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CHAPTER XIV

SPEECH OF REV. JAMES T. WOODBURY. -- EAGLE IN CONCORD FIGHT

REV. JAMES T. WOODBURY'S SPEECH

      WHO was Captain Isaac Davis? Who was Abner Hosmer? Who was James Hayward? And what was Concord fight? What did they fight for, and what did they win? These were Massachusetts Province militiamen, not in these good, quiet, piping times of peace, but in 1775, at the very dark, gloomy outbreak of the American Revolution.
      Let us turn back to the bloody annals of that eventful day. Let us see, as well as we can at this distance of three-quarters of a century, just how matters and things stood.
      General Gage had full possession of this city. The flag that waved over it was not that of "the old pine-tree;" nor that one, with that beautiful insignia over your head, sir, with the uplifted right hand lettered over with this most warlike, and, to my taste, most appropriate motto in a wrongful world like this, "Ense petit placidam, sub libertete quietem." No, no! It was the flag of that hereditary despot, George the Third.

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      And if there had been no Isaac Davis or other men of his stamp on the ground on that day, the flag of the crouching lion, the flag of Queen Victoria, due successor to that same hated George the Third, first the oppressor, and then the unscrupulous murderer of our fathers, --yes, I know what I say, the unscrupulous murderer of our fathers,-- would still wave over this beautiful city, and would now be streaming in the wind over every American ship in this harbor. Where, in that case, would have been this legislature? Why, sir, it would never have been; and my conscientious friend from West Brookfield, instead of sitting here a good "Free-Soil" man as he is, would have been called to no such high vocation as making laws for a free people, for the good old Commonwealth of Massachusetts, voting for Robert Rantoul, Jun., or Charles Sumner, or Hon. Mr. Winthrop, to represent us in a body known as the United States Senate, pronounced the most august, dignified legislative assembly in the civilized world. Oh, no! Far otherwise! If permitted to legislate at all, it would be done under the dictation of Queen Victoria; and if he made laws, it would be with a ring in his nose to pull him this way and that, or with his head in the British lion's mouth, --that same lion's mouth which roared in 1775, showing his teeth and lashing his sides at our fathers.
      This city was in full possession of the enemy,

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and had been for several months. General Gage had converted the house of prayer, the Old South Church, --where we met a few days since, to sit, delighted auditors, to that unsurpassed Election Sermon, --into a riding-school, a drilling-place for his cavalry. The pulpit, and all the pews of the lower floor, were, with vandal violence, torn out, and tan brought in; and here the dragoons of King George practised, on their prancing warhorses, the sword exercise, with Tory ladies and gentlemen for spectators in the galleries.
      At the 19th of April, 1775, it was not "Ense petit placidam, sub libertate quietem." "Sub libertate!" It would have been rather "sub vili servitio!" --sub anything rather than liberty under the British Crown.
      Information had been received from most reliable sources that valuable powder, ball, and other munitions of war, were deposited in Concord. General Gage determined to have them. Concord was a great place in '75. The Provincial Congress had just suspended its session there of near two months, adjourning over to the 10th of May, with Warren for their president, and such men as old Samuel Adams, John Hancock, John Adams. and James Otis as their advisers. Yes, Concord was the centre of the brave old Middlesex, containing within it all the early battlegrounds of liberty, -- Old North Bridge, Lexington Common, and Bunker Hill, -- and was for a time the capital

