Part 11

Back of the Russell house in a southerly direction, the land slopes gently upward for a little way, and then rises to a considerable height. Near the foot of this hill a goodly number of Americans were posted, among them the men from Danvers. Approaching along the slope of the hill, and parallel to the highway, was a strong British flanking party driving all before it. The Americans at that point were too few to openly resist, so retreated and entered the Russell house. Down the road came the main body under Percy, and perceiving the minute-men, advanced and opened fire. Russell being lame, was the last to reach the door-way, where two bullets felled him. The soldiers rushed in and pierced him, as he lay, with eleven bayonet thrusts. Then they entered the house, and within that little home enacted the bloodiest tragedy of the day. Here, the seven men from Danvers were killed. The other Americans retreated to the cellar, and from the foot of the stairs threatened death to any Briton who should come down. One attempted to, and died on the way. Another died in the struggle overhead. Then the house was plundered in accordance with Percy's method of warfare.

After the British had passed, the Americans gathered at the home of Jason Russell. The dead from the yard, and within the house, were laid, side by side, in the little south room. There were twelve of them, and the blood from their wounds mingled in one common pool upon the floor.[296]

The highway from Jason Russell's house, to the centre of Arlington village, proved to be the bloodiest half mile of all the Battle Road. Within this little stretch were killed twenty or more Americans, and as many or more Britons. And here, on the northerly side of the road, not far from where the British convoy was captured, in the forenoon, stood another Adams home. It was punctured with bullets and it was stained with blood, for the dead and dying and wounded were carried there after the combatants had passed on.[297]

One of the most unequal duels of any war was fought near here, between the venerable Samuel Whittemore, aged eighty years, and a number of British soldiers, acting as a flanking party, on the easterly side of the road.

Whittemore lived with a son and grandchildren near Menotomy River, and had been aroused early in the morning by the passing of Smith's forces on their way to Concord. Mrs. Whittemore then commenced her preparations for flight, to another son's house, near Mystic River, towards Medford. She supposed that her husband intended to accompany her, but was surprised to find him engaged in the warlike occupation of oiling his musket and pistols, and sharpening his sword. In his younger days he had been an officer in the militia. She urged him to accompany her and the children. He refused, with the excuse that he was going "up town" as he expressed it. He did so, arriving there before the British had returned. When they reached the neighborhood of the present railroad crossing they halted, some of them opposite Mystic Street. Whittemore had posted himself behind a stone wall, down Mystic Street about four hundred and fifty feet, near the corner of the present Chestnut Street. The distance seemed an easy range for him, and he opened fire killing the soldier he aimed at. They must have discovered his hiding-place from the smoke-puff, and hastened to close in on him. With one pistol he killed the second Briton, and with his other fatally wounded a third one. In the meantime the ever vigilant flank-guard were attracted to the contest, and a ball from one of their muskets struck his head and rendered him unconscious. They rushed to the spot, and clubbed him with their muskets and pierced him with their bayonets until they felt sure that he was dead. Soon after they left him, he was found by the Americans, and as he seemed to still live they bore him to the Cooper Tavern. Dr. Tufts of Medford was summoned, but declared it useless to dress so many wounds as the aged man could not possibly survive. However, he was persuaded to try, and Whittemore lived eighteen more years, dying in 1793, at the age of ninety-eight. When he was recovering, his wife could not forbear asking him if he did not regret he had not remained with the rest of the family from the first. But the old hero, still suffering from his many wounds, replied:

"No! I would run the same chance again."[298]

Four hundred feet farther along, at the corner of the Medford road, now Medford Street, stood the Cooper Tavern, Benjamin Cooper, landlord. He and his wife, Rachel, were mixing flip at the bar. Two of their guests, and possibly those two were all at the time, were Jason Winship, about forty-five years old, and his brother-in-law, Jabez Wyman, in his fortieth year.[299] Evidently they were non-combatants, and as such expected to remain unmolested. But the soldiers were lashed to a fury by the reception they had met along the road, particularly that of the last half mile. So many houses along back had concealed minute-men, that about all were freely riddled with bullets, then ransacked, and then set on fire. Cooper Tavern was not considered by them as a privileged exception. More than a hundred bullets were fired into it through the doors and windows. Then the soldiers entered for their finishing strokes. Mr. and Mrs. Cooper escaped to the cellar, but Wyman and Winship, both unarmed, were stabbed in many places, their heads mauled until their skulls were broken, and brains scattered about on the floor and walls.[300]

