Two hundred years ago, on 19 April 1775, American history changed. Colonial forces faced the British army at Lexington & Concord … and won. Word spread rapidly, and two regiments of Plymouth “Minute Men,” led by Colonel Theophilus Cotton, rallied to the Patriot cause. For the next six years, Plymoutheans participated in America’s battle for independence.
Although not the site of any great battles, nor the home of any triumphant generals, Plymouth is filled with the stories of the lawmakers and lawyers whose rhetoric inspired the Patriot cause, of the men who risked their lives and livelihood in military service, and of the civilians who kept the home fires burning, as well as of the Americans who, valuing loyalty above all, continued to support the King. They illuminate the complex and fascinating history of Massachusetts’ earliest town, as it embraced the movement for American independence, and the lasting impact it made on the Town’s historical landscape.
April 2: Stephen O’Neill – Plymouth’s 1749 Courthouse: Revolution in the Courts
April 9: Peggy Baker – Benjamin Warren’s War: A Plymouthean in the Continental Army
April 30: Patrick Browne – “Patriotism in a High Degree Zealous”: Ephraim Spooner & the Home Front
May 7: Mark Schmidt – Choosing Sides: Loyalists in the American Revolution
May 14: Donna Curtin – Dr. James Thacher & Plymouth’s Revolutionary Generation
