Visit Meriam's Corner, Concord, Massachusetts

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Meriam's corner is where colonial militia first attacked the British column during their return march to Boston on April, 1775. It is where April 19 went from a day of a couple of small violent skirmishes to becoming a running 16 mile long battle which became the opening salvo in a war which would last eight years. About noon, the column of approximately 700 British regular soldiers began the return march from Concord to Boston. They had been sent to Concord to seize and destroy colonial stockpiles of arms and military supplies. The day had so far been a disappointment. Many of the stockpiles had been removed from Concord before the British regulars arrived. Worse, there had been fighting in Lexington and later that morning in Concord. The alarm was raised throughout the countryside and minute man and militia companies were mobilizing and marching toward the area in great numbers.When the column of regulars reached Meriam's Corner, about a mile east of Concord's center, newly arrived companies from Reading, Chelmsford and Billerica arrived and took cover behind the Meriam houses and barns. First to arrive was a company of Reading minute men under the command of Captain Brooks. They had separated from their regiment a few miles up the Bedford Road and pushed ahead towards Concord. When they arrived they saw the British light infantry descending Meriam Hill and pulling back towards the road to cross a small bridge over Elm Brook. Thus temporarily without the protection of its flank guard, the British column was vulnerable to attack. Captain Brooks ordered his men to open fire. At Meriam's Corner, key elements combined to make the militia attack possible. First of all, Captain Brooks' company from Reading, pressing ahead of their regiment, arrived in time to engage the rear of the British column. Second, the column had to pull in their flank guards to cross a bridge over Elm Brook. This slowed their progress and allowed the militiamen to take up positions behind the Meriam houses and outbuildings within range of the bridge and the road.It's also interesting that Captain Brooks did not wait to see who was going to fire first. According to his account once they realized the red-coated soldiers descending Meriam hill were British regulars, they opened fire. This would make the fight at Meriam's Corner the first offensive action taken by the colonists in the war.

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