"Paul Revere's Ride" is an 1860
poem
Poetry (derived from the Greek ''poiesis'', "making"), also called verse, is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and often rhythmic qualities of language − such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre − to evoke meanings in ...
by American poet
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow (February 27, 1807 – March 24, 1882) was an American poet and educator. His original works include "Paul Revere's Ride", ''The Song of Hiawatha'', and ''Evangeline''. He was the first American to completely transl ...
that commemorates
the actions of American patriot
Paul Revere
Paul Revere (; December 21, 1734 O.S. (January 1, 1735 N.S.)May 10, 1818) was an American silversmith, engraver, early industrialist, Sons of Liberty member, and Patriot and Founding Father. He is best known for his midnight ride to a ...
on April 18, 1775, although with significant inaccuracies. It was first published in the January 1861 issue of ''
The Atlantic Monthly
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
''. It was later retitled "The Landlord's Tale" in Longfellow's 1863 collection ''
Tales of a Wayside Inn
''Tales of a Wayside Inn'' is a collection of poems by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The book, published in 1863, depicts a group of people at the Wayside Inn in Sudbury, Massachusetts as each tells a story in the form of a poem. Th ...
''.
Overview
The poem is spoken by the landlord of the
Wayside Inn
The Wayside Inn Historic District is a historic district on Old Boston Post Road in Sudbury, Massachusetts. The district contains the Wayside Inn, a historic landmark that is one of the oldest inns in the country, operating as Howe's Tavern ...
and tells a partly fictionalized story of Paul Revere. In the poem, Revere tells a friend to prepare signal lanterns in the
Old North Church
Old North Church (officially, Christ Church in the City of Boston), at 193 Salem Street, in the North End, Boston, is the location from which the famous "One if by land, two if by sea" signal is said to have been sent. This phrase is related ...
(
North End, Boston
The North End is a neighborhood of Boston, Massachusetts, United States. It has the distinction of being the city's oldest residential community, where Europeans have continuously inhabited since it was colonized in the 1630s. Though small, only ...
) to inform him whether the British will attack by land or sea. He would await the signal across the river in Charlestown and be ready to spread the alarm throughout
Middlesex County, Massachusetts
Middlesex County is located in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in the United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 1,632,002, making it the most populous county in both Massachusetts and New England and ...
. The unnamed friend climbs up the steeple and soon sets up two signal lanterns, informing Revere that the British are coming by sea. Revere rides his horse through
Medford,
Lexington, and
Concord
Concord may refer to:
Meaning "agreement"
* Pact or treaty, frequently between nations (indicating a condition of harmony)
* Harmony, in music
* Agreement (linguistics), a change in the form of a word depending on grammatical features of other ...
to warn the patriots.
Composition and publication history
Longfellow was inspired to write the poem after visiting the Old North Church and climbing its tower on April 5, 1860. He began writing the poem the next day. It was first published in the January 1861 issue of ''
The Atlantic Monthly
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
''. It was later re-published in Longfellow's ''
Tales of a Wayside Inn
''Tales of a Wayside Inn'' is a collection of poems by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The book, published in 1863, depicts a group of people at the Wayside Inn in Sudbury, Massachusetts as each tells a story in the form of a poem. Th ...
'' as "The Landlord's Tale" in 1863. The poem served as the first in a series of 22 narratives bundled as a collection, similar to
Geoffrey Chaucer
Geoffrey Chaucer (; – 25 October 1400) was an English poet, author, and civil servant best known for ''The Canterbury Tales''. He has been called the "father of English literature", or, alternatively, the "father of English poetry". He wa ...
's ''
The Canterbury Tales
''The Canterbury Tales'' ( enm, Tales of Caunterbury) is a collection of twenty-four stories that runs to over 17,000 lines written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer between 1387 and 1400. It is widely regarded as Chaucer's ''Masterpiece, ...
'', and was published in three installments over 10 years.
Longfellow's family had a connection to the historical Paul Revere. His maternal grandfather,
Peleg Wadsworth
Peleg Wadsworth (May 6, 1748 – November 12, 1829) was an American Patriot officer during the American Revolutionary War and a Congressman from Massachusetts representing the District of Maine. He was also grandfather of noted American p ...
, was Revere's commander on the
Penobscot Expedition
The Penobscot Expedition was a 44-ship American naval armada during the Revolutionary War assembled by the Provincial Congress of the Province of Massachusetts Bay. The flotilla of 19 warships and 25 support vessels sailed from Boston on July 1 ...
.
Analysis
When the poem was written in 1860, America was on the verge of
Civil War
A civil war or intrastate war is a war between organized groups within the same state (or country).
The aim of one side may be to take control of the country or a region, to achieve independence for a region, or to change government policies ...
. Longfellow first came forward publicly as an
abolitionist
Abolitionism, or the abolitionist movement, is the movement to end slavery. In Western Europe and the Americas, abolitionism was a historic movement that sought to end the Atlantic slave trade and liberate the enslaved people.
