In 1887, Josiah Bushnell Grinnell spoke to a packed house at the Congregational Church in New Haven, Vermont. The U.S. congressman from Iowa and radical abolitionist in the lead-up to the Civil War had returned to his tiny hometown to be the keynote speaker at a Historical Day commemoration.
Grinnell’s address, reprinted in the book “New Haven, A Rural Historical Town of Vermont,” included this intriguing passage:
“Solomon Brown also lived and died here fifty years ago. To him belongs the honor of having fired the first effective shot at the red coats in the revolutionary war. I attended his funeral, at which his memorable shot was mentioned, and I just remember the story from his own lips.”
For 250 years, historians have argued over who fired first at the Battle of Lexington, when Massachusetts militiamen faced British soldiers about 11 miles west of Boston. A musket blast caused red-coated regulars to shoot at colonists, officially marking the beginning of the Revolutionary War. Is Brown the one who pulled the trigger?
Born in Lexington in 1755, Brown was a young militiaman when the shooting started on April 19, 1775. Eyewitnesses placed him at the scene where the initial shot was thought to have been made on Lexington Common, although experts are not completely convinced he was the one who fired it.
“It’s not that I think he is definitely the man who fired first,” states historian and author J.L. Bell, who writes the daily blog Boston 1775 about the American Revolution. “But if I could go back in time, he’s the first person on my list that I would want to interrogate.”
Jim Clark of New Haven believes it was Brown. Clark resides in the rambling redbrick house built by Brown 230 years ago. For decades, he has lived with the legend of how the first owner fired “the shot heard ’round the world.”
“Given his reputation in the township, I have no doubt he would take a shot at a British soldier,” Clark says with a laugh. “Especially after a night of revelry in one of the pubs. He was a rabble rouser from what I hear.”
Brown certainly had motive to fire first. The day before, he was roughed up by a British scouting party after being detained for questioning. In fact, he was held overnight with Paul Revere, whose ride to warn that the British were coming was cut short by his arrest. Both were released in time to catch the sunrise service at Lexington Common.
At dawn that fateful morning, Brown watched as 700 British infantry were confronted by about 80 militiamen at what is now Lexington Battle Green. After the smoke cleared, eight Americans were dead and two British soldiers were wounded.
Both sides blamed the other for firing first. The Americans initially said they were just innocent bystanders and didn’t even have loaded weapons, a claim later proved to be false.
“Captain John Parker, and his men who survived, testified in 1775 that none of them fired a shot on the town common that morning,” says Roger Fuller, park ranger at the Minute Man National Historical Park. “They had unloaded guns and were preparing to go home when the advance guard of the regular army’s expedition marched into town.”
To sway public opinion against British “tyranny,” the Americans released somewhat spurious depositions by eyewitnesses. Levi Harrington and Levi Mead swore they watched as British officers “Fired a Pistol or two” to begin the bloodshed.
“These were the First Guns that were Fired and they were immediately followed by several volleys from the Regulars,” they said in a document dated April 25, 1775.
Bell, author of 2016’s “The Road to Concord: How Four Stolen Cannon Ignited the Revolutionary War,” argues the affidavits don’t paint a full picture: “They tell the truth and nothing but the truth, but they don’t tell the whole truth. I think that in the confusion and anger of the moment, the Lexington men just assumed the worst about their enemy.”
The British countered it was those “damned rebels” who drew first blood. In his report, Major John Pitcairn, leader of the advance force of English soldiers at Lexington, claimed colonists blasted away from a protected position, prompting his men to return fire.
“Some of the rebels who had jumped over the wall fired four or five shots at the soldiers, which wounded a man of the Tenth [Regiment of Foot] and my horse was wounded in two places,” he wrote.
British Lieutenant William Sutherland supported his assertion. In his report, he stated that three shots were fired from the corner of a large house (Buckman Tavern), adding, “some of the Villains were got over the hedge, fired at us, & it was then & not before that the Soldiers fired.”
That’s where Brown was reportedly hiding. For nearly five decades, his identity as the possible triggerman was kept secret. Then, in 1824, Elijah Sanderson stated, “I saw them firing at one man (Solomon Brown) who was stationed behind a wall. I saw the wall smoke with the bullets hitting it.”
In another account, Brown was at the entrance to Buckman Tavern when British troops returned fire. One of those musket balls may have struck the door, now displayed at the public house turned museum across from Lexington Common.
George Washington Brown said the damage was because of his father. He described the scene in “Sketch of the Life of Solomon Brown,” an 1891 essay he read before the Lexington Historical Society:
“No sooner had he stepped in the open door-way than a bullet from an enemy’s gun struck the doorpost about midway. Another following it struck the door near the top.”
Regrettably, no firsthand testimony by Brown was ever found. If he fired the first shot, why not admit it to the world? Fear of being hanged for treason by the British could be one reason. A guilty conscience over the eight dead Americans is another.
“One could make the case that he has blood on his head for causing a massacre,” Fuller says. “Not a claim I’d want to have.”
After the war, Brown moved to New Haven, about 40 miles west of the Vermont capital of Montpelier. Known for dustups with residents while a selectman and treasurer, he was also considered “a vocal and dynamic leader in the community.” Brown was the first deacon of the New Haven Congregational Church, married three times and fathered 19 children.
Although the record doesn’t say why, Brown was charged in 1803 with “falsehood and deception.” He was found innocent by “brethren,” though he was admonished for not treating selectmen with “Candour and frankness which became a Christian.”
When Brown died in 1837, he was buried in Evergreen Cemetery in New Haven. Residents still point to his grave and speak reverently about the man who started the Revolutionary War.
“If anyone asks, I of course confirm that, yes, Solomon Brown was the person who made the first shot at Lexington,” says Bev Landon, president of the New Haven Historical Society.
But many historians consider the evidence to be circumstantial at best.
“The consensus is that, yes, the first shot came from the Americans,” Bell states. “And it came from the vicinity of Buckman Tavern.”
And maybe the musket of Solomon Brown.