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of the Province, the seat of the government of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay.
      And Concord had within it as true-hearted Whig patriots as ever breathed. Rev. Mr. Emerson was called a "high son of liberty." To contend with tyrants, and stand up against them, resisting unto blood, fighting for the inalienable rights of the people, was a part of his holy religion. And he was one of the most godly men and eloquent ministers in the colony. He actually felt it to be his duty to God to quit that most delightful town and village, and the most affectionate church and people, and enter the Continental army, and serve them as a chaplain of a regiment.
      What a patient, noble-hearted, truthful, loyal, confiding, affectionate generation of men they were! And remember, these were the men, exasperated beyond all further endurance by the course of a deluded Parliament and besotted ministry, who flew to arms on the 19th of April, 1775. These were the men who then hunted up their powder-horns and bullet-pouches, took down their guns from the hooks, and ground up their bayonets, on that most memorable of all days in the annals of the Old Thirteen Colonies, -- nay, in the annals of the world, --which record the struggles that noble men have made in all ages to be free!
      Yes, to my mind, Mr. Speaker, it is a more glorious day, a day more full of thrilling incidents

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and great steps taken by the people to be free, than even the Fourth of July itself, 1776.
      Why, sir, the 19th of April, '75, that resistance, open, unorganized, armed, marshalled resistance at the Old North Bridge, that marching down in battle array at that soul-stirring air which every soldier in this house must remember to this day, for the tune is in fashion yet, -- I mean "The White Cockade," -was itself a prior declaration of independence, written out not with ink upon paper or parchment, but a declaration of independence made by drawn swords, uplifted right arms, fixed bayonets ground sharp, cracking musketry, -- a declaration written out in the best blood of this land, at Lexington first, and finally all the way for eighteen miles from Old North Bridge to Charlestown Neck, where those panting fugitives found shelter under the guns of British ships of war, riding at anchor in Mystic River ready to receive them; a declaration that put more at hazard, and cost the men who made it more, after all, of blood and treasure, than that of 1776.
      It cost Davis, Hosmer, and Hayward, and hundreds of others equally brave and worthy, their hearts' blood. It cost many an aged father and mother their darling son, many a wife her husband, many a Middlesex maid her lover.
      Oh, what a glorious, but oh, what a bloody day it was! That was the day which split in twain the British empire, never again to be reunited.

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What was the battle of Waterloo? What question did it settle? Why, simply who, of several kings, should wear the crown.
      Well, I always thought ever since I read it when a boy, that if I had fought on either side it would have been with Napoleon against the allied forces. But what is the question to me, or what is the question to you, or to any of us, or our children after us, if we are to be ruled over by crowned heads and hereditary monarchs? What matters it who they are, or which one it shall be?
      In ancient times, three hundred Greeks, under Leonidas, stood in the pass of Thermopyloe, and for three successive days beat back and kept at bay five million Persians, led on by Xerxes the Great. It was a gallant act; but did it preserve the blood-bought liberties of Greece? No. In time they were cloven down, and the land of Demosthenes and Solon marked for ages by the footsteps of the slaves.
      We weep over it, but we cannot alter it. But not so, thank God, with "Concord Fight;" and by "Concord Fight," I say here, for fear of being misunderstood, I mean by "Concord" all the transactions of that day.
      I regard them as one great drama, scene first of which was at Lexington early in the morning, when old Mrs. Harrington called up her son Jonathan, who alone, while I speak, survives of all that host on either side in arms that day. He

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lives, blessed be God, he still lives! I know him well, a trembling, but still breathing memento of the renowned past, yet lingering by mercy of God on these "mortal shores," if for nothing else, to wake up your sleeping sympathies, and induce you, if anything could, to aid in the noble work of building over the bones of his slaughtered companions-in-arms, Davis, Hosmer, and Hayward, such a monument as they deserve. Oh, I wish he was here, I wish he only stood on yonder platform, noble man!
      "Concord Fight" broke the ice. "Concord Fight," the rush from the heights at North Bridge, was the first open, marshalled resistance to the king. Our fathers, cautious men, took there a step that they could not take back if they would, and would not if they could. Till they made that attack, probably no British blood had been shed.
      If rebels at all, it was only on paper. They had not levied war. They had not vi et armis attacked their lawful king. But by that act they passed the Rubicon. Till then they might retreat with honor, but after that it was too late. The sword was drawn, and had been made red in the blood of princes, in the person of their armed defenders.
      Attacking Captain Laurie and his detachment at North Bridge was, in law, attacking King George himself. Now they must fight or be eter-

