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Les diagrammes suivants iliustrent la m^thode. 1 2 3 1 6 A I It -— PAUL REVERE'S SIGNAL THE TRUE STORY OF THE SIGNAL LANTERNS IN CHRIST CHURCH, BOSTON BY Thk Rev. JOHN LEE WATSON, D.D. With Remarks on Lav.no Dr. Watson's Communication be.oke xhk Massachusetts Historical Society, Nov. 9, 1876 By CHARLES DEANE X — liiSSiia'. '-*-''-'- >'r ■■p '»s PAUL EEVERE'S SIGNAL TUB TRUE STORY OF THE SIGNAL LANTERNS IN CHRIST CHURCH, BOSTON BY The Rev. JOHN LEE WATSON, D.D. With Remarks on Latixq Dr. Watson's Communication befobe the MASSACHUSBTi.'S HISTORICAL SOCIETY, Nov. 9, 1876 Br CHARLES DEANE 9j«iO CAMBRIDGE PRESS OF JOHN WDLSON AND SON 1877 ]2fl L |0) PAUL REYERE'S SIGNAL. At a meeting of the Massachusetts Historical Society on the 9th of November, 1876, Mr. Chaeles Deane made the following communication : — Mr. Deane said that some of the members of the Society- would remember an interesting communication which ap- peared some months ago (July 20) in the " Boston Daily Advertiser," entitled " Paul Revere's Signal : The true story of .the signal lanterns in Christ Church, Boston." It was written by the Reverend John Lee Watson, D.D., formerly of Trinity Church in this city, and now residing in Oi.mge, New Jersey ; and took the ground that the person who hung out or displayed the lanterns on Christ Church steeple, on the night of the 18th of April, 1775, was not Robert Newman, the sexton of the church, but John Pulling, a friend of Paul Revere. Dr. Watson's statement seemed to be conclusive, and to be fully concurred in by our historical friends. Mr. Deane said that Dr. Watson had sent to him a slip from the " Advertiser " containing his article, with some corrections and additions ; and he now communicated it to the Society, believing that it would find an appropriate place in our Proceedings. PAUL BEVERE's signal : THE TRUE STORY OF THE " SIGNAL LAN- TERNS IN CHRIST CHURCH, BOSTON. To the Editors of the Boston Daily Advertiser : — It will be remembered by many persons in Boston, that, last year, in the Centennial celebration of the events of the night of April 18, 1775. it was stated by my friend, the esteemed Rector of Cln ist Church, Boston, that the signal lanterns which directed the movements of Paul Revere on that night were " hung out on the steeple of the Old North Church " by one Robert Newman, who, it was said, was then the sex- ton of that church. Knowing that this statement could not be correct, and having my attention called to the matter by a kinswoman of mine, who furnished me with additional reasons for believing that the honor of aiding Paul Revere on that " night much to be remembend " be- longed rightfully to a member of our own family, I addressed a letter to the reverend Rector, asking for the authority on which he had made such a statement. In his very kind reply to my inquiry, he told me that he " had received his information from Mr. S. H. Newman, son of the sexton, Robert Newman " ; and that his story was supported by the remembrances of, Ist, an elderly woman, "Mrs. Sally Chittenden, now ninety years of age, who is the grand-daughter of John Newman, brother of Robert " ; 2d, " of Joshua B. Fowle, living at Lexington, who knew Paul Revere, who often came with the other patriots of his time to his father's house. It was the common talk among them that Rob- ert Newman put up the lanterns." 3d, '• William Green, who lives at the North End, is the grandson of Captain Thomas Barnard. His sis- ter, eighty-four years old, remembers Robert Newman." " All these Bay it was the universally received opinion that Robert Newman dis- played the signal lights." This is all, and 1 have no occasion to make any remark upon their evidence. The reverend Rector also writes that " the sexton was arrested, but nothing was proved against him. After giving the signal, he made his way out of a b.!ck window of the church into his house, and was found in bed." And he adds : " Our records — that is, the records of Christ Church — fail us in the Revolutionary period, and say nothing about the signal lanterns." Now, I have a story to tell, which, I think, will give a different aspect to this matter ; and I claim " the honor of raising the signal lanterns " for Captain John Pulling, of whom I will relate all that may be necessary to substantiate his claim. John Pulling, Jr., son of John and Martha Pulling, was born in Boston, February 18, 1737, and was brought up in Christ Church, where his father was a warden in 1752- '3, and a vestryman several years subsequently. He received his education in the town schools of that day, and before the period of the Revolution was established as a merchant, in extensive business. Pie married, first, Annis Lee, daughter of Colonel John Lee of Manchester, Mass., a well-known patriot of that day, and