“Never did I know a more anxious day than this… I considered it no more than the beginning of sorrows and a prelude to infinitely more distressing scenes which we expected would follow.”
PART 2
The militia’s route took them along Route 16 across Newton to Watertown Square. There they had a meal and received instructions to head for Menotomy (now Arlington). By this point, the roads were probably crowded with militia heading toward the fight, nervous excited and scared, and with civilians trying to get out of the way.
They marched through Belmont, down what is now Common Street to Pleasant Street – aiming to harass the British retreat along the Cambridge Road – what is now Mass Ave through Arlington Center. Here they started to meet up with the retreating British troops. More from good old Longfellow –
You know the rest. In the books you have read,
How the British Regulars fired and fled,—
How the farmers gave them ball for ball,
From behind each fence and farmyard-wall,
Chasing the red-coats down the lane,
Then crossing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn of the road,
And only pausing to fire and load.
If only it were that simple. Rev. West again: “The Needham company was soon on the ground, but unhappily being ignorant of what are called flank-guards they inserted themselves between them and the main body of the British troops. In consequence of which they suffered more severely than their Neighbors who kept to a greater distance.”
The Needham men met the retreating British at Menotomy, arriving around 4:30 in the afternoon. With the British approaching, there was not much time for them to prepare defensive positions, so they broke into smaller groups and shot from behind whatever structures they could.
It is probably fair to say that the British companies, under fledgling commander Lord Percy and Col. Smith, were tired and angry. They had been on the march since early morning, with little success to show for their efforts and losses. Their officers had assumed that a show of force would scare off the badly-armed farmers and put an end to their rebellious ways. But the minor skirmish that they foresaw had turned into a serious battle, leaving them in retreat. Worse still, the way back to Boston was riddled with these pockets of militia harassing them along the road, so the fighting just wouldn’t end.
Militias from thirteen towns had been diverted toward Arlington, skirmishing with the redcoats along the way. As the British approached, the militias scrambled to find defensive positions from which they could fire on the passing columns. The first shots were fired, I’m delighted to say, by the “Old Men of Menotomy” – the Exempts! They shot up a supply wagon at the head of the column, killing a horse and killing or injuring a rider. They captured the wagons, put its escorts to flight, and even captured one of the British officers.
The colonists were firing from the houses, the barns, behind the trees and stone walls. To stop these ambushes, the British began firing into the houses, then entering them with fixed bayonets, killing anyone found within. As one British soldier later remarked: “We were obliged to force almost every house on the road, for the Rebels had taken possession of them and galled us exceedingly. But they suffered for their temerity, for all that we found in the houses were put to death.”
Most of the Needham men, along with the militias from Salem, Danvers, Beverly, Lynn, and Dedham, took up positions behind the buildings and walls of Jason Russell’s farm, along what is now Mass Ave. One of the Danvers men warned the others that the position was too exposed, but there was not time to relocate so they stayed where they were. That was a mistake. As they approached Russell’s farm, Lord Percy diverted some of his men from the main road to go around behind the buildings and outflank the colonists who were shooting from behind the walls and barns. Trapped between the troops on the road and the soldiers who had maneuvered behind them, the militias took heavy casualties. Menotomy was the harshest and bloodiest battle of the day.
Many tried to shelter in Russell’s farmhouse, but once the British entered the house they had no real chance. The British had bayonets for close-quarter fighting, but the colonists did not and it took too long to load their muskets for them to offer any real resistance. Jason Russell himself was killed on his own doorstep. Overall twelve patriots and two British soldiers died at Russell’s farm, and many more were wounded. Witnesses who returned to the house later to collect their dead reported a scene of carnage, with dead and wounded throughout the house, and floors ankle-deep in blood. It took many years for the bloodstains in the house to fade away, but the bullet holes are still there as witness.
Back in Needham, all the Rev. West and the men’s families could do was wait and hope for news. They feared for their sons and husbands, but also for the grim consequences of taking up arms against the King’s army: “Never did I know a more anxious day than this… I considered it no more than the beginning of sorrows and a prelude to infinitely more distressing scenes which we expected would follow. We even anticipated the enemy, enraged as they were, at our doors and in our houses acting over all the horrors which usually attend the progress of a victorious exasperated army especially in civil wars like this…”
At the Jason Russell house, after the carnage, the bodies of 11 of the twelve men killed there were carried to the old Cemetery and buried together. They were buried in some haste, because there was considerable fear that the British would come back seeking revenge for their losses. There were four from Needham, one from Dedham, three from Lynn, one from Salem, and three from Menotomy. The body of the fifth Needham man, Elisha Mills, was carried back to Needham and buried in our cemetery. Of the five, three were minutemen and the other two were in the East Needham company. It is not clear what happened with the West Needham militia company. They did not form up the same way the Easterners did, instead apparently making their own way along the route. As a result, they arrived at Jason Russell’s farm a little later – there to give chase but probably not in time for the main fighting.
