A founding mother

The British are coming!”

On April 18th and 19th, 1775, Paul Revere, William Dawes, and Samuel Prescott rode out to warn the countryside that the British were coming to seize colonial weapons.

I learned that one of my ancestors, a woman no less named Mary Hartwell, actually played a role in helping to mobilize the colonial militias during the early morning leading to the battle at the Old North Bridge, the start of the Revolutionary War.

Around 2:00 a.m. on April 19th, Samuel Prescott escaped a British patrol and spread the alarm near the Hartwell Inn and Tavern, owned and operated by Ephraim Hartwell and his sons.

Upon receiving the news, Ephraim and his sons, all Minutemen, departed for Concord.

Mary Hartwell, the wife of Samuel Hartwell and mother of three small children, including an infant, left her children with a neighbor and went to spread the alarm to nearby farms, including that of Captain William Smith, the captain of the Lincoln Minutemen.

Smith then spread the alarm further and mustered the Lincoln militia in time to reach Concord before the battle began.

Mary describes moving along stone walls to avoid the British patrols. She returned around 6:00 a.m. in time to witness the British troops pass the tavern on their way to Concord.

She describes their return later in the afternoon as a ragtag procession under constant harassment from the colonial militias. The angry British troops fired into the tavern as they passed, but Mary and her children were hidden behind a thick oak table.

Injured and dead British soldiers were left behind. Mary ensured the care of one injured British soldier and the decent burial of others, saying their mothers deserved to have their sons buried properly.

The courage and actions of this founding mother encourage and inspire me to stand for freedom today.

This is Colleen Copple for the Freedom Fast. Now is the time. This is the place. We are the ones.