by that marriage was connected with Jeremiah Lee of Marblehead, " who," says a journal of those times, " was one of the most eminent merchants on the Continent ; a member of the Committee of Safety, and a resolute asserter and defender of the liberties of his country." Mr. Pulling was also the brother-in-law of John Glover, and Joshua and Azor Orue of Marblehead, of William Raymond Lee and Marston Watson, all officers of the Revolutionary army. I find also in the " Records of the Boston Committee of Correspondence, Inspection, and Safety," recently published for the first time,* that he and Paul Revere are mentioned together as " Captain John Pulling and Major Paul Revere," and as chosen members of that committee ; and from the titles given them it may of course be inferred that they both held com- * New England Historical and Genealogical Register, vol. xxx. p. 882. missions in the Continental service. It is also recorded, tliat " at a meet- in;? of the freeholders and other inhabitants of the town of Boston, in public town meeting assembled, at the Old Brick Mecting-liouse," &c., it was " voted that Captain John Pulling. IMiijor Paul Kcsvere," and others, *' be appointed a sub-committee to collect the names of all persons who liave in any way acted against or opposed the ri;.'hts atid liberties of this country," &c.. They were botii also the associates of Hancock, Warren, Adams, and other leading patriots ; and most not(!VVorthy is it that Paul Revere and John Pidling, intimate friends fiom boyhood, always acted together. These particulars are sufficient indications of the character and standing of John Pulling, and the estimation iu which he was held bv the " men of the Revolution." His first wife, Annis Lee, died August 11, 1771, leaving a son and a daughter; and in January, 1773, he married Mrs. Sarali (Thaxter) McBean, the widow of Major Duncan McHean, by which marriage he ac(piired a large property in the West Indies. The following is Paul Revere's narrative of the events of the night of the 18th of April, 177.") : "On Tuesday evening, it was observed that a mimber of soldiers were marching toward Boston Common. About ten o'clock. Dr. Warren sent, in great haste, for me, and begged that I would immediately set oft' for Lexington, where were Hancock and Adams, and acquaint tliem of the movements, and that it was thought they were the objects. On the Sunday before, I agreed with a Colonel Conant, and some other gentlemen," — in Charlestown, — " that, if the British went out by water, we should show two lancerns in the North Church steeple, and if by land, one, as a signal ; for we were apprehensive it would be difficidt to cross over Charies River. I left Dr. Warren, called npou a friend and desired him to make the signal. I then went home,* took my boots and surtout, went to the north part of the town, where I had kept a boat. Two friends rowed me across Charles River, a little to the eastward where the ' Somerset ' lay. It was then young flood ; the ship was winding, and the moon was rising. They landed me on the Charlestown side. When I got into town, I met Colonel Conant and several others. They said they had seen our signals." t Here, then, we trace the course of the movements on that eventful night. At ten o'clock, Paul Revere was sent for by Dr. Warren, who informed him of the intended march of the British to Lexington and Concord, and begged him to proceed immediately to Lexington and acquaint Hancock and Adams of the movement. He left Dr. War- ren's residence in Hanover Street,t and then culled upon a friend, -r his most intimate friend, John Pulling, — and desired him to make the sig- nals. This, of course, was the most critical and hazardous part of the whole enterprise. It was full of difficulty and danger, and required of * lie lived at that time in " North Square." t Paul Kevere's Narrative, Massachusetts Historical Society, vol. v., 1st Series. I On the site of the present American House. ■" ~i ■■' :i I--— < ^W •> -i ''..Ji ^4 6 any one who slioiiM undcrtiike it the union of discretion nnd jud^'n'^ot? with !i (hf^rcci of couram' jind (iiiniK'ss which coidd contrin|)liite ccr- tiiin death as the oidy altcrnativi' <»f Kucct'ss. 'llw. hoUWc.vh were, in tho streets, at no great distance from the church ; nud not only was there tlie risk of tlu; ii^jlit hcinj^ ohsci-vcul in tliat (juartcr, l)ut also, as I'uHiiij; said, "he was afraid that soiuci old woman would see the light and scream fire." No one who knows any tiling of Paul Revere will for a moment sup- pose, that, having heen intrusted with an important duty, Iw. would liave commiftur ea ly history, as he had stood through life, side by side with his friend Paul Revere. in t'>e statements which have now been made, I tru'^t that the Rector of Christ Church will recognize no want of that respect and regard which, he must know, I have always entertained for him ; for, although it was only by the sanction of his name and position that the sexton story could obti?in any notoriety, yet 1 aiu sensible that no fi«nlt can be imputed to liim on this account, as it was not possible for him to be acquainted with the facts which have now for the first time been made publio. And I indulge the hope that, when he has read this communication, he will be ready to acknowledge that the honor of " hanging out the signals in Christ Church," for the guidance of * As quoted in Frothingham's Life of Warren, p. 441. 