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nally disgraced. And now they did fight in good earnest. They drew the sword, and threw away, as well as they might, the scabbard. Yesterday they humbly petitioned. They petitioned no longer. Oh, what change from the 19th to the 20th of April!
      They had been, up to that day, a grave, God-fearing, loyal set of men, honoring the king. Now they strike for national independence; and after seven years of war, by the help of God, they won it. They obtained nationality. It that day breathed into life; the Colony gave way to the State; that morning Davis and all of them were British colonists. They became by that day's resistance, either rebels doomed to die by the halter, or free, independent citizens. If the old pine-tree flag still waved over them unchanged, they themselves were changed entirely and forever.
      Old Middlesex was allowed the privilege of opening the war, of first baptizing the land with her blood. God did well to select old Middlesex, and the loved and revered centre of old Middlesex, namely, Concord, as the spot, not where this achievement was to be completed, but where it was to be begun, and well begun; where the troops of crowned kings were to meet, not the troops of the people, but the people themselves, and be routed and beaten from the field, and what is more, stay beaten, we hope, we doubt not, to the end of time.

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      And let us remember that our fathers, from the first to the last in that eventful struggle, made most devout appeals to Almighty God. It was so with the whole Revolutionary War. It was all begun, continued, and ended in God. Every man and every boy that went from the little mountain town of Acton, with its five hundred souls, went that morning from a house of prayer. A more prayerful, pious, God-fearing, man-loving people, I have never read or heard of. If you have, sir, I should like to know who they are, and where they live. They were Puritans, Plymouth Rock Puritans, men who would petition and petition and petition, most respectfully and most courteously, and when their petition and petitioners, old Ben Franklin and the rest, were proudly spurned away from the foot of the throne, petition again; and do it again for more than ten long, tedious years. But after all they would fight, and fight as never man fought; and they did fight.
      When such men take up arms, let kings and queens take care of themselves. When you have waked up such men to resistance unto blood, you have waked up a lion in his den. You may kill them, -- they are vulnerable besides on the heel, -- but my word for it, you never can conquer them.
      At Old North Bridge, about nine o'clock in the forenoon, on the memorable 19th of April, 1775, King George's troops met these men, and, after

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receiving their first fire, fled. And the flight still continues, -- the flight of kings before the people.
      Davis's minute-men were ready first, and were on the ground first. They were an élite corps, young men, volunteers; and give me young men for war. They were to be ready at a moment's warning. They were soon at Davis's house and gun-shop, and they waited here till about fifty had arrived. While there some of them were powdering their hair, just as the Greeks were accustomed to put garlands of flowers on their heads as they went forth to battle; and they expected a battle. They were fixing their gun-locks, and making a few cartridges; but cartridges and cartridge-boxes were rare in those days. The accoutrements of the heroes of the Revolution were the powder-horn and the bullet-pouch, at least of the militia.
      And Concord Fight, with all its unequalled and uneclipsed glory, was won, by the help of God, by Massachusetts militiamen. Some were laughing and joking to think that they were going to have what they had for months longed for, -- a "hit at old Gage." But Davis was a thoughtful, sedate, serious man, a genuine Puritan, like Samuel Adams; and he rebuked them. He told them that in his opinion it was "a most eventful crisis for the colonies; blood would be spilt, that was certain. The crimsoned fountain would be opened; none could tell when it would close, nor

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with whose blood it would flow. Let every man gird himself for battle, and not be afraid, for God is on our side. He had great hope that the country would be free, though he might not live to see it." The truth was, and it should come out, Davis expected to die that day if he went into battle. He never expected to come back alive to that house.
      And no wonder that after the company started, and had marched out of his lane some twenty rods to the highway, he halted them, and went back. He was an affectionate man. He loved that youthful wife of his, and those four sick children, and he thought to see them never again; and he never did. There was such a presentiment in his mind. His widow has often told me all about it; and she thought the same herself. And no wonder he went back, and took one more last, lingering look of them, saying -- he seemed to want to say something; but as he stood on that threshold where I have often stood, and where, in my mind's eye, I have often seen his manly form, he could only say, "Take good care of the children;" the feelings of the father struggling in him and for a moment almost overcoming the soldier. The ground of this presentiment was this. A few days before the fight, Mr. Davis and wife had been away from home of an afternoon. On returning they noticed, as they entered, a large owl sitting on Davis's gun as it hung on the