So who were these five men?
Lt. John Bacon, Minuteman, was 54 years old. He was married and had 11 surviving children. Three of his sons – John Jr, Moses, and Timothy – also fought at Arlington; all three went on to further service during the Revolutionary War. Bacon was behind a stone wall farther up the road with a man identified as “Old Hawes” – probably Joseph Hawes, Sr. Hawes and his son, Joseph Jr. were both in the West Needham militia company, and Hawes and Bacon had served together in the French and Indian War. A British flank guard got around behind them. Hawes shouted “Run or you’re dead – here’s the guard!” Hawes got successfully over the wall, but Bacon was shot and killed.
Private Amos Mills, Minuteman, was 43. He was married and had six children, four sons and two daughters. He was killed near the Jason Rusell house, but there is no additional information about the circumstances.
The same is true about Private Nathaniel Chamberlain, Minuteman. He was the oldest, at 57, and also a veteran of the French and Indian War. He left a wife and three children.
Sgt. Elisha Mills, East Needham Company, was 40. He was a farmer and a blacksmith, and cousin of Amos Mills. He was married, with six children. He was fighting from a barn a short distance from the Russell house. He was shot down when he stepped out of the barn to fire at the British soldiers coming down the road. Because he was somewhat apart from the others, his body was not found until later in the day, so he was not buried in Arlington with the others. He was identified the next day by his friend and neighbor, Aaron Smith Jr; their two farms were right where High Rock Street converges with South Street. Smith brought Elisha’s body back to Needham for burial. As an aside, Smith married the widow Deborah five months later.
Private Jonathan Parker, East Needham Company, died on his 28th birthday. He was the youngest of the five. He was married with three children, one son and two daughters. His farm was on what is now Charles River Street, at the site of the baseball field. Supposedly, he was plowing when he heard the Call to Arms and left his plow in the field when he left for battle. He and another Needham man, Aaron Fisher, were shooting from behind Jason Russell’s barn when British soldiers came up behind them. Parker and Fisher tried to escape into the woods, but Parker did not make it.
Two other Needham men were wounded but survived. Private John Tolman, a Minuteman age 22, was shot in the back and gravely wounded when his musket failed to fire. It took him many months to recover, but eventually he did and returned to service, joining the Continental Army. Lt. Eleazer Kingsbury was shot in the leg, but his thick leather pants slowed the musket ball and so it did not cause him serious injury.
Lexington and Concord get all the credit, but Menotomy was by far the bloodiest and most desperate fighting of the day. Of the 65 British soldiers killed that day, 40 died at Arlington. And of the 49 colonists killed, 25 died at Arlington.
By nightfall, a few men started to straggle in from the battle road. The roads were once again crowded, as the various militias reassembled and started to make their ways home. They too were tired, and burdened by the memory of the blood they had shed. Needham’s men did not return home that night, but bedded down where they could in friendly farms along the road.
Rev. West: “In the evening we had intelligence that several of the Needham inhabitants were among the slain, and in the morning it was confirmed that five had fallen in the action and several others had been wounded. It is remarkable that the five who fell all of them had families, and several of them very numerous families so that there were about forty widows and fatherless children made in consequence of their death. I visited these families immediately, and with a sympathetic sense of their affliction I gave to some the first intelligence they had of the dreadful event, the death of a Husband and a Parent.”
Elisha Mills, as I mentioned, was brought back to Needham and buried in the Needham Cemetery. The exact location of his grave is no longer known, but in 1851, the Ladies Aid Society of the First Parish raised funds for a monument in the cemetery. It is on the top of the hill, which is said to be in the approximate location of Elisha Mills’ grave and it reads:
In memory of John Bacon, Amos Mills, Elisha Mills, Jonathan Parker, and Nathaniel Chamberlain, who fell at Lexington, April 19, 1775. For Liberty they died.
Even after April 19th, there was optimism that the war would not continue. Although the British had been shown that a mere show of force was not enough to send the colonists back to their farms, the colonists now thought that the British had seen the error of their ways. Rev. West again: “It was a happy circumstance that ye people in general & even our principal leaders … flattered themselves that the contest would soon be over, that if we could but dispose of the British force already here, that government would never think of pursuing the affair any further, but come to some compromise with the Colonies to mutual advantage.”
We of course know how the long story ended. There was no compromise and neither side backed off. Bunker Hill was almost exactly two months after Lexington, and the war was on. Needham was there as the war progressed, fighting at Roxbury, Dorchester Heights, Ticonderoga, West Point, Providence, Canada, and many other places. And Needham was there until it ended, just as they were when it all started.
AR