9 " Major Paul Revere," on the night of the 18th of April, a.d. 1775, belongs rightfully and exclusively to his friend " Captain John Pul- linr/' merchant of Boston. John Lee Watson. Orange, New Jersey, July, a.d. 1876. Mr. DsANE continued : Since the publication of that arti- cle, Dr. Watson has heard that some gentlemen here, who fully concurred in his opinion as to the agency of Robert Newman in displaying the lanterns, had some doubts as to the church itself from which the lights were shown ; that is to say, w^h ether they were shown from the steeple of Christ Church, or from that of the Old North Meeting-house, inas- much as Paul Revere, writing in 1798, and Richard Devens, writing without date, but evidently some years after the oc- currence of these events, both say " North Church." Feel- ing conJBdent that Christ Church was the place at which the signals were made, and being desirous that those having any doubts respecting it should see the grounds of his opinion, Dr. Watson has written me a letter on the subject, which 1 now lay before the Society. (See page 13.) Dr. Watson seems to me to be equally happy in establish- ing his last proposition ; and in confirmation of his position that Christ Church was known at that period and called " the North Church," certainly some time before Paul Revere wrote his interesting account of the incident, I will read some ex- tracts from an unpublished correspondence between a warden of Christ Church in Cambridge and Dr. Walter, Rector in 1792 of Christ Church in Boston ; also one from the wardens of Christ Church in Boston to a warden of Christ Church in Cambridge : — I. Jonathan Simpson to Rev. Dr. Walter, 26 October, 1790: "Dr. Winship and the two Wardens of the North Church in Boston have just left me." II. Rev. Dr. Walter to Jonathan Simpson. Shelburne, N.S., 5 i\o- vember, 1790 : " At die same time the Proprietors of the North Church were in a strange dilemma." III. Jonathan Simpson to Dr. Walter, 2 March, 1791 : "I am ex- cessively mortified to hear that you have desir'd the Wardens of the North Church to procure you a house in their neighbourhood." " Nor had I any idea when I pa^'tially consented to an union with the North Church." " All the world (except the North Church people) consider you as engaged to us, nor must you blanie us if we cannot consent to your residing with the North people." " I am sorry that the North Church take an undue advantage of our generosity in admitting them to an v.nion with us. If you give up your residence among us, it is my opinion that our Church will not be -connected with the North Church." 10 " I see now I went too far in saying that we were willing to be con- nected with the North Church at all." IV. James Sherman and Charles Williams, Church. Wardens. Bos- ton, 21 March, 1791 : " We this day received yours of 5 March instant, directed to the Wardens of the North Church, Boston." V. Dr. Walter to Jonathan Simpson. Shelburne, N.S., 5 April, 1791 : " The two Churches of Cambridge and Boston North being united under me with an assistant." " I have only some fears in my own mind respecting the gentlemen of the North." But it has })een said that, altliough Clirist Church may have been popularly called " the North Church " after the old North Meeting-house was taken down, yet it was never so ca^^ed while the latter was standing. This is a mistake, as I will now proceed to show. The Rev. Mather Byles, Jr., while pastor of the First Church in New London, became an Episcopalian, and received in 1768 a call to Christ Church, in Boston, whose rector, Dr. Cutler, had died three years before. His acceptance created considerable dissatisfaction in the New London parish, and resulted in a conference between the pastor and people, an account of which was published that year, in a pamphlet of considerable interest.