On April 19th, 1775, shots were fired on Lexington Green, but who fired first? The documentary record is confusing and contradictory. What Americans came to believe about that morning was shaped not by historians alone, but by a succession of artists who reimagined the battle for their own times.

Key Takeaways

• The first image of the battle was an engraving by Ralph Earl and Amos Doolittle in 1775, neither had witnessed the encounter

• Early depictions showed militia men fleeing, not fighting; later images increasingly showed them standing their ground and returning fire

• Lafayette's 1824 visit reignited debate over who fired first, Lexington or Concord

• Ralph Waldo Emerson's 1837 Concord Hymn coined the phrase 'the shot heard round the world'

• By the early 20th century, the image of courageous militia men exchanging fire with British regulars had become the dominant American memory of Lexington

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FAQ - Frequently Asked Questions

Q1: Who fired first at the Battle of Lexington?

No one knows for certain. The British reported that a colonist fired the first shot. Some colonists testified that no Americans fired at all. The documentary record is contradictory, men remembered it differently depending on where they stood and what they could see. What Americans came to believe was shaped less by the historical record than by a succession of artists who reimagined the battle over the following century.

Q2: Who created the first image of the Battle of Lexington?

Connecticut militia men Ralph Earl and Amos Doolittle created the first image in December 1775, just months after the battle. Neither had witnessed the encounter. Earl drew a sketch from a visit to the site, and Doolittle engraved it. The image shows the militia fleeing and no American returning fire, which reflects the ambiguity of what actually happened.

Q3: Where does the phrase 'shot heard round the world' come from?

The phrase comes from Ralph Waldo Emerson's Concord Hymn (1837), written for the dedication of a monument at Concord. Emerson wrote of the 'embattled farmer' who 'fired the shot heard round the world.' The phrase attributed the first shot to Concord, but artists continued reimagining the Lexington militia as the ones who stood their ground, blurring the historical distinction between the two engagements.

Q4: How did 19th-century artists change the depiction of the battle?

Over the course of the 19th century, artists progressively transformed the battle from a chaotic skirmish into an act of heroic resistance. Early images showed militia men fleeing. By mid-century, artists like Moses Swett and Alonzo Chappel depicted them returning fire in organized volleys. Hammatt Billings (1859) connected the Lexington militia to the anti-slavery cause, imaging them as symbols of resistance. By 1900, even a British artist depicted them heroically standing their ground.

What Happened on Lexington Green

A few minutes before dawn on April 19th, 1775, British troops on an expedition to confiscate arms stored in Concord, Massachusetts, fired on militia men on the Lexington Green. They killed eight men and wounded nine others. The remaining militia men dispersed. The British troops reformed their ranks and marched on toward Concord, where militia men were prepared to resist. The two sides exchanged fire and several men, British regulars as well as militia this time, were killed.

The British ransacked the town but found few weapons. They withdrew, returning to Boston, fighting a running battle with militia men who fired on them from both sides of the road. By the time the British troops made it back to Boston, colonists had killed or wounded 272 of the king's soldiers. The regulars had killed over 100 colonists, but had accomplished nothing of military importance. Since that morning, Americans have tried to understand what happened at Lexington. The British reported that a colonist fired the first shot. Some colonists testified at the time that no Americans fired at all. The documentary record is confusing and contradictory. Men remembered it in different ways depending on where they stood, what they did, and what they could see and hear. For the underlying history of that morning, see our episode on Lexington and Concord.

The First Artists

Much of what Americans imagined about that morning of April 19th, 1775 has been shaped by a succession of artists, each trying to make sense of the event in a way that was relevant to his own time and consistent with what Americans believed, or wanted to believe, about the Battle of Lexington. Two Connecticut militia men, Ralph Earl and Amos Doolittle, created the first image of the battle. Neither witnessed the encounter at Lexington. They visited the site a few weeks later, and Earl drew a sketch of the confrontation.