The British ...
in 1842 with the publication of his ''
Poems on Slavery''. Though he admitted the book made little impact, it was written for his best friend,
Charles Sumner
Charles Sumner (January 6, 1811March 11, 1874) was an American statesman and United States Senator from Massachusetts. As an academic lawyer and a powerful orator, Sumner was the leader of the anti-slavery forces in the state and a leader of th ...
, an activist abolitionist politician with whom he would continue to share common cause on the issues of slavery and the Union. "Paul Revere's Ride" was published in the January 1861, issue of ''
The Atlantic
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
'' magazine on December 20, 1860, just as South Carolina became the first state to
secede from the United States. The poem was meant to appeal to Northerners' sense of urgency and, as a call for action, noted that history favors the courageous. Longfellow, who often used poetry to remind readers of cultural and moral values, warns at the end of the poem of a coming "hour of darkness and peril and need", implying the breakup of the Union, and suggests that the "people will waken and listen to hear" the midnight message again.
By emphasizing common history, he was attempting to dissolve social tensions.
The phrase "Hardly a man is now alive" was true as one of the last men alive at the time had only recently died.
Jonathan Harrington, the young
fifer
A fifer is a non-combatant military occupation of a foot soldier who originally played the fife during combat. The practice was instituted during the period of Early Modern warfare to sound signals during changes in formation, such as the line ...
for Lexington's militia during the
battles of Lexington and Concord, died at the age of 96 in 1854, a few years before the poem was written. The poem fluctuates between past and present tense, sometimes in the same sentence, symbolically pulling the actions of the Revolution into modern times and displaying an event with timeless sympathies.
Longfellow's poem is not historically accurate but his "mistakes" were deliberate. He had researched the historical event, using works like
George Bancroft
George Bancroft (October 3, 1800 – January 17, 1891) was an American historian, statesman and Democratic politician who was prominent in promoting secondary education both in his home state of Massachusetts and at the national and internati ...
's ''History of the United States'', but he manipulated the facts for poetic effect. He was purposefully trying to create American legends, much as he did with works like ''
The Song of Hiawatha
''The Song of Hiawatha'' is an 1855 epic poem in trochaic tetrameter by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow which features Native American characters. The epic relates the fictional adventures of an Ojibwe warrior named Hiawatha and the tragedy of his l ...
'' (1855) and ''
The Courtship of Miles Standish
''The Courtship of Miles Standish'' is an 1858 narrative poem by American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow about the early days of Plymouth Colony, the colonial settlement established in America by the ''Mayflower'' Pilgrims.
Overview
''Th ...
'' (1858).
Critical response
Modern
Modern critics of the poem emphasize not the poem's overall quality of writing, but its many historical inaccuracies. For example, the poem depicts the lantern signal in the Old North Church as meant ''for'' Revere, but actually the signal was ''from'' Revere: the historical Paul Revere did not receive the lantern signal, but actually was the one who ordered it to be set up. The poem also depicts Revere rowing himself across the Charles River when, in reality, he was rowed over by others. He also did not reach Concord that night. Another inaccuracy is a general lengthening of the time frame of the night's events.
The majority of criticism, however, notes that Longfellow gave sole credit to Revere for the collective achievements of three riders (as well as other riders, whose names do not survive to history). In fact, Revere and
William Dawes
William Dawes Jr. (April 6, 1745 – February 25, 1799) was one of several men who in April 1775 alerted colonial minutemen in Massachusetts of the approach of British army troops prior to the Battles of Lexington and Concord at the outset ...
rode (via different routes) from
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
to Lexington to warn
John Hancock
John Hancock ( – October 8, 1793) was an American Founding Father, merchant, statesman, and prominent Patriot of the American Revolution. He served as president of the Second Continental Congress and was the first and third Governor of t ...
and
Samuel Adams
Samuel Adams ( – October 2, 1803) was an American statesman, political philosopher, and a Founding Father of the United States. He was a politician in colonial Massachusetts, a leader of the movement that became the American Revolution, an ...
that British soldiers were marching from Boston to Lexington to arrest Hancock and Adams and seize the weapons stores in Concord. Revere and Dawes rode toward Concord, where the militia's arsenal was hidden; they were joined by
Samuel Prescott
Samuel Prescott (August 19, 1751 – ) was an American physician and a Massachusetts Patriot during the American Revolutionary War. He is best known for his role in Paul Revere's "midnight ride" to warn the townspeople of Concord, Massachusetts ...
, a doctor who lived in Concord and happened to be in Lexington. Revere, Dawes, and Prescott were stopped by British troops in
Lincoln
Lincoln most commonly refers to:
* Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865), the sixteenth president of the United States
* Lincoln, England, cathedral city and county town of Lincolnshire, England
* Lincoln, Nebraska, the capital of Nebraska, U.S.
* Lincol ...
on the road to Concord. Prescott and Dawes escaped, but Revere was detained and questioned and then escorted at gunpoint by three British officers back to Lexington. Of the three riders, only Prescott arrived at Concord in time to warn the militia there.
Historical impact
Longfellow's poem is credited with creating the national legend of Paul Revere, a previously little-known
silversmith
A silversmith is a metalworker who crafts objects from silver. The terms ''silversmith'' and ''goldsmith'' are not exactly synonyms as the techniques, training, history, and guilds are or were largely the same but the end product may vary great ...
