bEFORE THE
“SHOT HEARD ‘ROUND THE WORLD”
THERE WAS LESLIE’S RETREAT
FEBRUARY 26, 1775
Tensions ran high in Boston in early 1770 between the British soldiers, the colonists and the loyalists. To help defray the cost of participating in the French and Indian War, England began taxing its American colonies. The Colonial rebels protested since they believed England had no right to tax them. Tensions continued to mount when additional British soldiers arrived in Boston to maintain order. It had the opposite effect. Skirmishes between British soldiers and colonists were common. On March 5, 1770, a street brawl broke out between colonists and a lone British soldier. It quickly escalated into a riot as additional British soldiers came to their comrades aid. They fired into the mob. Five colonists were killed in what the rebels called the “Boston Massacre.” The British called it “an unhappy disturbance.”
By 1774, Britain had repealed most taxes except the tax on tea. The rebels responded by dumping 342 chests of tea imported by the British East India Company into Boston Harbor. This became known as the Boston Tea Party. Britain reacted by closing the port and stripped Massachusetts of self-government. This was the first act of defiance to British rule and showed Great Britain that Americans would not stand for tyranny.
Preparing for War
In 1775, the British Army began patrolling beyond Boston. Militia companies continued to drill, and the colonists continued to stockpile gunpowder and supplies. While rebels in Boston kept a close watch on British movements, subjects loyal to Britain spied on the rebels.
The rebels were actively engaged in collecting military stores and making secret preparations for the approaching war, which appeared inevitable. Several old French cannons purchased after the French and Indian War were sent to a blacksmith in Salem to be mounted on carriages.
The blacksmith’s workshop was on the north side of the North River in Salem, over which was a drawbridge. The cannons were secreted in and hidden about the area. By the end of February 1775, a number of these carriages were completed, and the guns were mounted. Five thousand flannel cartridges were also prepared.
Leslie’s Retreat
Salem Tories, British loyalists to King George III, revealed the exact location of the hidden cannons to General Gage, commander-in-chief of His Majesty’s forces and military governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony. Gage was already concerned that Salem had hosted the Massachusetts Provincial Congress led by John Hancock, and he made immediate plans to capture the cannons.
Sunday, February 26, 1775 was a cold New England morning. A contingent of 240 troops under the command of Colonel Alexander Leslie boarded a transport and sailed to Marblehead. Their orders were to march to Salem and take possession of the rebel cannons in the name of His Majesty. They chose Sunday, because they thought it would catch the Puritans in their Meetinghouse at Sunday services.
After arriving in Marblehead, the column began their march to Salem as quickly as possible. Their plan to rely on a Sabbath surprise was thwarted by citizens of Marblehead. Captain John Pedrick quickly rode to Salem to spread the alarm. The cry of, “The foe, the foe, they come!” was heard throughout the town.
Bells were rung and drums were beat to spread the alarm. Riders mounted their horses and rode as fast as they could to secure the cannons. Some of the guns were conveyed to Buffum’s Hill and hidden in thick woods. Others were moved to Danvers and buried in a gravel pit.
With the fife and drum corps playing Yankee Doodle, the British regulars marched briskly in the biting cold toward Salem. They planned to cross the bridge over the North River to find the cannons and destroy them. They were met by the citizens of Salem at the North Bridge. Many were armed with hatchets, pickaxes and ropes. Most were angry and all appeared resolved that the Redcoats would not cross the bridge.
As soon as the British soldiers came into sight, the northern side of the drawbridge was raised to stop their progress. The people had collected on the north side of the river and calmly awaited their approach. Defiantly facing the British, the militia and minutemen from Salem and Danvers stood armed with everything from muskets to pitchforks and clubs. The militia was under the command of Captain Timothy Pickering.
When faced with the resolution of the Salem residents, Leslie was urged by his lieutenants to fire on the crowd. At that moment, Salem’s militia Captain John Felt, was unable to hold his peace any longer. He shouted at Leslie in a voice that was unmistakably heard by civilian and soldier alike, “If you do fire, you will all be dead men!” Had the command to fire been enforced, probably not a man in the whole regiment would have escaped death. The first bloody battle of the Revolution would have been fought at the North Bridge in Salem on the 26th of February instead of at Lexington on the 19th of April.
After discussion with his officers, Colonel Leslie was thoroughly convinced of the determination of the citizens to resist a forcible passage over the bridge. Still unwilling to abandon the mission, he advanced and said to the bystanders, “I am determined to pass over this bridge before I return to Boston, if I remain here until next autumn.”
Captain Felt, to whom this remark was addressed, replied, “Nobody would care for that”, to which Colonel Leslie replied, “By God, I will not be defeated.” Felt coolly answered, “You must acknowledge that you have been already baffled.” Then a firm but gentle voice, told Colonel Leslie not to fire “upon these innocent people.” Leslie turned around and inquired “who are you, sir?” The man replied, “I am Thomas Barnard a minister of the Gospel and my mission is peace.”
