Bob Allegretto rides Egypt across Minute Man National Historic Park as he portrays Dr. Samuel Prescott.
Bob Allegretto rides Egypt across Minute Man National Historic Park as he portrays Dr. Samuel Prescott. Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge

Concord250 crowdsources the American Revolution for info on veterans

By Laurie O’Neill — [email protected]

“Don’t throw away your shot!” declares local historian Beth van Duzer, channeling Alexander Hamilton in the eponymous Broadway musical. 

Hamilton is urging his friends not to waste the opportunity to participate in America’s war for independence. 

Van Duzer is exhorting Concordians to seize the chance to become part of history. “Many brave individuals from Concord fought in the American Revolution,” she says. “Could one of them be your ancestor?” 

Co-chair and clerk of the Concord250 History & Education Subcommittee, van Duzer is crowdsourcing an effort to identify veterans from Concord, whether they died in service or afterward, and locate where they are buried. 

She is asking Concordians if they have forebears who fought during the eight years — 1775 to 1783 — of the Revolution.

Searching for heroes

Two years ago, Henry Dane, the first chair of the Concord250 Executive Committee, established the subcommittee and tasked members with a significant mission: to find and honor those who sacrificed their lives during the Revolutionary War.

To date, the subcommittee has identified 514 individuals who fought for Concord and have a birthplace, home, or grave in Concord and 53 who were not inhabitants but whose Revolutionary War service was credited to the town. 

Most died after the war. The list includes the names of free and enslaved Black men, one soldier who fought for both the King’s Army and the Patriots, and one woman (read more below) who is credited with saving Concord from being burned.   

Beth van Duzer shares her research with an audience at the Concord Free Public Library. Photo: Laurie O’Neill/The Concord Bridge
Beth van Duzer shares her research with an audience at the Concord Free Public Library. Photo: Laurie O’Neill/The Concord Bridge

Van Duzer has discovered so far that 18 men with a birthplace, home, or grave in Concord died during their service. They include William Buttrick, Dr. Samuel Prescott, and Solomon Rice. 

Those 18 names will join that of the Rev. William Emerson, previously the only individual from Concord known to have died during the eight years of the conflict, on the Roll of Honor read at the town’s Memorial Day ceremony in Monument Square. 

The subcommittee learned that the graves of 22 Revolutionary War veterans had never been marked with flags. Seventeen of the graves are in Concord. The identification of these burial sites has allowed Tish Hopkins, the town’s cemetery supervisor, to have flags placed at these graves and to ask other communities to place a flag by the graves of forgotten Revolutionary War veterans. 

Van Duzer says she has been assisted by subcommittee members who serve as her “sounding board,” particularly Concord Museum curator David Wood, who serves as subcommittee chair; Joel Bohy; and historian Robert A. Gross. 

Curator David Wood shares the story behind the legendary lantern from Paul Revere’s midnight ride. Photo courtesy of the Concord Museum
Curator David Wood shares the story behind the legendary lantern from Paul Revere’s midnight ride. Photo courtesy of the Concord Museum

She has used numerous primary and secondary sources, including ancestry databases; the Massachusetts Archives in Dorchester; the Special Collections at the Concord Free Public Library; the Town of Concord Archives; military records, including pension applications, muster rosters, and payrolls; Gross’s 2022 social history of Concord titled “The Minutemen and their World;” and Lemuel Shattuck’s “History of Concord,” published in 1835. 

A 17-volume series titled “Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War” yielded an initial list of nearly 500 names. 

One of the primary sources van Duzer used from the special collections at the Concord Free Public Library. Photo: Laurie O’Neill/the Concord Bridge
One of the primary sources van Duzer used from the special collections at the Concord Free Public Library. Photo: Laurie O’Neill/the Concord Bridge

‘Voices from the past’

Van Duzer says she loves “finding voices from the past and hearing what their experience was like in their own words.”  

