Samuel Prescott’s 1:00 A.M. Ride

“Listen my children and you shall hear

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere …”

We have all heard Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s famous words about that fateful night in 1775 when Paul Revere allegedly single-handedly rode from Boston to Lexington to warn John Hancock and Samuel Adams that the redcoats were on the march. Yet, most people know nothing of the man who actually succeeded in delivering the message – Dr. Samuel Prescott.

The truth behind the ride

On the night of April 18, 1775, Dr. Joseph Warren sent Paul Revere and William Dawes, a lesser-known yet not entirely forgotten rider, to Lexington, MA. What history has largely failed to include is that on the way they met a third man. Samuel Prescott was considerably younger than the two of them. He was, according to David Hackett Fischer, “a handsome young country gentleman, splendidly mounted and elegantly dressed,” (Fischer, 129) which certainly would have made for a more dashing, appealing legendary hero, but society decided instead to embrace the forty-year-old Revere, whose arthritic back was probably aching from all that riding.

Prescott was young but accomplished. He was a twenty-four-year-old member of the Sons of Liberty working as a physician in Concord, Massachusetts, after having served his apprenticeship under his father. (Caes, 39, 41) On the night of the famous ride, he had been in Lexington visiting a much sought-after woman named Lydia Mulliken, to whom he had recently become engaged. He was on his way back to Concord at about one o’clock in the morning when he came across Revere and Dawes. (Fischer, 129)

Revere and Dawes explained their mission to the young patriot, and Prescott, without delay, offered to help them warn everyone in the area. (Fischer, 130) The three riders set about warning the residents of every single house they passed by, and Prescott knew he would be more easily believed than the other two, as everyone in the area knew him. (Forbes, 251)

Prescott’s bravery and determination

They continued in this fashion until they were intercepted by what they thought were two British soldiers. Prescott, being the courageous young man that he was, immediately prepared himself for a fight. The three riders then realized that they were being approached by four British soldiers, not two, and decided to attempt an escape. (Fischer, 131)

Revere, the only one of the three now commonly associated with the story, was captured on the spot. Dawes escaped, but ended up getting lost and falling off his horse, making no more progress in warning people of the British advances. (Forbes, 461)

Prescott, however, leapt over a stone wall into the forest. He rode through a treacherous woodland swamp too thick for the British soldiers to navigate, made it out, and continued his mission to warn of the British invasion. (Caes, 40)

The young doctor kept riding until he came across the home of a fellow Minuteman named Sergeant Samuel Hartwell. He roused Hartwell and told him everything that had happened, and Hartwell then also began to spread the news. (Caes, 40) It is because of Prescott that Dr. Warren’s message reached Concord.

Still, Dr. Samuel Prescott receives virtually no recognition for his valiant deed. There are no known portraits of him (Caes, 38), and books and articles honoring Paul Revere are the only sources with any information, albeit rather limited, available about the young rider. He was rendered historically irrelevant by Longfellow’s mighty pen. “The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere” took a few liberties with the facts of the event, giving Revere exclusive exposure and creating a national celebrity out of a common man. The unfortunate consequence was that Dawes, and to an even greater extent, Prescott, vanished from everyone’s understanding of the story.

Accomplishments and contributions after the famous ride

After his instrumental role in the delivery of Dr. Joseph Warren’s urgent message, Dr. Samuel Prescott continued to serve his country proudly. Historians don’t know much about the man, but he was a surgeon in the Continental Army during the Ticonderoga Campaign (Caes, 41), and he later joined the crew of a New England privateer. (Fischer, 287)

History has a peculiar way of choosing who and what to remember. As a culture, we like things to be simple. We like to focus on one person, one reason, or one action to represent a more complicated historical reality. Columbus discovered America, the purpose of the Civil War was to free the slaves, and America has been the good guy in every war – it’s easier that way. Had Henry Wadsworth Longfellow written a different poem, Prescott could have been a national hero, but after completing the ride that made a legend out of another man, he remains in eternal obscurity.

Sources

Caes, Charles J. "Midnight Riders." American History 2004: Print.

Fischer, David Hackett. Paul Revere's Ride. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1994. Print.

Forbes, Esther. Paul Revere and the World He Lived In. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1942. Print.

Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. "Paul Revere's Ride." The Eserver Poetry Collection. Web. 3 Nov 2009. <http://poetry.eserver.org/paul-revere.html>.

Image retrieved from: http://web.mit.edu/sos/paulrevere.gif