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hooks, -- his favorite gun, the very gun he carried to the fight, a beautiful piece for those days, his own workmanship, the same he grasped in both hands when he was shot at the bridge, being just about to fire himself, and which, when stone dead, he grasped still, his friends having, to get it away, to unclinch his stiff fingers.
      Sir, however you may view this occurrence, or however I may, it matters not. I am telling how that brave man viewed it, and his wife, and the men of those times. It was an ill omen, a bad sign. The sober conclusion was, that the first time Davis went into battle he would lose his life. This was the conclusion, and so it turned out. The family could give no account of the creature, and they knew not how it came in. The hideous bird was not allowed to be disturbed or frightened away; and there he stayed two or three days, siting upon the gun.
      But mark, with this distinct impression on his mind, did the heart of that Puritan patriarch quail? No; not at all, not at all. He believed in the Puritan's God, -- the Infinite Spirit sitting on the throne of the universe, Proprietor of all, Creator and Upholder of all, superintending and disposing of all, that the hairs of his head were all numbered, and not even a sparrow could fall to the ground without his God's express notice, knowledge, and consent. He took that gun from those hooks with no trembling hand or wavering

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heart; and with his trusty sword hanging by his side, he started for North Bridge with the firm tread of a giant. Death! Davis did not fear to die. And he had the magic power, which some men certainly have, -- God bestows it upon them, -- to inspire everyone around them with the same feeling. His soldiers to a man would have gone anywhere after such a leader. After about two miles of hurried march, they came out of the woods only a few rods from Colonel James Barrett's, in Concord, and halted in the highway, whether discovered or not (this road came into the road by Barrett's, some twenty rods from Barrett's house), looking with burning indignation to see Captain Parsons and his detachment of British troops with axes break up the gun-carriages, and bring out hay and wood, and burn them in the yard.
      They had great thoughts of firing in upon them then and there to venture. But Davis was a military man; and his orders were to rendezvous at North Bridge, and he knew very well that taking possession of North Bridge would cut off all retreat for this detachment of horse, and they must be taken prisoners.
      In a few minutes more he wheeled his company into line on the high lands of North Bridge, taking the extreme left of the line, -- that line being formed facing the river, which was his place, as the youngest commissioned officer present in the

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regiment, -- a place occupied a few days before by him at a regimental muster of the minute-men.
      A council of war was immediately summoned by Colonel James Barrett, and attended on the spot, made up of commissioned officers and Committees of Safety. The question was, What shall now be done? The Provincials had been talking for months -- nay, for years -- of the wrongs they had borne at the hands of a cruel motherland. They had passed good paper resolutions by the dozens. They had fired off their paper bullets; but what shall now be done? Enough had been said. What shall now be done? What a moment! What a crisis for the destinies of this land and of all lands, of the rights and liberties of the human race! Never was a council of war or council of peace called to meet a more important question, one on the decision of which more was at stake. Their council was divided. Some thought it best at once to rush down and take possession of the bridge, and cut off the retreat of Captain Parsons; others thought not.
      Here were probably found in battle array over six hundred troops, standing there under arms. Colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn were in plain sight, with their red coats on, their cocked-up hats and their spyglasses, inspecting from the old graveyard hills the gathering foe; for they came in from all directions, suddenly, unaccountably, like the gathering of a summer thunder-cloud.

