Old North Bridge Archives - New England Historical Society

There was a shot, and it was heard around the world, but who fired it and where? Debate over the shot heard round the world caused more than one skirmish over the years – between Concord and Lexington.

And then Menotomy jumped into the fight.

shot-heard-round-the-world-battle-lexington

The Battle of Lexington, where the shot heard round the world was fired.

First Armed Opposition

The question, “Where was the shot heard round the world fired?” surfaced in 1824. Then the Marquis de Lafayette visited all 24 states to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of independence. When he arrived in Lexington, Mass., people told him he’d reached the ‘birthplace of American liberty.’ But then he went to Concord, where people told him the patriots made the “first forcible resistance” there.

That infuriated Lexington, having been deprived of “the honour of having raised the first standard of an armed opposition to the unjust and tyrannical measures of the mother country.”

So in 1825, the Lexington Town Meeting appointed a committee to publish a statement of facts about the April 19 affair, “as may be supported by undoubted testimony.”

From that testimony, Elias Phinney tried to put the matter to rest. He compiled a book called, History of the Battle of Lexington: On the Morning of the 19th April, 1775 (now a free ebook).

In it, he explained the confusion. Shortly after the battles, British general Thomas Gage claimed the patriots fired the first shot. To refute that claim, witnesses in Lexington said the patriots hadn’t even fired.

But in the opening days of the war, Phinney wrote, no one wanted to admit that Lexington patriots had shot at British regulars. The outcome of the war was then far from certain, and militiamen identified as shooters could wind up on the gallows.

The Shot Heard Round the World

Phinney wrote that at sunrise, 700 British regulars showed up in Lexington and about 80 militiamen came out of Buckman’s tavern. They knew the British regulars were on the march to Concord to seize arms and ammunition.

Standing on Lexington Green, militia Capt. John Parker told his men not to fire first.

What really happened was that someone — no one, to this day, knows for sure — discharged a weapon. Some people consider that the shot heard round the world.

The Battle of Lexington, by William Barnes Wollen.

Phinney, however, neglected to mention that anonymous shot. Instead, he set out to prove that the redcoats, under orders, began firing.

“Their commander, Lieut. Col. Smith, advanced a few rods, and exclaimed, “Lay down your arms and disperse, you damned rebels!–Rush on my boys! Fire!” and fired his own pistol.

Well… not quite. Smith hadn’t even arrived. It was probably Maj. John Pitcairn who told the rebels to lay down their arms. But Finney wanted to prove that the patriots did shoot back, only, however, after the British fired a second unprovoked volley. So he listed the testimony of militiamen who said they’d fired their weapons.

Testimony

Phinney wrote that William Munroe was confident some of the militiamen fired back. He testified that Ebenezer Munroe, wounded in the arm, said to him, “I’ll give them the guts of my gun.”

“We then both took aim at the main body of the British troops,–the smoke preventing our seeing anything but the heads of some of their horses,–and discharged our pieces,” Munroe testified.

“I discharged my gun into the main body of the enemy,” said Ebenezer Munroe.

William Tidd retreated up the north road as an officer on horseback pursued him. He called out, “Damn you, stop, or you are a dead man!” …”Therefore I sprang over a pair of bars, made a stand, and discharged my gun at him.”

Nathan Munroe said he jumped over a wall when the British started firing, ‘and then turned and fired at them.’

Reenactors on the march to Lexington to commemorate the shot heard round the world.

Concord Hymn

That testimony didn’t persuade Ralph Waldo Emerson. He lived in Concord in a house called the Old Manse, where his father and grandfather had watched the skirmish. In 1836, he added fuel to the debate between Concord and Lexington when he published the Concord Hymn.

It begins:

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world.

Emerson, in essence, argued that in Concord at the Old North Bridge the patriots fired the first shots under orders. In Concord the British suffered their first fatalities and made their first retreat. So the first real resistance in the American Revolution happened in Concord, he concluded, along with the rest of the town.

Reconstructed Old North Bridge.

The animosity between Concord and Lexington simmered for the next few decades. During the bicentennial of the shot heard round the world, President Ulysses S. Grant considered skipping Massachusetts to evade the issue.

