Concord Town Sites

Barrett House

Benjamin Barrett built this home in 1705. Five years later his son James was born, and he would go on to inherit the house. He served as a captain in the French and Indian War. As the colonists prepared for a possible confrontation with British authorities in the 1770s, James Barrett was commissioned as a colonel in command of the local militia.

In 1775, James Barrett was living in this house with his wife, two unmarried sons, and a daughter, as well as a fourteen-year-old enslaved boy, Phillip. Colonel Barrett used his home to store military supplies, including several small cannons that had been smuggled out of Boston. When the British troops marched into Concord on April 19, 1775, one detachment was sent specifically to search the Barrett home. Colonel Barrett was organizing the militia, leaving his wife Rebeckah to coldly receive the British soldiers, who found nothing in their search.

James Barrett fought in the first battle of the war, but he died in April 1779. The house became part of Minute Man National Historical Park in 2012.

David Brown Farm Site

These four granite stones mark the footprint of the home of Captain David Brown, one of the leaders of the Concord militia. The Brown family settled in Concord in the 1640s, less than a decade after the town was founded. David Brown’s great-grandfather purchased fourteen acres of land, which was passed down through the generations. David Brown built a new house on the marked site sometime in the 1750s or 1760s. While not much is known about the house, surviving records show that it was two stories, with four rooms and a cellar.

David Brown was chosen to serve as captain of one of Concord’s minuteman companies in early 1775. On April 19, 1775, Captain Brown and his men were mustered on the high ground owned by David Brown, overlooking the North Bridge. One of those men was his oldest son, Purchase Brown. According to family legend, British soldiers entered the Brown house and smashed a mirror, which is today part of the Concord Museum’s collection.

David Brown died in 1802 at the age of 72. His youngest son Joseph inherited the house, but by the time he died the building was dilapidated. By the 1860s the Brown family had sold the property and the house had been torn down.

Major John Buttrick House

The Buttrick family were among the founders of the town of Concord in 1635. William Buttrick was listed as the owner of 215 acres of land in the first records of the town. Jonathan Buttrick built this house sometime in the 1710s. The two-story home he built has been altered many times since its original construction.

By 1775, the property was in the hands of Jonathan’s son, John Buttrick, who was a respected member of the community. He served on the various committees that organized and coordinated revolutionary activity in and around Concord, including the raising of troops. In the summer of 1775, after the battles of Lexington and Concord, John Buttrick served as an officer in the army of colonial militiamen laying siege to Boston. He went on to serve in the Saratoga Campaign and the failed attack on the British garrison in Newport, Rhode Island. After the war ended, John Buttrick continued to live in Concord for the rest of his life.

The Concord Museum

The Concord Museum began as the private collection of Cummings Davis, who moved to Concord in 1850. Initially, he displayed his collection of historic artifacts in rented rooms in the town’s courthouse. In 1886 the newly formed Concord Antiquarian Society acquired the collection and bought a house in 1887 to display it. The Society moved to a new building in 1930, and changed their name to the Concord Museum in 1984.

Among the objects in its collection are one of the signal lanterns from the Old North Church used on the night of Paul Revere’s ride. The Museum also owns the largest collection of objects related to Henry David Thoreau, including the lock and key from the jail cell where Thoreau was confined after his refusal to pay a tax because of his antislavery principles, which inspired his famous essay on civil disobedience.

Wright Tavern

This tavern was built in 1747. It had several different owners, but it is known as the Wright Tavern because in 1775 its owner was Amos Wright. The tavern was a center of political and social activity in Concord. The selectmen of the town did not receive a salary, but the town paid for their food and drinks when they met in the tavern.

In October 1774, the Wright Tavern served as the meeting place for the colonial leaders who met and formed the First Massachusetts Provincial Congress, a government outside of the authority of the British colonial government. In April of 1775, the Concord militia gathered here as word of the British march spread. When those British troops did arrive in Concord later in the day, the commander of the expedition used the tavern as their headquarters while the town was searched for weapons and military supplies.

Old Hill Burying Ground

This cemetery officially dates back to the 1670s, but it is possible that there are unmarked graves dating further back to the first years after the founding of the town of Concord. Among the Revolutionary War veterans are buried here are James Barrett, David Brown, and John Buttrick.

Grave of British Soldier

The “shot heard round the world” was fired at the North Bridge outside Concord, when British soldiers fired on approaching colonial militia. The American colonists returned fire, killing two British soldiers and mortally wounding another. When the British retreated back towards Concord, they left their dead on the field.

It is hard to say for certain who was killed in these opening shots of the Revolutionary War, but examination of British records seems to indicate that Thomas Smith, Patrick Gray, and maybe James Hall were the soldiers killed at the North Bridge.

According to sworn testimony collected after the battle, Zerchariah Brown and Thomas Davis buried the dead British soldiers. The graves were initially marked with two small stones. In 1870 Concord erected a more prominent stone slab, and in later years later the town added additional markers.

Grave of British Soldiers

After the British began their retreat from Concord back towards Boston, they were forced to cross a small bridge, which made them vulnerable to attack. A short exchange of musket fire between colonial militia and the British light infantry guarding the rear of the column marked the beginning of eight hours of constant fighting along Battle Road.