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Of course it was admitted on all hands that they could take possession of the bridge, but it was to be expected that this skirmish must bring on a general engagement with the main body in the town. The Provincials would be in greater force by twelve o'clock m. than at nine. And if the whole British army of eight hundred men should take the field against them in their present number, most undoubtedly the men would run, -- they never would "stand fire." Their officers thought so; their officers said so on the spot. They gave it as their opinion, and it is probable that no attack at that hour would have been made had it not happened that, at that moment, the smoke began to rise from the centre of the town, -- all in plain sight from these heights, -- the smoke of burning houses. And they said, Shall we stand here like cowards, and see Old Concord burn?
      Colonel Barrett gave consent to make the attack. Davis came back to his company, drew his sword, and commanded, them to advance six paces. He then faced them to the right, and at his favorite tune of "The White Cockade" led the column of attack towards the bridge. By the side of Davis marched Major Buttrick of Concord, as brave a man as lived, and old Colonel Robinson of Westford. The British on this began to take up the bridge; the Americans on this quickened their pace. Immediately the firing on both

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sides began. Davis is at once shot dead, through the heart. The ball passed quite through his body, making a very large wound, perhaps driving in a button of his coat.
      His blood gushed out in one great stream, flying, it is said, more than ten feet, besprinkling and besmearing his own clothes, these shoe-buckles, and the clothes of Orderly Sergeant David Forbush, and a file leader, Thomas Thorp. Davis when hit, as is usual with men when shot thus through the heart, leaped up. his fall length and fell over the causeway on the wet ground, firmly grasping all the while, with both hands, that beautiful gun; and when his weeping comrades came to take care of his youthful but bloody remains, they with difficulty unclutched those hands now cold and stiff in death. He was just elevating to his sure eye this gun. No man was a surer shot. What a baptism of blood did those soldiers then receive! The question is now, Do these men deserve this monument, -- one that shall speak?
      Davis's case is without a parallel, and was so considered by the Legislature and by Congress when they granted aid to his widow. There never can be another.
      There never can be but one man who headed the first column of attack on the king's troops in the Revolutionary War. And Isaac Davis was that man. Others fell, but not exactly as he fell. Give them the marble. Vote them the monu-

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ment, one that shall speak to all future generations, and speak to the terror of kings and to the encouragement of all who will be free, and who, when the bloody crisis comes to strike for it, "are not afraid to go."

[Photo - "Acton Monument"]

      At the base of the Acton monument may be seen the rude gravestones that stood in the ancient burial-ground seventy-five years before their removal to their present location.
      Their quaint epitaphs, chiselled before the

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result of the sacrifice was realized, are of interest, in that they tell the story before time had afforded an opportunity to arouse the sentiment of later days.

I SAY UNTO ALL

WATCH.

IN MEMORY OF CAPT. ISAAC DAVIS
WHO WAS SLAIN IN BATTLE AT
CONCORD APRIL YE 19TH 1775 IN
THE DEFENCE OF YE JUST RIGHTS
AND LIBERTRIES OF HIS COUNTRY
CIVIL & RELIGIOUS. HE WAS A LOVNG
HUSBAND A TENDER FATHER & A
KIND NEIGHBOUR AN INGENEOUS
CRAFTSMAN & SERVICEABLE TO
MANKIND DIED IN YE PRIME OF
LIFE AGED 30 YEARS 1 M., & 25 DAYS.

      Is there not an appointed time to man upon ye earth? are not his days also like the days of an hireling? As the cloud is consumed and vanisheth away, so he that goeth down to the grave shall come up no more. He shall return no more to his house, neither shall his place know hint any more. -- JOB vii. I, 9, 10.

"MEMENTO MORI"

HERE LIES THE BODY OF MR. ABNER HOSMER,
SON OF DEA. JONA. HOSMER, AND MRS. MARTHA HIS WIFE,
WHO WAS KILLED IN CONCORD FIGHT
APRIL 19TH, 1775,
IN YE DEFENCE OF YE JUST RIGHTS OF HIS COUNTRY,
BEING IN THE 21ST YEAR OF HIS AGE.