The death of these two unarmed men, formed the climax of Arlington's part of the battle, for Percy's troops passed through the rest of the town, and crossed Menotomy River into Cambridge without further bloody incident.

The Americans who were killed in Arlington, were Jason Russell, Jason Winship and Jabez Wyman of Arlington; Reuben Kennison, of Beverly; Samuel Cook, Benjamin Daland, Ebenezer Goldthwait, Henry Jacobs, Perley Putnam, George Southwick, and Jotham Webb, of Danvers; Elias Haven of Dedham; William Flint, Thomas Hadley, Abednego Ramsdell, and Daniel Townsend, of Lynn; William Polly and Henry Putnam, of Medford; Lieut. John Bacon, Nathaniel Chamberlain, Amos Mills, Sergt. Elisha Mills, and Jonathan Parker of Needham; Benjamin Peirce of Salem; and Jacob Coolidge of Watertown. These numbered twenty-five, and constituted half of all the Americans killed during the day.

The wounded in Arlington were Samuel Whittemore, of Arlington; Nathaniel Cleaves, Samuel Woodbury, and William Dodge, 3rd, of Beverly; Nathan Putnam, and Dennison Wallace of Danvers; Israel Everett of Dedham; Eleazer Kingsbury, and a son of Dr. Tolman, of Needham. They numbered nine out of the thirty-nine Americans wounded during the day.

The British killed in Arlington were at least forty, more than half of all their loss during the day.

The patriot dead of old Menotomy and her sister towns were gathered, and twelve of them placed on a sled and drawn by a yoke of oxen to the little village church-yard. There they were laid away in one large grave, side by side, in the same bloody garments they wore when they fell. One monument marks the place. In the meeting-house close by, friends and relatives met on the following Sabbath, and, we are told that among them were Anna, infant grand-daughter of Jason Russell, born on the day of the battle, and the little son of Jason Winship, who was brought to the altar for baptism. It must have been a sacred and patriotic consecration for all.[301] Some of the other slain from distant towns, were borne by their comrades back to their own homes.[302]

In Arlington, then, as the casualties show, the battle reached its climax. The savage ferocity of the personal encounters show to what a maddening frenzy the King's troops had been wrought. As in Lexington, Percy attempted the wholesale destruction of the American homes by the torch, but so closely had he been followed by the ever-increasing minute-men, that his efforts were futile. His soldiers had the time to start the fires, but not the time to fan them into conflagrations, and thus old Menotomy escaped the fate of Lexington.

Percy continued his march through the town of Arlington, crossing Menotomy River into Cambridge between five and six o'clock. The minute-men hovered dangerously near his rear guard so that he paused often long enough to wheel his two six-pounders about and prevent them from coming too near. They were entirely without fatal effect, but inspired at all times a wholesome respect, and kept the Americans farther away.

FOOTNOTES:

[287] Heath's Memoirs.

[288] Bolton's Brookline. White's was the only company to file claim for pay, however. See Mass. Archives.

[289] Heath's Memoirs.

[290] Heath's Memoirs.

[291] Mrs. Lydia Peirce's statement in Smith's Address, page 33.

[292] Mrs. Almira T. Whittemore in Parker's Arlington, page 194. The tavern is still standing, or part of it, numbered 965 Massachusetts Ave., opposite Mt. Vernon Street.

[293] This little child lived into womanhood and became the wife of James Hill.

