Patriots' Day -- April 19

The Road to Lexington 

By Lawrence W. Reed

In 1864, the last full year of America’s Civil War, how many veterans who fought in the country’s Revolutionary War (1775-83) do you think were still alive? Click on the link at the bottom of this article to find out.

The purpose of this article is to lay out the series of events that preceded the incident at Lexington, beginning with the famous Boston Tea Party in December 1773. My 2018 article, “America’s Republic: How the Great Experiment Came About” (https://tinyurl.com/4n3t62r9), provides a more complete list for those who desire additional detail.

Tensions in the pivotal colony of Massachusetts had been rising for a dozen years when Parliament imposed a new tax on tea and granted monopoly privileges to the British East India Tea Company in 1773. Angry colonists boarded British ships on December 16 and dumped their cargo of tea—all 342 chests of it—into Boston’s harbor. When the news reached London, Parliament decided a harsh reaction would teach the unruly colonists a lesson.

The Intolerable Acts (sometimes called the Coercive Acts) went far to deprive Massachusetts of its self-government by revoking its charter and putting the colony under Britain’s direct rule; closed the port of Boston until the tea was paid for; and provided for the quartering of British troops on private property. Resentment against the British spread like wildfire across all 13 colonies.

In Massachusetts, colonists responded with the Suffolk Resolves of September 9, 1774. They denounced the Intolerable Acts as violating rights and liberties and endorsed a boycott of British goods until the Acts were repealed. Furthermore, the document called for people to stop paying taxes to Britain and start forming a new government and militias.

Back in London, the great parliamentarian Edmund Burke saw huge significance in the Suffolk Resolves. He feared the colonists were on the brink of rebellion, which would result in open warfare if Parliament did not back down. He was right.

London’s concessions were indeed too little, too late. The Intolerable Acts and the courageous Suffolk Resolves produced unity from New England to the Deep South. Paul Revere presented a copy of the Resolves to the First Continental Congress in Philadelphia. Would the other 12 colonies support Massachusetts? They did, by vote of the Congress, on September 17. John Adams said, “This day convinced me that America will support Massachusetts or perish with her.”

America was a powder keg by the spring of 1775. On that fateful day of April 19 in that momentous year, the war with the mother country began. Fifteen months later, the Second Continental Congress would issue the Declaration of Independence. Of that document, the great abolitionist Frederick Douglass would proclaim the following, eight decades later:

The 4th of July is the first great fact in your nation's history — the very ring-bolt in the chain of your yet undeveloped destiny. Pride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetual remembrance. I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost.

So how many Revolutionary War veterans were still alive in 1864? To find out, the link is here: https://fee.org/articles/centenarians-for-liberty/