Battle of Lexington reenactment draws early-morning crowds for 250th anniversary

By Hillel Italie and Michael Casey

Lexington – Thousands of people came to this city of Massachusetts on Saturday just before the dawn to witness the beginnings of the American Revolution.

In the midst of a fire hail, they saw the British soldiers confronted a group of men of Lexington Minute at Lexington Battle Green. The battle, which left eight north -American and 10 injured, marks the 250th anniversary of the battles of Lexington and Match. The day offers an opportunity to reflect on this seminal moment in history, but also to consider what this struggle means today.

“It’s really important,” said Richard Howell, who portrayed Lexington Minute Man Samuel Tidd in the battle.

“This is one of the most sacred pieces in the country, if not the world for what it represents,” he said. “To represent what happened that day, as a small town of Lexington was a vortex of so much … Lexington was the first city to gather the men and was the first to face the British attack.”

The semi -maintennary comes when President Donald Trump, the scholarly community and others are divided on whether he has a party throughout the year until July 4, 2026, as requested by Trump or to balance celebrations with questions about women, enslaved and indigenous, and what their stories reveal.

The story of Lexington and Concord in Massachusetts is half -known, the deeply rooted myth.

What exactly happened to Lexington and Concord?

The reenactors can tell us that hundreds of British troops left from Boston early in the morning of April 19, 1775, and met about 14 kilometers north -in the city of Lexington’s Green.

The first -hand testimonies recalled that some British officers shouted, “He threw his arms, the villains, the rebels!” And this in the middle of the chaos felt a shot, followed by the “scattered fire” of the British. The battle turned so fierce that the area caused the dust burned.

At the end of the day, the fighting had continued about 7 kilometers west to concord and about 250 British and 95 settlers were killed or injured.

But no one has learned who fired first, or why. And the revolution itself was initially a revolution than a demand for better terms.

Woody Holton, a professor of North -American History at the University of South Carolina, says that most scholars agree that the rebels in April 1775 did not seek out of the empire, but to repair their relationship with King Jordi III and return to the days before the Seal Act, the Tea Act and other disputes of the previous decade.

“The settlers only wanted to return the clock to 1763,” he said.

Stacy Schiff, a Pulitzer Prize winner, including Benjamin Franklin and Samuel Adams Biographies Books, said that Lexington and Concord “Galvanized Opinion precisely as Massachusetts’ men, although it would still be a long way to a vote for independence, which Adams had to be declared on April 20, 1775. “

But at that time, Schiff added, “It did not seem possible for a homeland and its colony had come to it.”

A struggle for centuries

The rebels had already believed their cause higher than a disagreement between subjects and rulers. Long before the inflection points of 1776, before the Declaration of Independence or Thomas Paine show that “we have it in our power to start the world again”, they were launched in a age drama.

The so -called Suffolk resolved of 1774, drafted by Suffolk County Civic leaders, prayed for a life “without restrictions on power, taking off with shackles”, a struggle that would determine the “fate of this new world and millions of millions.”

The revolution was a story of surprise and improvisation. The military historian Rick Atkinson, the “ destiny of the day ” is the second of a trilogy planned in the war, called Lexington and a concord “ a clear victory for the home team ”, only so that the British had not expected such an impassive resistance to the colony’s militia.

The British, always despised those who King George considered a “misfortune and unhappy crowd” would be hit again when the rebels quickly framed and transmitted a narrative that blamed the royal forces.

“Once shootings were shot in Lexington, Samuel Adams and Joseph Warren made all the power to collect testimonial statements and circulate rapidly; it was essential for the colonies and the world to understand who had fired first,” Schiff said. “Adams was convinced that Lexington’s skirmish would be” famous in the history of this country. “

A country still in progress

Neither part imagined a war that lasted eight years, nor did it be confident in what kind of country was born. The founders came together in their pursuit of self-government, but differ how it really governs and if self-government could last.

The North -Americans have never allowed to discuss the balance of powers, the rules of confrontation or the importance of applying exhortation, “all men are created the same.”

“ I think it is important to remember that the language of the founders was aspirational. The idea of ​​all men who created the same was pre-fostering at a time when hundreds of thousands were enslaved, ” said Atkinson, who cites the twentieth-century poet Archibald Macleish that “ democracy is never done. ”

“I don’t think the founders had any sense of a country that someday had 330 million people,” said ATKINSON. “Our country is an unfinished project and probably will always be.”