The Declaration of Independence will be read from the balcony on the Old State House on July 4th. This commemorates the actual reading of the Declaration, on July 18, 1776.
Patriot’s Day is celebrated today, but Paul Revere’s Ride was actually tonight – April 18, 1775. Paul Revere crossed the Charles River to Cambridge, then rode his horse towards Lexington to warn the partisans there. He almost made it. Other riders carried the news further.
Evacuation Day and St. Patrick’s Day align in Boston, marking the departure of the British March 17, 1776. This ended the “Siege of Boston”. George Washington seized Dorchester Heights, fortified it with cannons, and surprised the British 2 weeks earlier. Painting by Gilbert Stuart.
Park Street church, view from the Public Garden. The Park Street Congregational Church replaced the Town granary on the Common’s eastern corner in 1809. Peter Banner designed this brick Georgian structure with a 217-foot steeple, inspired by the latest London architecture. The Soldiers & Sailors monument is just to the left of the steeple in this winter scene.
242 years ago this week. December 16, 1773 – A great crowd gathered at the Old South Meeting House to hear speeches protesting new taxes on imports, including tea. Shouting “Boston harbor a tea party tonight,” they went down to the nearby docks. Thinly disguised as “Mohawks”, fifty men boarded three East India ships – Dartmouth, Beaver and Eleanor. Breaking open 342 chests of imported tea, they dumped the lot into the harbor. The “Intolerable Acts” soon followed as punishment.
The Battle of Bunker Hill, as painted by John Trumbull. General Warren, the great patriot doctor, lies mortally wounded on the left. Patriot forces moved onto Bunker & Breed’s Hills in Charlestown the night before. The British regulars struggled to force them off these ramparts, while shelling the peninsula. The Patriot survivors retreated late in the afternoon, while the Regulars counted their dead and wounded. This painting is part of the magnificent Trumbull collection at Yale University.