Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Watson's Corner Casualties

 
Three of the men who were killed at Watson's Corner on April 19, 1775 are buried beneath this monument in the Old Burying Ground between Harvard Square and Cambridge Common. The fourth casualty, Isaac Gardner, is buried in Brookline.

ERECTED BY THE CITY
A.D. 1870
TO THE MEMORY OF
JOHN HICKS,
WILLIAM MARCY,
MOSES RICHARDSON,
BURIED HERE.
JASON RUSSELL,
JABEZ WYMAN,
JASON WINSHIP,
BURIED IN MENOTOMY.
MEN OF CAMBRIDGE
WHO FELL IN DEFENCE OF
THE LIBERTY OF THE PEOPLE
APRIL 19, 1775.
OH WHAT A GLORIOUS MORNING IS THIS

1 comment:

Robert J. said...

Yes, that's the one I remember. Jabez Wyman and Jason Winship appear several times in Fischer's "Paul Revere's Ride." It seems they fell in defence of their mugs of beer in the Menotomy tavern, rather than the liberty of the people (but perhaps that was simply their conception of liberty).

And it looks like Sam Adams' exclamation had already become iconic by 1870.

When I was a kid I had a great aunt who lived on Yerxa Road, not far from Watson's Corner. No British bullet holes in the front door that I recall, though.