.
Upon Revere's death in 1818, for example, his obituary did not mention his midnight ride but instead focused on his business sense and his many friends. The fame that Longfellow brought to Revere, however, did not materialize until after the Civil War amidst the
Colonial Revival Movement The Colonial Revival movement was a national expression of early North American culture, primarily the built and artistic environments of the Colonial Coast, east coast colonies. The Colonial Revival is generally associated with the eighteenth-cent ...
of the 1870s. In 1875, for example, the Old North Church mentioned in the poem began an annual custom called the "lantern ceremony" recreating the action of the poem. Three years later, the Church added a plaque noting it as the site of "the signal lanterns of Paul Revere". Revere's elevated historical importance also led to unsubstantiated rumors that he made a set of false teeth for
George Washington
George Washington (February 22, 1732, 1799) was an American military officer, statesman, and Founding Father who served as the first president of the United States from 1789 to 1797. Appointed by the Continental Congress as commander of th ...
. Revere's legendary status continued for decades and, in part due to Longfellow's poem, authentic silverware made by Revere commanded high prices.
Wall Street
Wall Street is an eight-block-long street in the Financial District of Lower Manhattan in New York City. It runs between Broadway in the west to South Street and the East River in the east. The term "Wall Street" has become a metonym for t ...
tycoon
J. P. Morgan
John Pierpont Morgan Sr. (April 17, 1837 – March 31, 1913) was an American financier and investment banker who dominated corporate finance on Wall Street throughout the Gilded Age. As the head of the banking firm that ultimately became known ...
, for example, offered $100,000 for a
punch bowl
A punch bowl or punchbowl is a bowl, often large and wide, in which the drink punch is served.''The Language of Drink'' Graham and Sue Edwards 1988, Alan Sutton Publishing
Origins
The word ''punch'' is a loanword from Hindi. The original drin ...
Revere made.
In 1883, Boston held a national competition for an
equestrian statue
An equestrian statue is a statue of a rider mounted on a horse, from the Latin ''eques'', meaning 'knight', deriving from ''equus'', meaning 'horse'. A statue of a riderless horse is strictly an equine statue. A full-sized equestrian statue is a d ...
of Revere. It was won by
Cyrus Edwin Dallin
Cyrus Edwin Dallin (November 22, 1861 – November 14, 1944) was an American sculptor best known for his depictions of Native Americans. He created more than 260 works, including the ''Equestrian Statue of Paul Revere'' in Boston, Massac ...
, although his model was not accepted until 1899, and the statue was not dedicated until 1940. It stands in "Paul Revere Plaza," opposite the Old North Church.
In 1896 Helen F. Moore, dismayed that William Dawes had been forgotten, penned a parody of Longfellow's poem:
: 'Tis all very well for the children to hear
: Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere;
: But why should my name be quite forgot,
: Who rode as boldly and well, God wot?
: Why should I ask? The reason is clear—
: My name was Dawes and his Revere.
For a long time, historians of the American Revolution as well as textbook writers relied almost entirely on Longfellow's poem as historical evidence – creating substantial misconceptions in the minds of the American people. In re-examining the episode, some historians in the 20th century have attempted to demythologize Paul Revere almost to the point of marginalization. While it is true that Revere was not the only rider that night, that does not refute the fact that Revere successfully completed the first phase of his mission to warn Adams and Hancock. Other historians have since stressed Revere's importance, including
David Hackett Fischer
David Hackett Fischer (born December 2, 1935) is University Professor of History Emeritus at Brandeis University. Fischer's major works have covered topics ranging from large macroeconomic and cultural trends ('' Albion's Seed,'' ''The Great Wave' ...
in his book ''Paul Revere's Ride'' (1995), a scholarly study of Revere's role in the opening of the Revolution.
In 2007, the
United States Postal Service
The United States Postal Service (USPS), also known as the Post Office, U.S. Mail, or Postal Service, is an independent agency of the executive branch of the United States federal government responsible for providing postal service in the U ...
(USPS) issued a commemorative stamp with images referencing the poem. Longfellow is represented by a painting by artist Kazuhiko Sano.
References
; Citations
Further reading
*
External links
Original text of "Paul Revere's Ride"by ''
The Atlantic
''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science.
It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
''
Discussion of "Paul Revere's Ride"by the Maine Historical Society
"Paul Revere's Ride" lesson plan by the
National Endowment for the Humanities
The National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) is an independent federal agency of the U.S. government, established by thNational Foundation on the Arts and the Humanities Act of 1965(), dedicated to supporting research, education, preserv ...
"Spotty History, Maybe, but Great Literature"''
The Wall Street Journal
''The Wall Street Journal'' is an American business-focused, international daily newspaper based in New York City, with international editions also available in Chinese and Japanese. The ''Journal'', along with its Asian editions, is published ...
'' on "Paul Revere's Ride"
"150 Years of 'Paul Revere's Ride': About the Poem"*
{{Paul Revere
American poems
Poetry by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Poems about the American Revolution
1861 poems
1775 in the Thirteen Colonies
Cultural depictions of Paul Revere
Works originally published in The Atlantic (magazine)