One American militiaman recalled that two British soldiers were killed, while another recounted nine British casualties. One militiaman recalled that “a great many lay dead and the road was bloody.” While the exact number of British soldiers killed at this site is not known for certain, it is believed that two British soldiers are buried at the site marked by the gravestone.

British Soldier Grave

The curves in the road from Concord back through Lexington to Boston provided ample opportunities for the American colonists to launch devastating ambushes of the British column. Many of the British soldiers killed in the fighting were left behind and buried by the local residents.

Different accounts state that either two or three British soldiers are buried here at the section of the road known as “the Bloody Angle.” Others killed at this site were taken to the cemetery in nearby Lincoln for burial.

Captain William Smith House

This home was built in the 1690s. In 1775 it was the home of Captain William Smith, the commander of the Lincoln minutemen. He was a newcomer to the town, having only arrived in 1774. He was the brother of Abigail Adams, and that family connection to the prominent Patriot may have been part of the reason he was given such an important position. In 1775, the Smith household included an enslaved black man named Cato.

Captain Smith mustered his militia when word arrived of the approaching British troops on the morning of April 19, 1775. The Lincoln minutemen were among the colonial militia who confronted the British at the North Bridge outside Concord.

As the British retreated back towards Boston, the running battle along the road passed by the Smith house around 1:30 in the afternoon. A British soldier who was mortally wounded may have been cared for by Captain Smith’s wife in the days after the battle.

After the war, the house passed through a series of owners until it became part of the Minute Man National Historical Park in 1975. While alterations and additions were made, much of the original house remains intact, and the National Park Service has worked to restore the structure to its 1775 appearance.

Grave of British Solider at Folly Pond

This stone supposedly marks the grave of a British grenadier who was mortally wounded during the fighting on April 19, 1775, and cared for in his final days by Catherine Smith, the wife of militia Captain William Smith. However, no evidence has been found to confirm the identity of the soldier buried here. Doctor Joseph Fiske of Lexington treated two wounded soldiers in the town of Lincoln after the fighting, and this may have been one of them, but details are scarce.

Paul Revere Capture Site

The midnight ride of Paul Revere ended here, when he was captured by a British patrol sent out with the intention of intercepting riders carrying word of the British expedition to Concord. Revere was traveling at the time with William Dawes and Dr. Samuel Prescott. Dawes was able to escape, while Revere and Prescott were detained for several hours before being released.

While Paul Revere’s name is most famously associated with the raising of the alarm, in reality he was only one of many messengers who carried news of the British march across the Massachusetts countryside. Thus, his capture did not stop the warning from getting out to towns and villages around Boston.

Grave of British Soldiers at the Nelson House

The gravestone here marks the resting places of two British soldiers killed on April 19, 1775. Supposedly, the two soldiers were killed by William Throning, a young man serving in the colonial militia. However, this story did not appear until the 19th century. In 1850, a resident of the area pointed out the grave locations to a local historian. Another account says that a third British soldier was mortally wounded in this area, and was buried nearby when he died.

Grave of British Soldiers at Bloody Bluff

The gravestone and plaque at this site mark the supposed burial place of two British soldiers who were killed in the fighting around this bluff. The grave was noted by a 19th century historian, Frank Coburn. The British rear guard skirmished with colonial militia on and around this bluff as the main column continued on its retreat back towards Boston.

Grave of British Soldiers at Fiske Hill

A minuteman from the town of Reading recounted that, as the British troops navigated this hill, “A number of Americans behind a pile of rails raised their guns and fired with deadly effect.” The Fiske family, who had been sheltering from the violence, emerged to discover several dead and wounded men inside their home.

Doctor Joseph Fiske, Ebenezer Fiske’s cousin, came to the house to treat the wounded the day after the battle, but only one of the three wounded men survived. According to Rebecca Fiske, Ebenezer Fiske’s daughter-in-law, two of the dead British soldiers were buried beneath a pine tree on the property. However, the exact location of that tree and the graves beneath it is not known today.

Ebenezer Fiske House Site

These stones outline the foundation of the home of Ebenezer Fiske. The Fiske family claimed this land in the mid-1600s. Ebenezer Fiske inherited the house from his father, David Fiske III, in 1729. The house was likely two stories tall, with a large central fireplace.

While many civilians fled to safety, Ebenezer Fiske was confined to bed and could not evacuate. His son Benjamin and daughter-in-law Rebekah remained with him. They watched as the British marched past on their way to Concord, and then took shelter when they returned, now engaged in a running battle with colonial militia.

Rebekah Fiske emerged after the combatants had moved on and discovered the house and gardens in ruins, and several dead and dying British soldiers in and around the home. There was also one mortally wounded American militiaman. Ebenezer Fiske’s cousin Doctor Joseph Fiske came to the house to treat the wounded the day after the battle, though most of them did not survive.

Ebenezer Fiske died later in 1775. The farmstead was eventually sold and the house was torn down. After the National Park Service acquired the site in 1959, archeologists discovered the foundations of the building.