[294] Mrs. Adams's Deposition and Smith's Address, wherein he quotes Mrs. Thos. Hall, grand-daughter of Mrs. Adams, Rev. Mr. Brown's Sermon on James Hill, and S. G. Damon's article in The Christian Register, Oct. 28, 1854. The building, or part of it, is still standing (1912) being the ell of a building on the southerly side of Massachusetts Avenue, third house westerly from Bartlett Avenue.

[295] Born Jan. 25, 1717. Paige's History of Cambridge. The old grave-stone in the cemetery at Arlington calls him 59 years old.

[296] King's Address and Smith's Address. The old home is still standing though removed a few rods back from its original location.

[297] It stood easterly of the present (1911) Town Hall. When the railroad went through, part of the house blocked the way and therefore the whole had to be demolished. The grand old elm that shaded the yard was destroyed in a gale and a smaller one now takes its place.

[298] Statement of F. H. Whittemore. Smith's Address, pages 43, 44.

[299] Cutter's Arlington and Paige's Cambridge.

[300] Deposition of Rachel Cooper.

[301] Smith's Address, page 52.

[302] King's Address, page 14.

PERCY'S RETREAT THROUGH CAMBRIDGE.

Occasionally the contest narrowed down to personal encounters between two or more. It was near the Menotomy River, on the Cambridge side, that Lieut. Bowman, of Arlington, overtook a straggler from the British ranks, and engaged him in single combat. Both had guns, but neither one was loaded. The Briton rushed at Bowman with fixed bayonet, but the latter warded it off, and with his musket clubbed his antagonist to the ground. Then he took him prisoner.[303]

Cambridge was the home of Capt. Samuel Thatcher's company of seventy-seven men, but it is probable that Smith had encountered them as far back as Lincoln, for the muster roll in the Massachusetts Archives states that most of them marched twenty-eight miles, which would mean up into Lincoln and return, and to Charlestown Neck and return.

Percy's march through Cambridge, from Menotomy River to the Somerville line, measured nearly a mile and a quarter. The provincials expected that he would return to Boston by the route he came out, that is through Harvard Square over Charles River bridge into Brighton, thence through Roxbury, and along Boston Neck and into Boston. Anticipating as much, it was ordered that the bridge should be made impassable. But Percy deemed it wise to hurry on to Charlestown, trusting that Gen. Gage would have an ample force there to receive and protect him. It was several miles nearer, and with no possibility of dismantled bridges to reconstruct, for his troops to pass over. Nor should it be forgotten that Percy's original plan was to remain that night, at least, in Harvard Square, but he had not counted on such intense hostility, from so large an army of minute-men in open rebellion. He deemed it wiser, therefore, to move constantly forward towards the main army.

This mile and a quarter in Cambridge proved to be one of continual battle, also. The Americans were ever on the alert, and growing more and more active as they realized more and more the real meaning of the invasion. The sight of many of the British soldiers loaded down with plunder; the curling smoke and flames from American dwellings; the dying and the dead, some of them horribly mutilated, scattered all along the highway, were at last inspiring an intense feeling of hatred, and a longing for a satisfying vengeance. Percy's army experienced practically the same sensations. Trained as soldiers to the usages of open warfare, they deemed the frontier method of fighting as unfair and cowardly. They held in contempt the man who should remain concealed in safety and shoot down one who was compelled to remain in the open. Undoubtedly, too, the memory of a comrade, lying at the North Bridge with that ugly hatchet death-wound in the head, aroused the most savage instincts, that seemed to cry for brutal retaliation. Whittemore, and Wyman, and Winship seem to have been victims of vengeance rather than of war.

The Americans did not profit much by the lessons which they had received, earlier in the day, for they again fell victims to the British flankers. Quite a number had gathered near the home of Jacob Watson, situated on the southerly side of the highway near the present Rindge Avenue. Their fragile security was a pile of empty casks, not far from the road, from behind which they awaited the oncoming of the British. But the flank-guard came up in their rear, unobserved, and completely surprised them, killing Major Isaac Gardner of Brookline, a favorite son of that town, and the first graduate of Harvard College to fall in the War, and two Cambridge men, John Hicks, nearly fifty years old, and Moses Richardson, fifty-three years old. And near the same place, another Cambridge man, William Marcy, as tradition says[304] of feeble intellect, and a non-combatant. He was sitting on the fence, evidently enjoying the military spectacle, and perhaps good-naturedly cheering on the marching red-coats. His friendly demonstrations were entirely mistaken for shouts of derision. In the midst of his simple pleasure, some Briton esteemed it his duty to kill him as an enemy of the King.