Conducting research was complicated and exhausting, but gratifying, she says. For example, she found several individuals who weren’t designated as Revolutionary War veterans, perhaps because they lived so long and were no longer remembered for that service. Also, many veterans moved, and their graves are elsewhere in New England and beyond. 

Concord historian Beth van Duzer offers remarks during the rededication. Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge
Concord historian Beth van Duzer offers remarks during the 2024 rededication of the town’s Civil War Monument . Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge

Names were sometimes spelled in two or three different ways on early documents, and some veterans were Minute Men who died in service but were not immediately paid, so their names don’t show up on compensation lists. Still others who fought were from outside Concord but had perhaps marched from here or were signed into service in Concord.  

While diving into documents, van Duzer stumbled upon some intriguing stories. One involves the town’s Liberty Pole, whose exact location at the time is unclear. One account says it was “erected on the heighth [sic] opposite the meeting house,” now First Church.  

During the battle, the Minute Men hoisted an American flag — no one is sure which version — on the pole. The British tried to burn the pole but when that didn’t work, they attempted to pull down the flag. When the halyards got tangled, the Regulars cut down the pole.  

Revolutionary War re-enactors from the Concord Minute Men, Acton Minutemen, and 6th Middlesex Regiment fire a musket volley during Concord250’s “250 Days to the 250th: Community Kickoff” on August 11. Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge
Revolutionary War re-enactors from the Concord Minute Men, Acton Minutemen, and 6th Middlesex Regiment fire a musket volley during Concord250’s “250 Days to the 250th: Community Kickoff” on August 11, 2024. Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge

Another ‘Midnight Rider’

The most famous riders who spread the alarm that the British Regulars were coming were Paul Revere, William Dawes, and Dr. Samuel Prescott. But historians say there were more, including Nathan Munroe and Benjamin Tidd, who galloped to Bedford from Lexington. 

Van Duzer’s discovery of yet another rider, from Concord, was “pretty exciting,” she says. Timothy Merriam lived at Merriam’s Corner and was just 17 years old in 1775. When he was told the Regulars were approaching from Lexington, he alerted inhabitants in the east part of Concord and then in Bedford. Then he joined his company in Concord, fought at the North Bridge, and pursued the British as they retreated to Boston. 

Merriam survived the war and is buried in Framingham.

Research for the project can be viewed at concordma.gov

“It would be great if anyone who is a Concordian, loves Concord, or loves history could check the Excel sheet [titled War of Independence Participants Directory] and let me know if anyone is missing or incorrect,” van Duzer says. 

You can send information to van Duzer at [email protected], and include primary source evidence. The group’s charge ends in December 2026, and van Duzer hopes that by then, the database will be complete. 

Portraying a British officer in the 10th Regiment of Foot, Paul O’Shaughnessy recites the names of British war dead during the seventh annual Patriot Vigil at Minute Man National Historical Park on April 18, 2024. Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge
Portraying a British officer in the 10th Regiment of Foot, Paul O’Shaughnessy recites the names of British war dead during the seventh annual Patriot Vigil at Minute Man National Historical Park on April 18, 2024. Photo: Ken McGagh/The Concord Bridge

Who stopped the British from burning Concord? A woman

Martha Moulton was a hero.

In 1775, the impoverished widow was 71 and “very infirm.” When the British Regulars marched into town, she bore witness to the first battle of the Revolution.   

With the colonial militia laying in supplies and some 220 British troops approaching, Moulton’s neighbors fled Concord. She and a few others remained. 

Around 8 a.m., troops drew up in formation before her door, some demanding water and provisions, which she provided. 

Then Moulton saw the Regulars set fire to gun carriages “near the [Town] house,” and the building ignited, historical records say. 

She “put [her] life, as it were, in her hands” and implored the British to put out the flames. The men brushed her off, saying, “Oh Mother, we will not do you any harm,” but she pressed. Remarkably, the British doused the fire “by one pail of water after another.” 

Moulton had saved the town. 

A year later, Moulton petitioned the General Court of Massachusetts in search of compensation for damaged and lost property. 

The Court awarded her £3.  

— Laurie O’Neill

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