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Salem Powder Alarm
by Erik K. Smith
orinally published in the Salem Gazette, February 2006
James Duncan Phillips wrote in his book Salem in the Eighteenth Century
“Under date of Monday, April 17, just two days before Lexington, are the words
referring to Leslie’s retreat: ‘It is reported that the Americans have hoisted their
standard of liberty at Salem.’ If Great Britain was willing to admit before the
nineteenth of April that the Revolution had begun in Salem, there seems no good
reason why Americans should deny it.”
He is referring to what has become known as Leslie’s Retreat, an event of
major significance to the American Revolution right here in Salem. It has been said
by many an historian that the Battle of Lexington and Concord would not have
occurred where it not for the actions here on February 26, 1775. For a couple of
hundred years people have been saying that Salem should be celebrated for this day,
and perhaps now would be a good time to take up that call again.
Salem has evolved into a city where tourism plays a significant role.
Obviously, the boom times for this industry are months other than cold, wet, gray
February. In the spirit of the patriots of the 1700s, who braved a lot more than
mere cold weather in their dedication to the cause of Liberty, we residents of Salem
in 2006 should put our creative minds together to find a way to make February 26 a
day of celebration.
Leslie’s Retreat was part of a series of events in Massachusetts known as the
Powder Alarms. Citizens all over the colony organized a network that would alert as
many as possible to the movements of the King's troops, or the “Regulars” as they
were known. They were especially concerned with amassing and then protecting the
weapons and gunpowder that would allow them to wage war on one of the largest and
most experienced armies of their day. One of the more celebrated leaders of this
effort was Paul Revere. David Hackett Fischer’s book Paul Revere’s Ride puts
February 26 into brilliant context. In his book, Fischer describes how Lexington
and Concord happened, not as an inevitable event that occurred in some kind of
vacuum, but rather as the result of a series of deliberate actions taken by hundreds
of everyday people.
In 1774 Parliament passed two acts targeted at the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
People here referred to them as the “Intolerable Acts.” One of them dealt with the
consequences of the Boston Massacre and was known as “The Murder Act.” It basically
said that the King’s troops could not be tried for murder in Massachusetts courts.
It was as though a hunting license was issued and open season was declared on the
colonists. The other act was the “Massachusetts Government Act” which put all power
in the hands of the military governor, General Gage, and said that local meetings
would happen only with his approval.
On August 1 the acts took effect, and the colonists immediately began defying
them. Town Meetings were announced and held in flagrant violation, as though the
citizenry was daring General Gage to do something about it. Salem, the seat of the
local provincial government (much like a County Seat today) held theirs on August
27, and Gage ordered the leaders of the Salem Committee of Correspondence held
prisoner. Some of them posted bail, but others refused. The word went out, and
several thousand armed men from the surrounding communities crowded into the town.
Gage was forced to release the remaining men, but he vowed to assert his control
over Salem and all of Massachusetts.
On February 9, 1775, General Gage declared the Colony of Massachusetts in a
state of Open Rebellion. There was also a network of loyalists, or Tories, who
passed along information to Headquarters in Boston. Having been alerted to Salem’s
cache of weapons and ammunition, General Gage sent Lieutenant Colonel Alexander
Leslie and a 240 man strong battalion of infantry from the 64th Regiment North to
investigate. On Saturday, February 25 they sailed to Marblehead Neck. They waited
below decks until it was felt the townfolk would be in church on Sunday. In
Marblehead, Major John Pedrick recognized what was taking place and rode to warn his
neighbors in Salem.
In an age without telephones, radios, or even loudspeakers, a cry went out
that quickly brought Colonel Thomas Pickering and the First Regiment of Militia, 40
Salem men. Bells all over the town rang; the locals spread the word and armed
themselves with whatever gun, tool, or farm implement they had. By the time Leslie
had marched his soldiers from the little fishing harbor to Salem, the rebels-to-be
had positioned themselves well to defend against this encroachment.
As they marched along the King’s Highway through Salem toward the Northfields
Bridge, the band played “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” that musical insult the patriots
eventually adopted in proud defiance. Colonel Pickering’s men formed up on the
North bank of the river, the canon housed behind them in the Northfields at Gardner
Farm. The drawbridge on their side was raised, making passage impossible. The
bridge crossed the North River in a location near where the MBTA parking lot is
now. At that time the river was much wider; the canal and surrounding landfill had
not yet been constructed.
Colonel Leslie and his men arrived. He shouted orders that the bridge be
lowered or they would open fire. The colonials taunted the regulars and dared them
to shoot. “If you fire you’ll be dead men,” warned Captain John Felt.