The British loss at this place was but one killed.

On they marched, wheeling to the left, into Beech Street, a thoroughfare about seven hundred feet long, and thence out of Cambridge and into Somerville.

Soon after this, the wife of John Hicks, whose home is still standing (1912) at the corner of Dunster and Winthrop Streets, fearing for his safety, sent her son, fourteen years of age, to look for him. He had been absent since morning, and undoubtedly the noise of battle, a mile and a quarter away, coming across the fields, bore a sad burden of prophecy. Her misgivings were well founded, for the son found his father by the roadside where he fell, and near him the others.

The body of Isaac Gardner was taken to Brookline and there buried the next day. The remains of John Hicks, Moses Richardson and William Marcy, were immediately taken to the little churchyard near the Common, a mile from where they fell. They were buried in one grave, without coffins or shrouds even. A son of Moses Richardson, standing by, realizing that the earth was to fall directly on their faces, jumped down into the grave and arranged the cape of his father's coat, that it might shield him somewhat from the falling earth.

We may wonder now, at that hasty burial, without much, if any, ceremony; but let us associate with it the trail of the invading army, and of what seemed possible for the morrow, if it should return, greatly reinforced, for vengeance. Boston was not far away, and Gen. Gage, even then, might be preparing to move on Cambridge, with a force sufficiently large for its subjection. The Americans did not fully realize their own power or their own courage, not even as well as Gen. Gage did, who wisely decreed to remain in Boston and Charlestown, and decide later whether to pursue an aggressive or a defensive campaign. The spontaneous rousing of the country was an impressive one to the British commander.

It had evidently been Percy's plan to camp on Cambridge Common that night, and while awaiting expected reinforcements, or upon their arrival, lay the buildings of Harvard College, and others, in ruins. Such a course would have been in harmony with his warfare in Lexington and Arlington, and serve as a practical lesson to those in rebellion, of the disposition and readiness of their King to wreak a swift and terrible vengeance upon his enemies.[305] But Percy's plans were rudely disarranged, and he commenced to realize that he was really being driven back to Boston.

FOOTNOTES:

[303] Dr. B. Cutter's Statement in Smith's Address, page 47.

[304] Paige's History of Cambridge, page 414.

[305] See Thanksgiving Sermon in the Camp at Roxbury, Nov. 23, 1775, by Rev. Isaac Mansfield, Jr., Chaplain to Gen. Thomas's Regiment. Mr. Mansfield fully believed such plans to have been made and states that his information came so direct that he could not hesitate to accept it but did not feel at liberty to publish the name of his informer.

PERCY'S RETREAT THROUGH SOMERVILLE.

It was about half past six o'clock when Percy left Cambridge and entered the present city of Somerville, crossing the line at the corner of Beech and Elm Streets. Just about at the Somerville line the battle was hotly renewed. Near the corner of Beech Street, and on the easterly side of Elm Street, stood, and still stands (1912), the house of Timothy Tufts. Here Percy halted his army while his two field-pieces were dragged up the hill back of the Tufts house and discharged towards his pursuers, with the usual result of his cannonading--none killed. From out a grove a little way up the road, came a scattering fire of American sharpshooters and in consequence quite a number of Britons were killed. They fell in the road, just in front of the Tufts house, and a tablet there marks where they were buried.

