Lexington Battle Green

It was here, on the morning of April 19, 1775, that "the first blood was spilt in the dispute with Great Britain," as George Washington wrote in his diary. In this first skirmish, 77 Minutemen (local colonists who had volunteered to be first responders to military and other threats) faced British Regulars. Eight Minutemen lost their lives and 10 were wounded. Two British soldiers were also injured. After the battle, Samuel Adams exclaimed to John Hancock, "What a glorious morning for America!"

View Henry H. Kitson's Minuteman Statue, erected in 1900, to memorialize the Lexington Minutemen. The oldest war memorial in the country, the Revolutionary Monument was completed on July 4, 1799 and sits on what was originally the site of the Town’s first schoolhouse. In 1835 the remains of the colonists slain in the Battle of Lexington were moved from their common grave in the Old Burying Ground and placed under this monument.

Where it is: Lexington Center at the junction of Massachusetts Avenue and Bedford Street (Rt. 4/225). map >>