Leslie ordered men to the riverbank to secure several boats there, that they
might be used to row across the river. Salem men recognized this possibility and
rushed to the boats with hatchets to scuttle their own property. Leslie’s men and
the locals clashed, and according to first hand accounts, at least one man,
distillery foreman Joseph Whicher was wounded with a bayonet. He tore open his
shirt and dared a soldier to stab him. Although not a grave wound, it was the first
blood spilled in the name of open revolution.
As the drama unfolded, more armed men joined the crowds on both sides of the
river. They arrived from Danvers, Beverly, Amesbury, Lynn, Marblehead. A pacifist
Quaker, Joseph Boyce, set about hauling the 19 canon to Danvers. As the locals
delayed the British militia, the very object of their mission was being spirited
away to safety.
Back at the bridge, men shouted across at the Englishmen “Soldiers! Red Jackets!
Lobster Coats! Cowards! Damnation to your government!”
On the Southern Bank of the river, the Reverend Doctor Thomas Barnard of the
North Church was trying to broker a peace. Leslie and Reverend Barnard found a way
to prevent any serious bloodshed. The battalion was allowed to march across the
bridge and a short distance onto the fields to look for cannon that the Salem men
knew had already been moved. The regulars would then immediately turn around to head
back to Marblehead. It was important to Leslie that he be able to return to Boston
having saved face.
This time, to the boisterous taunts of the locals, the regimental band played
the song “The World Turned Upside Down.” This would be the same tune played at the
surrender at Yorktown. They marched home in the darkening wet night past hordes of
angry, armed locals. On their march back toward Marblehead, a Salem healer named
Sarah Tarrant shouted out a window “Go home and tell your master he sent you on a
fool’s errand, and has broken the peace of our Sabbath. Do you think we were born
in the woods, to be frightened of owls?” One of the regulars couldn’t bear this,
and he aimed his weapon at her. In the spirit of the day she didn’t flinch, yelling
“Fire, if you have the courage, but I doubt it.” She was correct.
The surprise of this event shocked the British General into an understanding
that these supposed bumpkins might pose more of a threat than had been imagined.
The Essex Gazette claimed that, had word not gone out that hostilities had been
averted, 40,000 armed patriots would have arrived on scene. The events in Salem on
that cold February Sunday set the stage for the action 52 days later at Lexington
and Concord.
Perhaps a good place to start in commemorating this event would be having the
bells of the city ring at a given hour on February 26. Then maybe someday a re-
enactment of some sort might be organized, followed by fireworks. Salem should be
proud of its role in the American Revolution, both before and after hostilities
broke out at Lexington and Concord.
by Erik K. Smith
orinally published in the Salem Gazette, February 2006
James Duncan Phillips wrote in his book Salem in the Eighteenth Century
“Under date of Monday, April 17, just two days before Lexington, are the words
referring to Leslie’s retreat: ‘It is reported that the Americans have hoisted their
standard of liberty at Salem.’ If Great Britain was willing to admit before the
nineteenth of April that the Revolution had begun in Salem, there seems no good
reason why Americans should deny it.”
He is referring to what has become known as Leslie’s Retreat, an event of
major significance to the American Revolution right here in Salem. It has been said
by many an historian that the Battle of Lexington and Concord would not have
occurred where it not for the actions here on February 26, 1775. For a couple of
hundred years people have been saying that Salem should be celebrated for this day,
and perhaps now would be a good time to take up that call again.
Salem has evolved into a city where tourism plays a significant role.
Obviously, the boom times for this industry are months other than cold, wet, gray
February. In the spirit of the patriots of the 1700s, who braved a lot more than
mere cold weather in their dedication to the cause of Liberty, we residents of Salem
in 2006 should put our creative minds together to find a way to make February 26 a
day of celebration.
Leslie’s Retreat was part of a series of events in Massachusetts known as the
Powder Alarms. Citizens all over the colony organized a network that would alert as
many as possible to the movements of the King's troops, or the “Regulars” as they
were known. They were especially concerned with amassing and then protecting the
weapons and gunpowder that would allow them to wage war on one of the largest and
most experienced armies of their day. One of the more celebrated leaders of this
effort was Paul Revere. David Hackett Fischer’s book Paul Revere’s Ride puts
February 26 into brilliant context. In his book, Fischer describes how Lexington
and Concord happened, not as an inevitable event that occurred in some kind of
vacuum, but rather as the result of a series of deliberate actions taken by hundreds
of everyday people.
In 1774 Parliament passed two acts targeted at the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
People here referred to them as the “Intolerable Acts.” One of them dealt with the
consequences of the Boston Massacre and was known as “The Murder Act.” It basically
said that the King’s troops could not be tried for murder in Massachusetts courts.
It was as though a hunting license was issued and open season was declared on the
colonists. The other act was the “Massachusetts Government Act” which put all power
in the hands of the military governor, General Gage, and said that local meetings
would happen only with his approval.
