In the days, weeks, and months leading to April 19, 1775, tensions across the colony of Massachusetts reached a boiling point. The previous summer British warships closed Boston Harbor, Royal Governor, General Thomas Gage, tasked with implementing the wildly unpopular Massachusetts Government Act, also dismissed the elected Massachusetts legislature, the Great and General Court. In October Patriot leaders called for a Provincial Congress in Massachusetts. Towns across Massachusetts chose to send representatives to this essentially illegal body which immediately proceeded to assume political power. They took control of the colony's militia forces, and began stockpiling arms, ammunition and provisions. Their goal was to raise and equip an army of 15,000 men.Isolated in Boston, General Gage was running out of options. At last, following the advice he received from his superiors in England, Gage decided to send a force of around 700 soldiers on a secret expedition into the countryside to seize and destroy arms and supplies and disrupt the colonists' warlike preparations. His target was the town of Concord, 18 miles northwest of Boston, where a considerable quantity of these arms and supplies were stockpiled. The expedition consisted of 21 companies of Grenadiers and Light Infantry, the elite soldiers of the army. Grenadiers were chosen for their height and courage. They wore distinctive bear-fur caps which adds to their height and frightening appearance. Light Infantry were soldiers chosen for their physical speed, stamina and intelligence. They were trained to spread out, take advantage of cover, and skirmish with the enemy. Their uniforms were adapted to this service with short coats and leather caps instead of brimmed hats which helped them move more easily through woods.
Meet us at mile 19!
Once the bells were rung, Concord immediately turned out its two minute companies and two militia companies, who mustered at the town center near the meeting house. Colonel James Barrett, who was responsible for safeguarding the military stockpiles in town, began detaching men from their companies to assist in removing or hiding any of the stores that had not already been removed a few days prior.
On April 25th Captain Parker gave a sworn statement about what happened. "I...ordered our Militia to meet on the common in said Lexington, to consult what to do, and concluded not to be discovered, nor meddle or make with said Regular Troops (if they should approach) unless they should insult us; and upon their sudden approach, I immediately ordered our Militia to disperse and not to fire. Immediately said Troops made their appearance, and rushed furiously, fired upon and killed eight of our party, without receiving any provocation therefore from us."
The British entered Concord. Thaddeus Blood, a Private in Captain Nathan Barrett's Company was among an advanced party that marched about mile east from the center of town along a high ridge that runs along the north side of the road. There they saw the column of British soldiers, 700 strong in a column stretching about a quarter mile, marching toward them. Blood described the scene a follows:
When the regulars entered Concord, the militia, outnumbered by 3 to 1, retreated back along the ridge towards town, then over the North Bridge to a hill nearly a mile beyond called Punkatasset. There they waited for reinforcements. The British then moved to secure both the North and South bridges.
Securing the bridges was necessary to prevent rebels from slipping across from remote parts of town to threaten the mission. Also, Lt. Colonel Smith sent seven companies across the North Bridge with orders to search for supplies and artillery known to be hidden at Barrett's farm, about a mile west of the bridge. They left three companies (about 96 men) at the bridge to guard it and keep it open for their return.
"The enemy were then rising and passing over Fiske's Hill. An officer, mounted on an elegant horse, and with a drawn sword in his hand, was riding backwards and forwards, commanding and urging on the British troops. A number of Americans behind a pile of rails raised their guns and fired with deadly effect. The officer fell, and the horse took fright, leaped the wall, and ran directly towards those who had killed his rider. The enemy discharged their musketry in that direction, but their fire took no effect." It is believed that sometime between Parker's Revenge, this encounter and meeting up with reinforcements, both senior commanders of the British expedition, Lt. Colonel Francis Smith and Major John Pitcairn, were wounded. Learn more about Fiske Hill (U.S. National Park Service) (nps.gov).
Through a tragedy of errors 1st Brigade, under Hugh Earl Percy, did not leave Boston until 9:00 a.m. (Gage issued the order to muster the brigade and march at 4:00 a.m.). By the time they reached Lexington, about half a mile east of the town common, Smith's column was in an almost full headlong retreat. Lt. John Barker, 4th Regiment of Foot recounts...