* On the reverse of its title-page, the writer says, " As the Public are so very desirous of knowing the Reasons of Mr. Byles's leaving the Church of Christ, in New London, where he was so happily settled to all Appearance, in so unexpected a departure for 13oston, without Time or Inclination of seeing or bidding any of his best Friends farewell ; will let them know it is in Consequence of an Invitation of the Wardens, Vestry, &c., of the Episcopal North Church, Boston : which he has thought fit to accept," &c. Then fellows the account of the conference, near the beginning of which the minister says, " I will now communicate to you a letter I received from the wardens and vestry of the north church, in Br-ston, dated 8th of March," «fec. (p. 3). " And since that have re- ceived a line from brother Walter, wherein he advises me : * This day, at a meeting of the wardens and vestry of the north churchy in Boston, they have come to the determina- tion of sending for you to Boston,' " &c. (p. 4). Mr. Tyles's acceptance of the call to Christ Church made * A P ate between the Rev'd Mr. Byles, tlie Pastor of the First Church, in New Loiin.in, and the brethren of that Church, held at tlie meeting-house, pre- vious to iiis leaving said Society, containing the substance or heads of the Dis- course which then passed. As also a specimen of one of the many volumes which Mr. Bi/Us is supposed to have been convinced by, &c. By A. Z., Esq. See 84th chap, of Ezekiel. To which are added some remarks. iVieu; London : Printed in the year 1768. Sold at Draper's prlnting-offlce, Boston. 11 in je- it necessary that he should go to England, to receive ordi- nation ; and he accordingly went, bearing a letter to the Secretary of the Society for Propagation of the Gospel, &c., dated " Providence, 5th May, 1768,',' of which the follov/ing is an. extract : " Rev. Sir, — The bearer hereof is Mr, Byles, a New England gentleman, was bred a Dissenter ; his Father the Doctor still a Pastor in Boston. . . He is now going to England for Episcopal Ordination, under I doubt not a full and clear Conviction of its superiority. He has accepted an Invitation from the North Church in Boston where the late Dr, Cutler was their long and faithful Pastor," ... * " J. Graves." Mr. Byles continued to be the Rector of this church till 1775, when the troubles of the Revolutionary war intervening, and his parishioners being divided in political sentiment, the church was closed. (Dr. Burroughs's Hist. Address, p. 24.^ Paul Revere, writing to Dr. Belknap, on the Lexington and Concord affair, in 1798, says that he had agreed with Colonel Conant and some others of Charlestown, ihe Sunday evening before («.e., two days before the 18th of April), "that if the British went out by water we would show two lanterns in the North Church steeple, and if by land one, as a signal, for we were apprehensive it would be difficult to cross the Charles River or get over Boston Neck." In saying " North Church," Revere would be likely to use a name which his readers, at the time he wrote, understood; and we have just seen, in the correspondence above cited, in 1790 and 1791, that by " the North Church " Christ Church was intended. We have also seen that by that name Christ Church was known just pre- vious to the time the affair of the lanterns took place. If Revere had meant to describe or refer to the " Old North Meeting-house," which had stood in North Square, and had been destroyed by the British during the siege, whatever name that old structure once bore, would he not have said so ? I now wish to call the attention of members to Price's large v.iap of Boston, dated 1743, on which all the churches of Boston are delineated. "Christ Church'' is shown to have a very tall steeple, rising from a high tower ; while the " Old North Meeting," as the inscription reads at the bottom of the map, has only a low tower or belfry, terminating ab- ruptly in a point. Devens says the signal " was a Ian thorn hung out in the upper ivindow of the tower of N. Ch. towards Charlestown." Now the Old North Meeting-hoase had no " upper window " answering to this description. It Perry's Hist. Coll. relating to the Am. Col. Church, III. 836. 12 had simply one window (if it may be so called), — an opening at the place where a bell may have hung. Christ Church, on the contrary, had both an upper and a lower window in its tower, above which its spire rose. The language of Devens, and also of Revere, — the only authorities hitherto relied on, — if carefully considered, clearly sustain the view advo- cated by Dr. Watson. Moreover, the position of Christ Church, elevated, just opposite Charlesto\7n, was a fit place from which such signals could be seen. Not so, it is l)elieved, with the Old North Meeting-house, as well from its location, surrounded by buildings, as from its having no tower or steeple or spire, properly so called. A writer of bad verses (happily unpublished), residing in the vicinity of Boston, under date of " March 15, 1795," three years before Paul Revere wrote his letter to Dr. Bel- knap, and fifty-four years before Richard Devens's memo- randum was published by Mr. Frothingham, thus commences his poem, entitled '• Story of the Battle of Concord and