In September 1774, Patriot leaders initiated a system of alarms and express riders to warn towns whenever British troops marched out of Boston. On April 18th, at about 10:00 in the evening, two riders set out from Boston ahead of 700 British troops. William Dawes took the land route south of Boston, while Paul Revere crossed the Charles River, obtained a horse, and began his ride. They stopped in Lexington to warn Patriot leaders John Hancock and Samuel Adams, then headed on to Concord, where military supplies for the colony were stored. As the two men alerted the countryside, other towns sent more riders out into the night. About 4,000 Massachusetts Militia and Minute Men took up arms and arrived in time to fight on April 19th, and by day’s end, about 20,000 were on the march. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem Paul Revere’s Ride, published in 1861, helped make the alarm rider an American icon.