"The country was an amazing strong one, full of hills, woods, stone walls &c., which the Rebels did not fail to take advantage of, for they were all lined with people who kept an incessant fire upon us, as we did too upon them but not with the same advantage, for they were so concealed there was hardly any seeing them. In this way we marched between 9 and 10 miles, their numbers increasing from all parts while ours was reducing by deaths, wounds and fatigue, and were were totally surrounded by such an incessant fire as it's impossible to conceive, our ammunition was likewise near expended. In this critical situation we perceived the 1st Brigade coming to our assistance..."
"...our Regiment received orders to form the rear guard. We immediately lined the walls and other cover in our front with some marksmen, and retired from the right of companies by files to the high ground a small distance in our rear, where we again formed in line, and remained in that position for near half an hour, during which time the flank companies, and the other regiments of the Brigade began their march in one column on the road towards Cambridge... before the column had advanced a mile on the road, we were fired at from all quarters, but particularly from the houses on the roadside, and the adjacent stone walls..."
Building on the lessons learned from Within Reach, we launch a new five-year strategic plan, Closing the Distance. Over the next five years, we will deepen our impact in four to six national community health systems to bring essential primary care to last mile communities, and we will influence community health financing across Africa to improve how $2 billion in sustainable funding is invested for the greatest impact at the last mile.
This Amalgamation or similar facsimiles of the Navigation Rules, (as the one pictured), may be used to meet the 'copy of these Rules' requirement of 33 CFR 83.01(g). For the USCG policy on the use of electronic charts and publications to meet U.S. carriage requirements see the USCG Navigation and Vessel Inspection Circular (NVIC) 01-16 CH-2.
In the Food Access Research Atlas, several indicators are available to measure food access along these dimensions. For example, users can choose alternative distance markers to measure low access in a neighborhood, such as the number and share of people more than one-half mile to a supermarket or 1 mile to a supermarket. Users can also view other census-tract-level characteristics that provide context on food access in neighborhoods, such as whether the tract has a high percentage of households far from supermarkets and without vehicles, individuals with low income, or people residing in group quarters.
Under this measure, a tract is considered low access if at least 100 households are more than one-half mile from the nearest supermarket and have no access to a vehicle; or at least 500 people or 33 percent of the population live more than 20 miles from the nearest supermarket, regardless of vehicle access. Using this measure, an estimated 1.9 million households, or 1.7 percent of all households, are in low-income and low-access census tracts, are far from a supermarket, and do not have a vehicle. An additional 0.2 million people are more than 20 miles from a supermarket.
Methods used to assess distance to the nearest supermarket are the same for each measure. First, the entire country is divided into -kilometer (about 1/3-mile)-square grids, and data on the population are aerially allocated to these grids (see Low-Income and Low-Foodstore-Access Census Tracts, 2015-19 in the link below). Distance to the nearest supermarket is measured for each grid cell by calculating the distance between the geographic center of the -kilometer square grid that contains estimates of the population (number of people and other subgroup characteristics) and the center of the grid with the nearest supermarket.
Once distance to the nearest supermarket is calculated for each grid cell, the estimated number of people or housing units that are more than 1 mile from a supermarket in urban tracts, or 10 miles in rural census tracts, is aggregated at the census-tract level (and similarly for the alternative distance markers). A census tract is considered rural if the population-weighted centroid of that tract is in an area with a population of less than 2,500; all other tracts are considered urban.
A tract is identified as having low-vehicle availability if more than 100 households in the tract report having no vehicle available and are more than one-half mile from the nearest supermarket. This corresponds closely to the 80th percentile of the distribution of the number of housing units in a census tract without vehicles at least one-half mile from a supermarket (the 80th percentile value was 108 housing units). This means that about 20 percent of all census tracts had more than 100 housing units that were one-half mile from a supermarket and without a vehicle. This indicator was applied to both urban and rural census tracts. 2ff7e9595c
Comments