Concord.—Their Annoyance on the Road by the Militia.—Re-enforcement from Boston.
Observing the rapid augmentation of the militia, Colonel Smith thought it prudent to return with his troops to Boston as speedily as possible. A little after twelve o'clock they commenced their retreat toward Lexington, the main column covered by strong flanking guards. They soon perceived that the whole region was in arms, and minute men were collecting from all points. The cautious counsels at Concord, not to attack the enemy without further provocation, were disregarded, and at Merriam's Corner, a company of provincials under Captain Brooks (afterward the distinguished colonel at Saratoga, and Governor of Massachusetts), secreted behind barns and fences, made a destructive assault upon the retreating enemy. A volley was fired in return, but not a militia-man was injured. This example was followed along the whole line of march to Lexington, and the British were terribly galled all the way. From every house, barn, and stone wall guns were fired with sure aim, and many of the regulars were slain. At Hardy's Hill there was a severe skirmish, and at almost every wooded defile numbers of the enemy were picked off by the concealed marksmen. All military order among the provincials was at an end, and each fought according to the dictates of his own judgment. Some of them were killed by the flankers, who came suddenly upon them behind the walls; but the number of the militia slain was comparatively small. Colonel Smith was severely wounded in the leg at Fiske's Hill, near Lexington; and near the battle ground of the morning, at Lexington meetinghouse, several of the British soldiers were shot. Greatly fatigued by the night's march and the day's adventures, and worried on every side by the militia, that seemed, to use the expression of one of their officers, "to drop from the clouds," the whole body of eight hundred men, the flower of the British army at Boston, must have surrendered to the provincials in an hour had not relief arrived.
An express was sent from Lexington to General Gage, early in the morning, acquainting him with the rising of the militia, and praying for a strong re-enforcement. At nine o'clock three regiments of infantry, and two divisions of marines, amounting to about nine hundred men, with two field-pieces, under Lord Percy, left Boston and marched toward Lexington. They passed through Roxbury, the bands playing Yankee Doodle in derision, it being employed as a sort of "Rogue's March" when offending soldiers were drummed out. * Vague
* Gordon relates that a shrewd boy in Roxbury made himself extremely merry when he heard the tune of Yankee Doodle, and by his antics attracted the attention of Lord Percy. He asked the boy why he was so merry. "To think," said the lad, "how you will dance by-and-by to Chevy Chase." Percy was often much influenced by presentiments, and the remarks of the boy worried him all day. It may be asked why was Earl Percy troubled, and what connection had the name of Chevy Chase with him. The answer is in the fact that Percy was a son of the Duke of Northumberland, a lineal descendant of Earl Percy, one of the heroes of the battle of Chevy Chase, and who was there slain. There was great rivalry between the houses of Percy and Douglas, the former an English borderer and the latter a Scotch borderer. Percy was determined to have a field fight with his rival, and so vowed publicly that he would "take pleasure in the border woods three days, and slay the Douglas's deer." Earl Douglas heard the vaunt. "Tell him," he said, "he will find one day more than enough." Percy's aim was the armed encounter thus promised. He appeared at Chevy Chase with his greyhounds and fifteen hundred chosen archers. After taking his sport at the Douglas's expense, gazing on a hundred dead fallow deer and harts, tasting wine and venisop cooked under the greenwood tree, and saying the Douglas would not keep his word, when
"Lo! yonder doth Earl Douglas come,
His men in armor bright;
Full twenty hundred Scottish spears
All marching in our sight.
All men of pleasant Tiviotdale,
Fast by the River Tweed.
'O cease your sport!' Earl Percy said,
And take your bows with speed.'
Soon after this,
"The battle closed on every side,
No slackness there was found;
And many a gallant gentleman
Lay gasping on the ground."