own reinforcements. Every minute of
delay was dangerous, for now the American military leaders were
gathering. If Hancock and Adams had left the field, Warren hastened to
it. We know some of his sayings as he left Boston. "They have begun
it,--that either party can do; and we'll end it,--that only one can do."
To the remark, "Well, they are gone out," he replied, "Yes, and we will
be up with them before night." Warren probably was present at a meeting
of the Committee of Safety which was held that morning, but his
biographer says: "I am unable to locate him until the afternoon, about
the time Lord Percy's column rescued Colonel Smith's party from entire
destruction, which was at two o'clock."

Warren was no mere adviser. With General Heath he had been planning for
the work of the day, and when, after half an hour's rest, Percy's troops
moved onward, the time came for the measures to be put into effect.
Warren went with Heath to the scene of battle. Yet little could be done
in organized form, at least in the open country, and the minute men
continued to pick off the British. But when the troops were among
houses, and in revenge for their losses began to plunder[70] and burn,
the Americans for the first time began to close in. Many of them fired
from barricaded houses, and were killed in consequence. The Danvers
company, the only one that tried to fight as a body, were caught between
the main column of the regulars and a strong flanking party, and many
were killed in an improvised enclosure. But even without defences the
Americans became very bold, and the fight fiercer. Warren, rashly
exposing himself, had a pin shot out of his hair. Percy, on the other
hand, lost a button from his waistcoat. Nothing can explain the
comparatively slight losses of the British except the rapidity of their
march to safety. As it was, the regulars were almost worn out with their
exertions when they saw ahead of them the hills of Charlestown, and
looking across the Back Bay, might perceive on the slopes of Beacon Hill
half the population of Boston watching their disgrace.

Boston had been in suspense since early morning. All the Whigs had
suspected the meaning of Gage's preparations, and the town was no sooner
astir than the news was abroad that the expedition had started. Next
came word that an officer had come in haste with a message for Gage. At
about eight came news of the death of five men in Lexington. Already
Lord Percy's detachment w