‘That struck the foremost man of all this world,’
was hailed as the first of freemen, what honors are not due to him, who, undismayed, bearded the British lion, to show the world what his countrymen dared to do in the cause of liberty? If the statue of Brutus was placed among those of the gods, who were the preservers of Roman freedom, should not that of Warren fill a lofty niche in the temple reared to perpetuate the remembrance of our birth as a nation?”
The late Rev. Dr. Homer, of Newton, Massachusetts, recently deceased, who was present on this ever memorable occasion, related the following incident, which we consider worthy a place on these pages. He says, “while the oration was in progress, a British officer, seated on the pulpit-stairs, raised himself up and held one of his hands before the speaker, with several pistol-bullets on the open palm. Warren observed the action, and without discontinuing his discourse, dropped a white handkerchief upon the officer’s hand.”
How happy had it been for the country, if this gentle and graceful admonition could have arrested the march of violence, and averted the fatal presage afforded by this sinister occurrence of the future fate of the patriotic speaker—a presage too soon and too exactly realized on the following 17th of June. The first position of a public character in which Dr. Warren took a part, were those which grew out of Governor Gage’s determination to fortify the southern entrance of Boston, by lines drawn across the isthmus or Neck, which unites it to Roxbury. On this occasion a convention was held, of delegates from all the towns in the county of Suffolk, which then comprehended the present county of Norfolk, for the purpose of endeavoring to prevent this measure from being carried into effect. Dr. Warren was a delegate to this convention, and was made chairman of the committee which was appointed to prepare an address to the governor upon the subject. The governor replied in a brief and unsatisfactory manner.
The committee rejoined in another address, of greater length, which was transmitted to the governor, to which he did not think proper to reply. These papers were written by Warren, and give a very favorable idea of his literary taste and talent, as well as of his courage and patriotism. The correspondence was communicated by Dr. Warren, as chairman of the committee, to the Continental Congress; and that body, in their reply, notice, in terms of high approbation, the part taken in it by the committee. The high sense, which was now entertained by his fellow-citizens, of the value of the services of Warren to the cause of liberty, was strikingly evinced on this occasion, first by his election as a delegate from Boston to the Congress, and secondly, by his designation as President of that body, and chairman of the committee of public safety. By virtue of these situations, he united in his person the chief responsibility for the conduct of the whole civil and military affairs of the new commonwealth, and became a sort of popular dictator. The Congress was organized at Salem, but shortly after removed to Concord, and, a few days before the battle of Lexington, adjourned to meet again at Watertown, on the 10th May, 1775. The Committee of Safety held its meetings, at this time, in a public house at West Cambridge, and seems to have been in session every day. It was soon apparent that the station now occupied by Warren, in the councils of Massachusetts, would be no sinecure. The events of the 19th of April, including the battles of Lexington and Concord were of such a character, that no individual could well occupy a very conspicuous position in the field. There was no commander-in-chief, and, properly speaking, no regular engagement or battle. The object of the British was to destroy the military stores at Concord; that of the Americans, to prevent this, if possible, and to show that, in this quarter of the country, every inch of ground would be desperately contested. For the vigor and determination which marked the conduct of the people on this important day, it is not too much to say, that the country is mainly indebted to the vigilance, activity and energy of Warren.
It had been the intention of the British commander to surprise the Americans, and so severe were the precautions taken for this purpose, that the officers employed in the expedition were only informed of it on the preceding day. Information of a meditated attack had been, however, for some time in possession of the Americans; the first intimation having been given by a patriotic lady of Boston, the wife of a royalist officer. A most vigilant observation was, in consequence, maintained upon the movements of the British; and, in this operation, great advantage was derived from the services of an association, composed chiefly of Boston mechanics, which had been formed in the autumn of the preceding year. The late Col. Paul Revere was an active member of this society, and was employed by Dr. Warren, on this occasion, as his principal confidential messenger. Some preparatory movements took place among the British troops on the 15th of April, which attracted the attention of Warren. It was known that the principal object of the contemplated expedition was to seize the stores at Concord. Presuming that the movement would now be made without delay, the committee of safety took measures for securing the stores by distributing a part of them among the neighboring towns. John Hancock and Samuel Adams were then at the house of the Rev. Mr. Clark, in Lexington, and Colonel Revere was dispatched as a special messenger to inform them of the probable designs of General Gage. On his return to Boston, he made an agreement with his friends in Charlestown, that, if the expedition proceeded by water, two lights should be displayed on the steeple of the North Church, if it moved over the neck, through Roxbury, only one. The British commander finally fixed upon the 19th for the intended attempt; and, on the evening of the 18th he sent for the officers whom he had designated for this service, and communicated to them, for the first time, the nature of the expedition upon which they were to be employed. So strict had been the secrecy observed by the governor in regard to this matter. The same discretion had not been maintained in other quarters, for Lord Percy, who was to command the reserve, on his way home to his lodgings, heard the expedition talked of, by a group of citizens, at the corner of one of the streets.
He hastened back to the governor’s headquarters, and informed him that he had been betrayed. An order was instantly issued to prevent any American from leaving town, but it came a few minutes too late to produce effect. Dr. Warren, who had returned in the evening from the meeting of the Committee of Public Safety, at West Cambridge, was already informed of the movement of the British army, and had taken the necessary measures for spreading the intelligence through the country. At about nine o’clock on the evening of the 18th the British troops intended for the expedition were embarked, under the command of Colonel Small, in boats at the bottom of the Common. Dr. Warren inspected the embarkation in person, and having returned home immediately after, sent for Colonel Revere, who reached his house about ten o’clock. He had already dispatched Mr. Dawes overland as a special messenger to Lexington, and he now requested Colonel Revere to proceed through Charlestown on the same errand. The colonel made arrangements, in the first place, for displaying the two lights on the steeple of the North Church, agreeably to the understanding with his friends in Charlestown, and then repaired to a wharf, at the north part of the town, where he kept his boat. He was rowed over by two friends, a little to the eastward of the British ship of war Somerset, which lay at anchor in this part of the channel, and was landed on the Charlestown side.
He pursued his way through Charlestown and West Cambridge, not without several perilous encounters with British officers, who were patroling the neighborhood, and finally arrived safely at Lexington, where he met the other messenger, Mr. Dawes, whom he had, however, anticipated.
After reposing a short time, they proceeded together to Concord, alarming the whole country as they went, by literally knocking at the door of almost every house upon the road. They had of course been in part anticipated by the signals on the North Church steeple, which had spread intelligence of the intended movement, with the speed of light, through all the neighboring towns. By the effect of these well-judged and well-executed measures, Hancock and Adams were enabled to provide in season for their personal safety, and the whole population of the towns, through which the British troops were to pass, were roused and on foot before they made their appearance. On reaching Lexington Green, they found a corps of militia under arms and prepared to meet them. At Concord, they found another; and when, after effecting as far as they could, the objects of their expedition, they turned their steps homeward, they were enveloped, as it were, in a cloud of the armed yeomanry, which thickened around them at every step, and did such fearful execution in their ranks, that nothing but their timely meeting with the reinforcements under Lord Percy, at West Cambridge, could have saved them from entire disorganization and actual surrender. Colonel Revere, many years afterward, drew up a very curious and interesting account of his adventures on this expedition, in the form of a letter to the corresponding secretary of the Massachusetts Historical Society, which is printed in the Collections of that body, and is now familiar to the public. Warren who was now in attendance on the Committee of Safety at West Cambridge, expecting the British troops to pass that way on their return from Concord, awaited their arrival.
On their approach he armed himself and went out in company with General Heath to meet them.