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IN MEMORY OF MR. JAMES HAYWARD,
SON OF CAPT. SAMUEL AND MRS. MARY HAYWARD,
WHO WAS KILLED IN CONCORD FIGHT,
APRIL 19TH, 1775,
AGED 25 YEARS AND FOUR DAYS.

This monument may unborn ages tell How brave Young Hayward, like a hero fell, When fighting for his countrie's liberty Was slain, and here his body now doth lye, He and his foe were by each other slain, His victim's blood with his ye earth did slain, Upon ye field he was with victory crowned, And yet must yield his breath upon that ground. He express't his hope in God before his death, After his foe had yielded up his breath. O may his death a lasting witness lye, Against Oppressors' bloody cruelty.

EAGLE OF CONCORD FIGHT.

      A most interesting relic of the Civil War is the eagle "Old Abe," that is now in the State House at Madison, Wis. But the eagle of Concord Fight is equally valuable as a relic; and the circumstances attending its presence at Old North Bridge, and preservation for one hundred and twenty years, are more fascinating than any told by the Greeks of the phoenix, the bird of fable that rose from its own ashes.
      The eagle went to Concord on the morning of April 19, 1775, with the Acton men, and was in the form of a bosom-pin represented above.

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      It may seem almost fabulous that the soldiers of that day went forth to battle decked in jewels. But we must remember that it was the citizens who responded to the alarm, going forth to battle as citizens.
      We have unmistakable evidence that not only the Provincials, but also the regulars, wore such

[Photo - "Eagle of Concord Fight"]

ornaments into the battle of one hundred and twenty years ago.
      Living in the enjoyment of luxury, as many of the British army were at that time in Boston, and at first regarding the movements out of town on the night of April 18 as a holiday excursion, it was not strange that they wore gold watches and bosom-pins, and had an abundance of coin in their pockets.

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      A ring is still treasured by the descendants of the Provincial who gave relief to a British soldier when on his retreat from Concord. It was given by the wounded enemy to the one who assisted him, not because of Tory sentiments, but from a feeling of humanity.
      The cues of the British officers who fell in Lincoln, and were there buried in a common grave, were tied up with broad ribbons. Rev. Mr. Woodbury has already told us that some of Captain Isaac Davis's men spent the time, while waiting for others to assemble, in powdering their hair, and fixing themselves for a fine appearance.
      How that may have been we cannot prove now. But certain is it that Abner Hosmer wore in battle a silver pin representing the eagle. This was not taken from his body, but was buried with him. The reason of this may probably be assigned to some superstition that was entertained by the sorrowing family.
      After seventy-five years, the remains of Davis, Hosmer, and Hayward were disinterred, and placed beneath the monument on Acton Common. When the grave of Hosmer was opened, this bosom-pin was discovered, and taken by one of his family connections, and when scoured revealed the familiar initials.
      It seems a most remarkable fact that after three-quarters of a century there should come evidence from the grave that the bird selected

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as our national emblem was then present at the opening scene of that war which gave us a nation.
      From this it is natural to conclude that the eagle was not adopted for our national emblem in 1785 so much because of its nativity here, as because of its having been used from the very early times on heraldic devices. It was accounted one of the most noble bearings in heraldry.
      How long this silver eagle had been in the Hosmer family cannot be determined; but it is supposed that it was given by the father, Jonathan Hosmer, to his much-loved son on his twenty-first birthday.
      Abner was one of three sons of his family who were in the war. The second gave up his life at Bennington.
      The father, a deacon in the Acton church, was a third member of the family to die for his country. Too aged and feeble to go to Concord, when the news of the battle reached Acton, this man went out a short distance to learn the particulars. There he heard that his son Abner was one who had fallen at the bridge. He returned, and entering his house uttered groans of lamentation in substance like those of David of old. O my son Abner, my son! my son Abner! would God I had died for thee, O Abner, my son, my son!

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