Then in 1894, Lexington petitioned the Massachusetts Legislature to proclaim April 19 as “Lexington Day.” Concord countered with a petition to call it “Concord Day.” Arlington, then called Menotomy, entered the fray, declaring patriots had fought a larger battle there during the British retreat to Boston.

Gov. Frederic T. Greenhalge came up with a compromise to honor the shot heard round the world: Patriots’ Day.

Since 1969, Patriots’ Day falls on the third Monday of the month of April. Maine and Connecticut also celebrate the holiday to commemorate the shot heard round the world.

Images: Reenactors By Jrcovert – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=19639046. Old North Bridge By Daderot at en.wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=5942756. This story last updated in 2022.

Hurricane Diane might not have caused so much damage had Hurricane Connie not struck a few days earlier.

Winsted, Conn., after Hurricane Diane

But Hurricane Diane was bad — almost as bad as Hurricane Carol, which hammered New England the year before.

Connie brought 4-6 inches of rainfall to New England on Aug. 11 and 12, 1955, saturating the ground. Then on Aug. 17, 1955, came the very wet, very windy Diane. In some places Diane dumped 20 inches of rain in two days.

Hurricane Diane affected the entire East Coast from North Carolina to Massachusetts. More than 100,000 New Englanders lost their jobs, as flooded mills and factories had to shut their doors in Diane’s wake. The hurricane injured 7,000 New Englanders and killed more than 100 people.

It was the first hurricane to cost more than $1 billion in damage.

Connecticut

Connecticut got hit the hardest. Near Torrington, Conn., a weather station recorded 16.86 inches of rain within 24 hours, the highest in the state’s history.

Diane split the state in two as it swept away bridges and severed communications. It cost nearly 86,000 Connecticut workers their jobs.

Connecticut lost 77 people of the 180 people killed as a result of Diane. Gov. Abraham Ribicoff called it ‘the worst disaster in the state’s history.’ It was at least the worst flood in the state’s history.

Main Street in Winsted, Conn., was nearly wiped out. A Connecticut National guardsman flew over in a helicopter and said it looked like someone had taken cars and thrown them against each other, the Hartford Courant reported.

A guardsman spotted a house floating down the river, complete with lawn and landscaping. Another house floated by with smoke curling out of the chimney.

The Still River flooded the struggling Gilbert Clock Co., and forced it to close its doors for good. The local newspaper reported Hurricane Diane destroyed or severely damaged 95 percent of Winsted businesses.

In the flooded town of Putnam, Conn., Diane set fire to, then collapsed, a magnesium processing facility. As dawn broke, hundreds of barrels of burning magnesium drifted along the streets before exploding.

In Waterbury, 26 people died when Diane washed away 13 houses in one neighborhood.

Elsewhere in New England

The hurricane washed out the Horseshoe Dam in Woonsocket, R.I., dislodging coffins from historic cemeteries. It also damaged wire and rubber factories, throwing 6,000 of Woonsocket’s 50,000 residents out of work. The Blackstone River swelled to a width of a mile.

Longmeadow cricket courts. Photo courtesy Boston Public Library, Leslie Jones Collection.

In Massachusetts, Hurricane Diane washed away the historic Old North Bridge over the Concord River. Thirteen people were killed, mostly by drowning. In Worcester, Hurricane Diane destroyed flooded shoe factories and threw 10,000 workers out of their jobs. The hurricane’s rains flooded the Longmeadow cricket courts, delaying the Davis Cup.

Aftermath

Eight states were declared federal disaster areas. National guardsmen dropped food to stranded flood victims from C-47 airplanes. Guardsmen in helicopters plucked people off of roofs and out of trees. Donations to help the victims came from around the world.

Never again would a hurricane be named Diane.

In 1956, Congress passed the Federal Flood Insurance Act, creating federal flood insurance, but didn’t fund it. A national flood program would have to wait until 1968. Hurricane Diane also led to the creation of the National Hurricane Center.

To see a youtube video of the rescue operations after the flooding from Hurricane Diane, click here.

This story was updated in 2022.

Old North Bridge

The Shot Heard Round the World: Concord vs. Lexington vs. … Menotomy?