On August 1 the acts took effect, and the colonists immediately began defying
them. Town Meetings were announced and held in flagrant violation, as though the
citizenry was daring General Gage to do something about it. Salem, the seat of the
local provincial government (much like a County Seat today) held theirs on August
27, and Gage ordered the leaders of the Salem Committee of Correspondence held
prisoner. Some of them posted bail, but others refused. The word went out, and
several thousand armed men from the surrounding communities crowded into the town.
Gage was forced to release the remaining men, but he vowed to assert his control
over Salem and all of Massachusetts.
On February 9, 1775, General Gage declared the Colony of Massachusetts in a
state of Open Rebellion. There was also a network of loyalists, or Tories, who
passed along information to Headquarters in Boston. Having been alerted to Salem’s
cache of weapons and ammunition, General Gage sent Lieutenant Colonel Alexander
Leslie and a 240 man strong battalion of infantry from the 64th Regiment North to
investigate. On Saturday, February 25 they sailed to Marblehead Neck. They waited
below decks until it was felt the townfolk would be in church on Sunday. In
Marblehead, Major John Pedrick recognized what was taking place and rode to warn his
neighbors in Salem.
In an age without telephones, radios, or even loudspeakers, a cry went out
that quickly brought Colonel Thomas Pickering and the First Regiment of Militia, 40
Salem men. Bells all over the town rang; the locals spread the word and armed
themselves with whatever gun, tool, or farm implement they had. By the time Leslie
had marched his soldiers from the little fishing harbor to Salem, the rebels-to-be
had positioned themselves well to defend against this encroachment.
As they marched along the King’s Highway through Salem toward the Northfields
Bridge, the band played “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” that musical insult the patriots
eventually adopted in proud defiance. Colonel Pickering’s men formed up on the
North bank of the river, the canon housed behind them in the Northfields at Gardner
Farm. The drawbridge on their side was raised, making passage impossible. The
bridge crossed the North River in a location near where the MBTA parking lot is
now. At that time the river was much wider; the canal and surrounding landfill had
not yet been constructed.
Colonel Leslie and his men arrived. He shouted orders that the bridge be
lowered or they would open fire. The colonials taunted the regulars and dared them
to shoot. “If you fire you’ll be dead men,” warned Captain John Felt.
Leslie ordered men to the riverbank to secure several boats there, that they
might be used to row across the river. Salem men recognized this possibility and
rushed to the boats with hatchets to scuttle their own property. Leslie’s men and
the locals clashed, and according to first hand accounts, at least one man,
distillery foreman Joseph Whicher was wounded with a bayonet. He tore open his
shirt and dared a soldier to stab him. Although not a grave wound, it was the first
blood spilled in the name of open revolution.
As the drama unfolded, more armed men joined the crowds on both sides of the
river. They arrived from Danvers, Beverly, Amesbury, Lynn, Marblehead. A pacifist
Quaker, Joseph Boyce, set about hauling the 19 canon to Danvers. As the locals
delayed the British militia, the very object of their mission was being spirited
away to safety.
Back at the bridge, men shouted across at the Englishmen “Soldiers! Red Jackets!
Lobster Coats! Cowards! Damnation to your government!”
On the Southern Bank of the river, the Reverend Doctor Thomas Barnard of the
North Church was trying to broker a peace. Leslie and Reverend Barnard found a way
to prevent any serious bloodshed. The battalion was allowed to march across the
bridge and a short distance onto the fields to look for cannon that the Salem men
knew had already been moved. The regulars would then immediately turn around to head
back to Marblehead. It was important to Leslie that he be able to return to Boston
having saved face.
This time, to the boisterous taunts of the locals, the regimental band played
the song “The World Turned Upside Down.” This would be the same tune played at the
surrender at Yorktown. They marched home in the darkening wet night past hordes of
angry, armed locals. On their march back toward Marblehead, a Salem healer named
Sarah Tarrant shouted out a window “Go home and tell your master he sent you on a
fool’s errand, and has broken the peace of our Sabbath. Do you think we were born
in the woods, to be frightened of owls?” One of the regulars couldn’t bear this,
and he aimed his weapon at her. In the spirit of the day she didn’t flinch, yelling
“Fire, if you have the courage, but I doubt it.” She was correct.
The surprise of this event shocked the British General into an understanding
that these supposed bumpkins might pose more of a threat than had been imagined.
The Essex Gazette claimed that, had word not gone out that hostilities had been
averted, 40,000 armed patriots would have arrived on scene. The events in Salem on
that cold February Sunday set the stage for the action 52 days later at Lexington
and Concord.
Perhaps a good place to start in commemorating this event would be having the
bells of the city ring at a given hour on February 26. Then maybe someday a re-
enactment of some sort might be organized, followed by fireworks. Salem should be
proud of its role in the American Revolution, both before and after hostilities
broke out at Lexington and Concord.