Doolittle, a silversmith, engraved the drawing and offered it for sale in December 1775. Although he titled the engraving the Battle of Lexington, the fighting looks one-sided. The militia men don't look organized or heroic. Most are fleeing. The British are delivering an organized volley and no American is returning fire. Artists paid no further attention to the fighting on Lexington Green until 1822, when Connecticut engraver John William Barber produced the first new image of the confrontation in almost 50 years. Two years later, the Battle of Lexington became the center of a controversy over where Americans had first fired on the British. The controversy boiled over when the Marquis de Lafayette visited Lexington and Concord.

In Lexington, a young man approached Lafayette with a rusty musket, which he claimed was the musket from which the first fire was returned to the English upon the field of Lexington. In Concord, Lafayette's host assured the old general that he was on the spot on which the first forcible resistance was made. Determined to settle the controversy, Elias Phinney of Lexington published the recollections of Lexington militia men who reported firing on the British. Reverend Ezra Ripley of Concord promptly responded with his own history of the fight at Concord. He insisted that Lexington was simply the scene of blood and massacre. The war that followed Lexington escalated rapidly through the events we cover in our episode on the Battle of Bunker Hill.

Artists Remake the Battle

John Barber was familiar with these claims when he published a new wood engraving of the Battle of Lexington in 1827 for his book, Historical Scenes in the United States. Five men lie dead or wounded on the ground. Others are fleeing. It's easy to underestimate the influence of such simple prints, crude compared to the fine prints of the time, but sold for prices ordinary Americans could afford. They shaped the way Americans imagined their past. In 1831, Barber persuaded Doolittle to assist him in preparing a new engraving based on the original. The influence of this engraving far exceeded its artistic merits. Versions of it were published and republished for the rest of the 19th century.

Ironically, Barber didn't think the encounter on Lexington Green was a battle at all. "The scene represented in this engraving cannot with any propriety be called a battle," he wrote, "though thus spoken of by most historians. It is memorable only as the spot where the first American blood was shed, where the first American life was taken in the revolution." Barber may not have been convinced that the Lexington men had fired back, but others were. Among them was Moses Swett. In his 1830 version of the Battle of Lexington, several militia men are firing at the British.

As if in reply, in 1837, Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote his Concord Hymn for the dedication of a monument, coining the phrase: the embattled farmer who "fired the shot heard round the world." Despite Emerson's claim attributing the first shot to Concord, the number of embattled farmers imagined at Lexington grew with each new image. In Alonzo Chappel's Battle of Lexington, painted around 1856, the militia are fighting a pitched battle with the regulars, men in the background deployed in two lines, firing in an organized volley.

The Artists Win

Hammatt Billings's 1859 depiction of the battle was just as dramatic. Billings connected the struggle for liberty in the revolutionary era with the anti-slavery movement of his own time and imagined the Lexington militia as a symbol of resistance to the slave power. The Reverend Theodore Parker, whose grandfather, Captain John Parker, had commanded the Lexington militia, tied the two ideas together.

Charged with inciting a riot against the Fugitive Slave Act, Parker explained that he was inspired by the high ideals of his grandfather, who had told his men: "Don't fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here." Billing's version of the battle memorializes that resolve. Billings depicted each man, emphasizing his individuality and personal commitment. Facing a powerful foe, none shrinks from the fight. They are free men united in the sacred cause of liberty.

By the beginning of the 20th century, images of courageous militia men stubbornly returning British fire were so widely accepted that a British artist, William Barnes Wollen, imagined the Battle of Lexington that way, probably unaware that his composition could be traced to an 18th-century American engraving of British regulars firing on militia men who weren't firing back. In the battle over the Battle of Lexington, the artists had won. Their depictions of the Lexington militia standing its ground and exchanging fire with the British regulars have shaped how Americans imagine the Battle of Lexington for the last 100 years. The cause those Lexington militiamen fought for would be formalized a year later, as we cover in our episode on the Declaration of Independence.