How were the Minute Men able to ambush the British Regulars on their way back from concord???

Question

( history/literature!!! )

Answer 1

they used the guerrilla tatic which is hiding in the woods and attacking them as they travleled through.

Answer 2

Basically, what had happened was that the word had gotten out that the British Regulars had been on their way, and so militia men from all of the neighboring towns converged on Lexington, and more importantly, Menotomy (Arlington today) and Cambridge. After the British had been awake, had left at dusk the night before, and had been marching now for a great amount of time, it didn't hurt that they were really fatigued, especially after being forced back at Concord. On the way back, all of the converging minutemen , about 4000 all told, hid behind trees, fences, rocks, and houses and sniped at the British. Militia men caught the British in a crossfire on the way back on the Lexington/Lincoln border, taking out 30 British soldiers. It should be noted that at least 8 times, militia groups formed ranks and fired on the British in traditional fighting style. Ultimately, the British were escorted back by a reinforcement column under Lord Percy, but things broke down in Menotomy, where frustrated soldiers lacking leaders took matters in their own hands and went after local citizens. (My personal favorite is how 80 year old Samuel Whittemore killed three British soldiers before being beaten, shot, and bayonetted and left for dead, but survived and lived another 18 years.) In fact, more casualties occured here than in Lexington or Concord, with the British losing about 40 soldiers here, and 25 colonists were killed as well. Finally, the British straggled back into Boston, only to find that by the next day they were more or less trapped in the city by all the militiamen. (Hence the later battle of Bunker Hill.)

Answer 3

The winter of 1774-75 was mild for New England, however the affairs of men met no tempering influences. The Committee of Safety set up by the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts (it was given the power to call out the entire militia of the colony), voted that "all kinds of warlike stores be purchased sufficient for an army of 15,000 men," and selected the village of Concord as a suitable depot, far from the reach of British Major General Thomas Gage's raids.


Meanwhile, England decided to show that the civil "arm" of Parliament was as active as the military, and decided to mandate a new Act, called "The Fisheries Bill," which forbid not merely Massachusetts, but all the New England colonies to trade anywhere except in England or the British West Indies. Worse, the entire New England fishing fleet was barred from the North Atlantic fisheries.

The curtains were beginning to open on the American stage of the Revolution.


While the Provincial Congress discreetly shifted to Concord in order to be out of Gage's reach, more military problems would have to be considered. An entire brigade (4,000 troops) had been led out of Boston by Lord Percy on a practice march that swung through Watertown and Cambridge. The Congress at Concord had already resolved that whenever "troops to the Number of Five Hundred shall march out of Boston . . . it ought to be deemed a design to carry into execution by Force the late acts of Parliament . . . and therefore the Military Forces of the Province ought to be assembled and an Army of Observation immediately formed, to act solely on the defensive so long as it can be justified on the Principles of Reason and Self-Preservation and no longer."
British General Thomas Gage was in an increasingly awkward position. He had his mission -- enforcement of the Acts of Parliament and pacification of Massachusetts. If, in Parliamentary minds, he had ample military means to carry out what was ordered, each proposed course of action must have brought into Gage's mind the increasingly swift massing of armed militia which had followed every show of force. Yet something had to be done or awkward questions would be asked in London.





On April 15th, 1775, Major General Thomas Gage decided to send a column of seven hundred troops (two hundred over the magic number that the Concord Congress had set) to Concord under the command of Lt. Col. Francis Smith and his second, Major John Pitcairn. Gage had no intention of tolerating anything approaching a repetition of the action at Fort William and Mary. Learning that the depot in Concord held a growing store of gunpowder and arms, he sent these soldiers twenty miles from Boston to seize the military supplies. On the evening of the 18th, Dr. Joeseph Warren, President of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, sent Paul Revere and other messengers to Lexington to warn patriots there.


When Colonel Smith moved into the countryside to collect these arms and munitions gathered by the patriot militia, hostilities erupted at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. Soon afterward, militia contingents from places throughout New England took up positions outside Boston, putting the city under siege.


Paul Revere did not make it to his destination when sent to warn his countrymen that the British were coming.
Captured and briefly detained, he was forced to walk home as the Redcoats retained
his horse for His Majesty's service when they detained him.