Lexington, and Revere's Ride, twenty'' years ago" : — * " He spared neither horse, nor whip, nor spur, As he galloped through mud and mire ; He thought of naught hut liberty, And the lanterns that hung from the spire." If not a uniform rule, certainly the general custom seems to have been, as Dr. Watson shows, to denominate the places of worship of Dissenters as " meeting-houses." On Price's editions of Bonner's map of Boston, 1743 and 1769, copies of each of which are in my own possession, we have the follow- ing marginal references to the body of the map : " The Old Meeting, Old North M., Old South M., Anabaptist M., King's Chapel, Brattle St. M., Quakers' M., New North M., New South M., Frencli M., New No. Brick M., Christ Church, Irish Meeting-house, Hollis Street Meeting, Trinity Church, Lynds Street Meeting." (Many of these places of worship on Bonner's original map, 1722, were designated as " churches " ; but that name was afterwards carefully erased, except where it was applied to Episcopal churches.) Religious bodies known as " churches," a name dear to our fathers, were connected with every Dissenting, or what we now call Orthodox, religious society ; comprehending a select bod3'^ of the "saints," the visible Church. To this body the minister sustained peculiarly close relations. The whole * These verses were written on some half-dozen leaves of an old folio ac- count-book, dated as above, and signed " Eb. Stiles." The detached leaves were presented to tlie Cabinet of this Society last year. 18 society, in fact, existed for the Church, and was guided and governed by the Church which gave its name, so to speak, to the whole worshipping assembly. To speak, therefore, of Dr. Lathrop's Church was to speak of his worshipping as- sembly, not his meeting-house, or place of worship. The *• Old North Church," as a religious body, worshipped in the " Old North Meeting-house." The location of these Boston " churches " may be seen in Fleet's Register, and other sta- tistical books of the time. Misapprehensions and errors arise by not paying sufficient attention to the meaning of words and terms as they are found recorded in old books. When the records of the " Old North Church " are spoken of, or when it is said that the " Old North Church " had owned a piece of land or other property, it should be known that the religious association, either the church or the society, is intended, and not the meeting-house,' which could not properly be said to keep records or to hold property. Dr. Watson's letter to me here follows : — Orange, New Jersey, October 21st, a.d. 1876. My dear Sm, — Since the publication of my letter to the editors of the " Boston Daily Advertiser," I have received a great many letters from persons interested in the matter, all of which, with scarcely an exception, express the belief of the writers that " John Pulling was the man who showed the lights for Paul Revere on the night of the 18th of April, 1775"; and none of them intimate any doubts of Christ Church being the place where they were shown. I have learned, however, from a friend that one or two gentlemen, especially conversant with the history of those times, " have the im- pression that it was " from the ' Old North Meeting-house,' not from * Christ Church,' that the signals were put out." Having great defer- ence for the opinions of those gentlemen, and being desirous of remov- ing their doubts, I trust to your kindness to excuse the liberty I take in addressing you, as one interested in the subject, and asking you to do me the favor of bringing to the notice of those gentlemen, as you may have opportunity, the following reasons for my belief that the " steeple of Christ Church " was the place where the lights were shown by John Pulling. As far as I am informed, the only objections to this statement, of any importance, are, first, that Richard Devens, a well-known patriot of that day, in a letter without date, but written probably in 1775 or 6, speaks of " the lights being shown from N. C'h.," — by which it is supposed he meant " North Church " ; and, second, that Paul Revere, in his Narrative, written in the year 1798, twenty-three years after the event, makes use of the same term, the " North Church " ; and it is claimed that, in both these instances, the words " North Church " mean " North Meeting-house." In reply to these objections, I beg leave to state the well-known r 14 fact that the Puritan forefathers of Massachusetts, and the ministers and writers of their generation generally, were very scrupulous about applying the word " Church " to their " places of worship," and used it, princifially, to designate the " communion of the society to which they belonged," as distinguished from the " non-communicating parts of the congregation " ; both together forming " the Church and Congre- gation worshipping