The Colonel complained that his soldiers were insulted and expressed his determination to cross the bridge. He was upon the King’s highway and would not be prevented from passing freely over it. An old man replied, “It is not the King’s highway. It is a road built by the owners of the lots on the other side and no king, country or town has any control over it.”
The tide was now low, and three boats lay in the mud on the west side of the bridge. Worried that Leslie might appropriate them for his troops, several people began to scuttle them with axes and rocks. A scuffle ensued between the British and Americans and brought about what may have been the first bloodshed in a war that was yet to begin. The account by Charles Moses Endicott written in 1856 tells of the incident:
“One Joseph Whicher, the foreman in Colonel Sprague’s distillery, was at work scuttling the Colonel’s gondola and the soldiers ordered him to desist and threatened to stab him with their bayonets if he did not, whereupon he opened his breast and dared them to strike. They pricked his breast so as to draw blood. He was very proud of this wound and afterward in life was fond of exhibiting it.”
Almost an hour and a half had been consumed in the fruitless attempt to pass the bridge. The day was ending, and the temperature was quickly falling. The soldiers were trembling in the frigid cold. A conference was held with Colonel Leslie, Captain Pickering, Captain Felt, Reverend Barnard, and Colonel Mason. The conversation went:
“So, you came all this way just to cross a bridge?”
“Well yes, and to get the guns.”
“We’ve hidden them where you can’t find them”
“Well how can I tell the Governor that I found no guns if he learns that I never even got across the bloody bridge?”
“You want to tell the Governor that you crossed the bridge but discovered no guns?”
“Considering the circumstances, me thinks that will suffice.”
This conference resulted in Colonel Leslie pledging his word that if the inhabitants would allow him to march no more than fifty rods beyond the bridge, he would then return peacefully without molesting any person or property. His orders were to pass the bridge and he could not disobey them. Discussion was made with the people, by Mason and others, that they should accept these terms.
There was little danger in allowing the troops to pass, for the guns had been secured and placed beyond their reach. With the preliminaries settled and the distance which the regiment was to march beyond the bridge accurately measured, the drawbridge was lowered, and the troops quietly passed over.
The feelings of the inhabitants were highly excited by the appearance of British troops in their streets on the Sabbath. While the soldiers were in the act of turning for their return march, in one of the houses nearby a nurse named Sarah Tarrant peered out of an upstairs window and shouted at the Redcoats, “Go home and tell your master he has sent you on a fool’s errand and has broken the peace of our Sabbath. What do you think we were born in the woods, to be frightened by owls?” (This was a common expression of the time that was meant to indicate that the speaker was accustomed to danger and could not be easily frightened.) When one angered British trooper raised his weapon and took aim at her, she exclaimed, “Fire if you have the courage, but I doubt it!”
There were eight militia companies in Marblehead at that time, comprising nearly the whole male population between the ages of sixteen and sixty. They had all promptly assembled and were ordered to station themselves behind the houses and fences along the road. They were prepared to attack the British on their return from Salem if hostile measures had been used. If no act of violence upon the persons or property of the people was committed, they were ordered not to show themselves, but to allow the British detachment to return unmolested to their transport. On their way back to Marblehead the Redcoats band played “The World Turned Upside Down.” The song was heard years later when Cornwallis surrendered at Yorktown.
Post Story
No shots were fired that day in Salem. Colonel Leslie retreated to his transport and sailed back to Boston empty-handed. His conduct did not meet with the approval of his superiors. For the failure of this expedition, he was tried and found guilty by court martial and was dismissed from service. Leslie was later restored to his former rank and eventually was promoted to Brigadier General. He served in several major battles of the Revolutionary War and died in 1792 in Glasgow.
The failure of this expedition should have convinced the ruling powers in England of the unconquerable spirit of the colonists and their resolution to defend their rights and privileges. However, the rest is well-known history. News of this event took time to cross the Atlantic. Just two days before the Battle at Lexington and Concord, The Gentleman’s Magazine of London published the following announcement:
“By a ship just arrived from America, it is reported that the Americans have hoisted their standard of liberty at Salem. There is no doubt that the next news will be an account of a bloody engagement between the two armies.”
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https://www.history.com/topics/american-revolution/boston-massacre
https://historicipswich.org/2019/02/13/leslies-retreat-or-how-the-revolutionary-war-almost-began-in-salem/
https://salemsecretunderground.wordpress.com/tag/leslies-retreat/
us.archive.org - Proceedings of the Essex Institute – Volume 1, 1848-1856, pgs. 89-122
https://archive.org/search.php?query=Leslie%27s%20Retreat
Peter Charles Hoffer, Prelude to Revolution: The Salem Gunpowder Raid of 1775, (Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore) 201
https://streetsofsalem.com
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