Along Elm Street to Oak Street, and then continuing in Somerville Avenue, was their route, when the march was resumed. At the foot of Laurel Street on Somerville Avenue was then a little pond. Into that many weary Britons threw themselves--some for the refreshing plunge, others to quench their thirst.[306]

Their march was continued rapidly now, and in consequence the fatalities on the American side were slight, if any, on the road from the Tufts house through Bow Street, for that was a part of Battle Road then, to Union Square. From the latter place they continued through Washington Street, where the American sharpshooters had a grand opportunity to renew their havoc. Washington Street skirts along the westerly foot of Prospect Hill, the summit of which commands easily a stretch of highway for more than half a mile. Many were killed and wounded, some of the latter of whom were taken into the house then standing at the corner of Washington and Prospect Streets. Here Percy paused long enough to train his two field pieces up the road, and again with his usual lack of fatal results. But he checked the Americans.

A little way farther along on the northerly side of the road, stood the home of Samuel Shed. Percy's troops halted there, for the few moments necessary to turn his field pieces on his pursuers again. While there one of the Britons, ambitious for plunder, entered the Shed home, and finding there a bureau or highboy filled with household effects, commenced the work of selecting what he desired. It took him too long, for his companions passed on, and left him still too busy to notice their departure or the coming of the Americans. Bullets came through the window, one of which killed him, and three riddled the old bureau, spattering his blood over it, and on the floor.[307]

A few rods farther, the grassy slope of Prospect Hill descended in a southerly direction to Washington Street, then called the Cambridge Road. James Miller, about sixty-six years old, stood there awaiting the British. With him was a companion, and both fired with deadly effect, again and again, as the British marched by in the road below. They were discovered finally, and Miller's companion urged him to retreat.

"Come, Miller, we've got to go."

"I'm too old to run," replied Miller, and he remained only to be pierced with a volley of thirteen bullets.[308] His home was but a short distance down the road, and is still standing, next to the house on the easterly corner of Washington and Franklin Streets.

Miller was the only American killed in Somerville, as the British were in too full retreat to act very much on the aggressive. Their loss was considerable, however, and along the entire Battle Road, for the minute-men were exceedingly active in the rear and on the northerly side of the road, particularly.

The policy of property destruction was continued by Percy through Somerville. The limited time at his command did not allow of very thorough work, but he accomplished something. The estate of James Miller whom they killed on the slope of Prospect Hill, was damaged to the extent of £4, 12s. ($23.00). Ebenezer Shed lost his house, barn, and another building, valued at £140 ($700), and the damage to his crop, fences, etc., he estimated at £279, 3s. 2d. ($1395.79). The widow of Abigal Shed suffered to some extent in the same way.[309]

FOOTNOTES:

[306] Booth, in Somerville Journal. April, 1875.

[307] The old highboy was in existence in 1910 and treasured by a Somerville man, Francis Tufts, to whom it descended. I have seen it, with its blood stains and three bullet holes.

[308] E. C. Booth in an article on Somerville in Drake's History of Middlesex County, Vol. 2, page 312.

[309] J. F. Hunnewell, A Century of Town Life, page 153.

PERCY'S ARRIVAL IN CHARLESTOWN.

The sun set at seven o'clock on that nineteenth day of April, in 1775.[310] It never rose again on Middlesex County under kingly rule. Percy must have been in the vicinity of Union Square, Somerville, at that particular moment. The pauses for his artillery demonstration; the destruction of the few buildings; the killing of Miller; and the hurried march to the Charlestown line, did not occupy more than half an hour. It was just dark enough for the musket flashes to be seen across the marshes and across the waters of the Charles River to the Boston shore, where were grouped anxious watchers awaiting the news of battle.

Percy's thirty-six rounds for each of his soldiers had been about all expended. He describes the fire all around his marching column as "incessant," coming from behind stone walls, and from houses that he at first supposed had been evacuated.[311]

Charlestown Common, now Sullivan Square, was soon reached, and his column gladly wheeled to the right and marched up Bunker Hill. As they did so, a mile away, on top of Winter Hill, in Somerville, were just then arriving three hundred more Americans, who had marched from Salem under Col. Timothy Pickering. They were half an hour late to be particularly effective. No blame can be attached to them for that, for there were thousands of other minute-men, from distant towns who were also late, for April 19th, but who were in ample time to join the besieging army on April 20th.