in the North or South JVIeeting-houiJe." And so tenacious were they of this phraseology, that, if a few solitary instances are found to the contrary, they ought to be considered as the exceptions, which prove the general rule. Most persons are so well acquainted with this familiar fact, that I cannot but think it unnecessary to say any thing more about it, except to notice some instances which occur in the few books within my reach. In "The Siege of Hoston " and "The Life of Joseph Warren," by Mr. Frothingham, it will be found, in almost every instance, that where the buildings are spoken of, and the words of the original writers are preserved, it is "Meeting-house" which is used ; though often changed, or explained by the historian, to mean " Church." I may also refer to Dr. Belknap's writings, and particularly to the account of his visit to the camp in Cambridge, Oct. 22, 177(5, where he speaks of "preaching in tlie Meeting-house"; and to the Diary of Dr. Sewall, the minister of the " Old South Meet- ing-house," as he always called it ; and to Judge Sewall's Journal ; and to Snow's History of Boston ; and to Greenwood's " History of King's Chapel " ; and to various articles in the Massachusetts Histor- ical Collections ; the "Journal of Deacon Newell;" "The Diary of Ezekiel Price ; " and indeed, generally, to the journals and newspa- pers of those days. In a word, if one had courage and patience enough to examine the venerable and dusty piles of religious pamphlets, which have accumulated in the closets and upper rooms of many of our large libraries, and to select from them the " dedication sermons," and other writings of the " pious and pains-full " preachers of those times, he would lind, probably, more than a thousand instances of the use of the word " Meeting-house " to designate the places of worship of their own or kindred denominations, and scarcely one of the word " Church " being applied to any other than those of the Episcopal, or Church of England congregations. And, if he wanted additional proof of this, he might find it, perhaps, in that humble elevation in Roxbury, which they called "Meeting-house Hill," because they had built a place of worship there ; which name, I believe, still remains, a perpet- ual memorial of the peculiar phraseology of our forefathers, in their relijiious nomenclature. From these and other considerations, and from the testimony of elderly persons to the same effect, I think I am justified in believing that the writers of those times, and people in general, when they spoke of the congregational places of worship, called them " Meeting-houses " ; and that if Devens and Revere had meant the " North Meeting-house " as the place where the lights were shown, they would have so written it. In the next place, I wish to call attention to the fact, that the custom of calling " Christ Church " the " North Church " began in pre- Revolutionary times, and prevailed very generally in the times of 15 Devens and Revere. This custom arose from Christ Church being the most northerly church in Boston, and having a very lofty steeple, — at that time 191 feet in height, and after the gale in 1804 reduced to its present height, 175 feet, — which formed the most couspicuous land- mark for vessels entering the harbor, and thence being well known, especially among the merchants and seafaring men, and generally among the inhabitants of the North End, as the " North Church." I have an impression, also, that it was so designated in the printed direc- tions to pilots and masters of vessels entering the harbor. The Rev. Dr. Greenwood, in his "Hirtory of King's Chapel," — when giving an account of the " inc"ease of P^piscopacy in Massachusetts, in the year 1723," says : " Anu thus Dr. Cutler " — who had been a Congrega- tionalist, and President of Yale College — "became the first Rector of the North, or Christ Church." I have a letter from a lady whose mother was a member of Christ Church in those times, who says " that, when young, she seldom heard it called by any other name than the North Church ; and that she was twelve years old before she ever heard a Meeting-house called a Church, and then it was by a person from the South, and not a New-Englander." I have also lately been in- formed that the descendants of John PuUing's second wife say of her, " that she always called Christ Church the North Church," and when- ever she told her story of the lanterns, which she was fond of repeat- ing, said " that it was from the steeple of that church that they were shown." And this custom continued to a very late period, and, pos- sibly, even now continues. And, in this connection, I may be permitted to add the testimony of my own experience, — now, of three-quarters of a century, — for, though brought up in Trinity Church, I had friends and acquaintances in Christ Church, with whom I associated, — and in my boyhood I scai'cely knew that that church had any other name than the North Church. In later years, in my intimacy with a very dear friend, who was then the Rect.