The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere
On April 18, 1775, Paul Revere was given the task of riding to Lexington, Massachusetts, with the news that British troops were about to march into the countryside northwest of Boston. Revere contacted a friend and instructed him to show lanterns in the tower of the Old North Church as a signal. Two lanterns meant that the British troops planned to row “by sea” across the Charles River to Cambridge, rather than march “by land” out the neck of Boston.
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-Five:
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to his friend, “If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry-arch
Of the North-Church-tower, as a signal-light,—
One if by land, and two if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be,
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm,
For the country-folk to be up and to arm.”
(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)
Paul Revere went to Charlestown across the river and informed the Sons of Liberty. He made sure they could see the lanterns as signals in the North Church tower. Revere then borrowed a horse and set off about 11:00 pm, informing houses and militia throughout the countryside: “The British are coming – The British are coming.” He arrived in Lexington sometime after midnight and went to the house where Samuel Adams and John Hancock were staying.
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