Here I must pause again, to acquaint you that in the morning of the 19th, before we had breakfasted, between eight and nine, the whole neighbourhood was in alarm; the Minute-men (so called from their having agreed to turn out at a minute’s warning) were collecting together; we had an account that the Regulars had killed six of our men at Lexington; the Country was in an uproar; another detachment was corning out of Boston; and I was desired to take care of myself and partner. I concluded that the Brigade was intended to support the Grenadiers and Light-Infantry, and to cover their retreat, in which I was not mistaken. The Brigade took out two cannon, the detachment had none. Having sent off my books, which I had finished packing up the day before, conjecturing what was coming on from the moment I had heard of the resolutions of Parliament, though I did not expect it till the reinforcement arrived, we got into our chaise, and went to Dedham. At night we had it confirmed to us, that the Regulars had been roughly handled by the Yankees, a term of reproach for the New-Englanders, when applied by the Regulars. The Brigade under Lord Percy marched out, playing, by way of contempt, Yankee Doodle; they were afterwards told, that they had been made to dance to it.

Soon after the affair, knowing what untruths are propagated by each party in matters of this nature, I concluded that I would ride to Concord, inquire for myself, and not rest upon the depositions that might be taken by others. Accordingly I went the last week. The Provincial Congress have taken depositions, which they have forwarded to Great Britain; but the Ministry and pretended friends to Government, will cry them down, as being evidence from party persons and rebels; the like may be objected against the present account, as it will materially contradict what has been published in Boston, though not expressly, yet as it is commonly supposed, by authority; however, with the impartial world, and those who will not imagine me capable of sacrificing honesty to the old, at present heretical, principles of the Revolution, it may have some weight.

Before Major Pitcairn arrived at Lexington signal guns had been fired, and the bells had been rung to give the alarm; but let not the sound of bells lead you to think of a ring of bells like what you hear in England; for they are only small sized bells, (one in a Parish,) just sufficient to notify to the people the time for attending worship, &c. Lexington being alarmed, the train band or Militia, and the alarm men (consisting of the aged and others exempted from turning out, excepting upon an alarm) repaired in general to the common, close in with the meeting-house, the usual place of parade; and there, were present when the roll was called over about one hundred and thirty of both, as I was told by Mr. Daniel Harrington, clerk to the company; who further said, that the night being chilly, so as to make it uncomfortable being upon the parade, they having received no certain intelligence of the Regulars being upon their march, and being waiting for the same, the men were dismissed, to appear again at the beat of drum. Some who lived near, went home, others to the publick house at the corner of the common. Upon information being received about half an hour after, that the Troops were not far off, the remains of the company who were at hand collected together, to the amount of about sixty or seventy, by the time the Regulars appeared, but were chiefly in a confused state, only a few of them being drawn up, which accounts for other witnesses making the number less, about thirty. There were present as spectators, about forty more, scarce any of whom had arms. The printed accounts tell us, indeed, that they observed about two hundred armed men. Possibly the intelligence they had before received had frightened those that gave the account to the General, so that they saw more than double. The said account, which has little truth in it, says, “that Major Pitcairn galloping up to the head of the advanced companies, two officers informed him, that a man (advanced from those that were assembled) had presented his musket, and attempted to shoot them, but the piece flashed, in the pan.”

The simple truth, I take to be this, which I received from one of the prisoners at Concord in free conversation, one James Marr, a native of Aberdeen, in Scotland, of the Fourth Regiment, who was upon the advanced guard, consisting of six, besides a sergeant and corporal. They were met by three men on horseback before they got to the meeting-house a good way; an officer bid them stop; to which it was answered, you had better turn back, for you shall not enter the Town; when the said three persons rode back again, and at some distance one of them offered to fire, but the piece flashed in the pan without going off. I asked Marr whether he could tell if the piece was designed at the soldiers, or to give an alarm? He could not say which. The said Marr further declared, that when they and the others were advanced, Major Pitcairn said to the Lexington Company, (which, by the by, was the only one there,) stop, you rebels! and he supposed that the design was to take away their arms; but upon seeing the Regulars they dispersed, and a firing commenced, but who fired first he could hot say. The said Marr, together with Evan Davies of the Twenty-Third, George Cooper of the Twenty-Third, and William McDonald of the Thirty-Eighth, respectively assured me in each other’s presence, that being in the room where John Bateman, of the Fifty-Second, was, (he was in an adjoining room, too ill to admit of my conversing with him,) they heard the said Bateman say, that the Regulars fired first, and saw him go through the solemnity of confirming the same by an oath on the bible.

Samuel Lee, a private in the Eighteenth Regiment, Royal Irish, acquainted me; that it was the talk among the soldiers that Major Pitcairn fired his pistol, then drew his sword, and ordered them to fire; which agrees with what Levi Harrington, a youth of fourteen last November, told me, that being upon the common, and hearing the Regulars were coming up, he went to the meeting-house, and saw them down in the road, on which he returned to the Lexington Company; that a person on horseback rode round the meeting, and came towards the company that way, said something loud, but could not tell what, rode a little further, then stopped and fired a pistol, which was the first report he heard, then another on horseback fired his pistol; then three or four Regulars fired their guns; upon which, hearing the bullets whistle, he ran off, and saw no more of the affair.

Mr. Paul Revere, who was sent express, was taken and detained some time by the officers, being afterwards upon the spot, and finding the Regulars at hand, passed through the Lexington Company with another, having between them a box of papers belonging to Mr. Hancock, and went down a cross road, till there was a house so between him and the company as that he could not see the latter; he told me likewise, that he had not got half a gun-shot from them before the Regulars appeared; that they halted about three seconds; that upon hearing the report of a pistol or gun, be looked round, and saw the smoke, in front of the Regulars, our people being out of view because of the house; then the Regulars huzzaed and fired, first two more guns, then the advanced guard, and so the whole body. The bullets flying thick about him, and he having nothing to defend himself with, ran into a wood, where he halted, and heard the firing for about a quarter of an hour.

James Brown, one of the Lexington Militia, informed me, that he was upon the common; that two pistols were fired from the party of the soldiers towards the Militiamen as they were getting over the wall to be out of the way, and that immediately upon it the soldiers; began to fire their guns; that being got over the wall, and seeing the soldiers fire pretty freely, he fired upon them, and some others did the same.

Simon Winship of Lexington, declared, that being upon the road about four o’clock, two miles and an half on this side of the meeting-house, he was stopped by the Regulars, and commanded by some of the officers to dismount, or he was a dead man; that he was obliged to march with the said Troops until he came within about half a quarter of a mile of the said meeting-house, when an officer commanded the Troops to halt, and then to prime and load; which being done, the Troops marched on till they came within a few rods of Captain Parker’s Lexington Company, who were partly collected on the place of parade, when said Winship observed an officer at the head of said Troops flourishing his sword round his head in the air, and with a loud voice giving the word fire; the said Winship is positive that there was no discharge of arms