^r of that church, the Rev. Dr. Croswell, when conversing together about the events of its former days, we were very much in the habit of calling it the Old North Church ; and I have now before me letters from the same friend, after he left Boston, in which he speaks of it, in affectionate terms, as " the dear Old North " ; and in the " Memoirs " of his life, written by his father, there are letters and pieces of poetry, dated from the " Cloisters of the Old North Church." I conclude, from these and otfcer circumstances that might be mentioned, that when Richard Devens wrote " N. C'h.," he meant " North Church " or " Christ Church," as the place where the signals were shown. And all this applies to Paul Revere's account, with still greater force. For, as is well known, the North Meeting-house was destroyed by the British in the year 1776; and afterward, "as the Old North Society had lost their Meeting-house, and the New Brick Society had lost their minister, the two congregations united, and worshipped to- gether," in the building called the New Brick Meeting-house. But Revere wrote his Narrative in the year 1798 ; and it is scarcely proba- ble that, in that account, he would have referred his readers to a build- ing which, twenty -three years before, had been " entirely demolished and consumed for fuel " ; at least, without some explanation. And therefore MP i.i 'I n ' 16 ;; / I conclude, also, that when Paul Revere wrote " North Church," he meant " Christ Church," and called it by the name which was most familiar to himself and his readers. Although it may be thought that enough has been said to resolve all doubts, yet I may be allowed to observe that all the probabilities in the case seem to be decisive in favor of Christ Church as the place. It appears from the records of that chur(!h, as quoted by the Rev. Dr. Eaton, in his historical account, in 1823, that " the Rector, the Rev. Mather Byles, Ji-., continued his services till April, 1775, and then went to Portsmouth, N.II. "; and, also, that "from this time the church was closed till August, 1778." This, of course, would render it easy for Pulling — a vestryman, having authority — to have entire control of the building, and go in and out, and do as he pleased, with- out interruption. Besides that, the steeple of Christ Church was the very best place for hanging the lanterns, so that the lights could be seen by Conant on the beach in Charlestown, and also be concealed from the British, who were, mainly, in an opposite direction. Now, to compare these circumstances with those of the Meeting-house. As far as can be ascertained from any and every source, it was a low wooden building, with a small oj)eu belfry, in North Square, immedi- ately opposite tlie soldiers' barracks, where the troops were then mus- tered, with sentinels at every corner and outlet. I cannot think there is the least probability that Pulling would choose such a place, where he would have found it difficult to enter without being discovered ; or, if he succeeded in entering, and showing the lights, where they would have been immediately seen by the troops, and where they could not possibly be seen by Conant on the beach in Charlestown. It is true that all the streets of the North End were full of danger that night, but it is plain that the North Square was the most dangerous of all ; and it seems to me that the North Meeting-house, in the North Square, was the very last jilace that Paul Revere and John Pulling — who were not deficient in prudence and discretion — would have been likely to choose for their operations on that eventful night. There is much more of this kind of evidence which might be brought forward ; but I will only add, at present, that some weight should be given to the fact that the two traditions, though disagreeing as to the man, yet concur in representing Christ Church as the place ; and that it was the sexton of Christ Church who was suspected and arrested, " because the lights were shown from the steeple of that building." And now, sir, I cannot but think that these considerations will be sufficient to remove the doubts which may have arisen in the minds of others ; and — in the absence of any evidence to the contrary, or in favor of any other place — to incline them to believe that the " steeple of Christ Church " was the place where John Pulling " showed the lights," at the request of his friend Paul Revere. But, whatever may be the result, I feel well assured that these views will receive impartial consideration ; and am, sir, Very respectfully. Your obedient servant, John Lee Watson. Charles Deane, Esq., LL.D., &c., &c. ' M