The battles of Concord and Lexington, generally believed to have been the opening hostilities of the American Revolution occurred on April 19, 1775. Massachusetts and Maine (which was part of Massachusetts until 1820) celebrate a public holiday called Patriots' Day each year in commemoration of the event.
There is, as the wiki article about the battles mentions, a verse from Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Concord Hymn" inscribed on the base on the Minuteman Statue at the North Bridge in Concord, where the first serious fighting occurred.
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.
Btw, the sculptor of the Minuteman statue, Daniel Chester French is also the sculptor of the Lincoln statue in the Lincoln monument in Washington, D.C.
When I was a child, we all read Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's poem, "Paul Revere's Ride." It had the effect of making Paul Revere seem the most important personage of the day, with his giving of the alarm as the most memorable event. Without the alarm, of course, the militias would not have come; but if they had not fought the British regulars, it would not have mattered.
An der Grabstätte von Kronprinzessin Cecilie
1 week ago
2 comments:
I find it interesting that even here in conservative Utah, there isn't much ado about Patriots' Day. Thanks for the reminder even if I didn't see this until it was too late.
I'm also a little surprised that the day never became a holiday outside Massachusetts and Maine, except in Wisconsin, which observes it as a "school holiday."
I guess July 4 is all the rest of the country wants to commemorate the Revolutionary War and independence.
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