Ditson Affair and the Alarm of 1775

In the winter of 1774-75 Billerica, like the other towns of Middlesex, armed and drilled its militia in expectation of a clash with the British troops in Boston. At the town meeting in March 1775 the town voted to raise a company of fifty minute-men, to train weekly at one shilling for each half-day, with Captain Ebenezer Bridge and Lieutenants Jonathan Stickney and James Lewis as officers; the men were to pass muster before Colonel William Tompson, Captain Solomon Pollard and Captain Edward Farmer, and another committee was to "perfect the alarm List," taking in all men above fifty-five.

A few days later a young Billerica farmer, Thomas Ditson Jr., went into Boston to buy a gun. By his own sworn deposition he bargained on March 8 with a soldier he called McClenchy for a musket and an old coat, and was then seized on the charge of enticing a soldier to desert and held overnight in the guard-house on Foster's Wharf. On the morning of Thursday, March 9, soldiers of the 47th Regiment stripped him, tarred and feathered him, hung a paper on his neck reading "American Liberty, or Democracy exemplified," and drew him in a chair on a truck from the wharf up King Street, along Fore Street and the main street past the Governor's house to Liberty Tree and Frog Lane, with drums and fifes and with officers in front, one of whom he was told was Lieutenant Colonel Nesbit, the regiment's commander. When the gathering crowd pressed in, the soldiers were ordered to load their muskets, and Ditson was let go at Frog Lane. Later accounts, beginning with Frothingham, say the fifes played "Yankee Doodle" in derision, and Hazen repeated a tradition that the song's words were first used on that day.

The outrage was quickly known throughout the province. The selectmen of Boston reported the case to the selectmen of Billerica, who sent General Thomas Gage a remonstrance protesting that one of their townsmen had been "tarred and feathered, and very much abused" by a party of the 47th under Lieutenant Colonel Nesbit, in violation of the personal security due to every Englishman, and demanding satisfaction. Samuel Adams wrote that Gage told the selectmen he knew nothing of any such design and promised to inquire into it, but that nothing more was heard of it. At a town meeting on March 20 Billerica thanked its selectmen "for the wise and prudent measures" they had taken, declared itself dissatisfied with Gage's reply, and instructed them to lay the case before the Provincial Congress. The same day the town voted "to look up the old Bayonets," and on April 14 it voted to "furnish the minute-men with Bayonets and Cartridge Boxes."

The alarm of April 18 and 19, 1775 probably reached Billerica about two o'clock in the morning, coming over the Woburn, Lexington and Bedford roads, and Hazen supposed that the Ditsons on the Woburn Road were among the first to hear it. The town's men gathered at the Common and marched toward Concord. The Lexington Alarm rolls in the Massachusetts Archives, as printed by Coburn, show three Billerica bodies on the march that day: the minute company of Captain Jonathan Stickney, with Lieutenants James Lewis and John Lewis, in Colonel Bridge's regiment, fifty-four men; the militia company of Captain Edward Farmer, thirty-five men; and twelve men under Lieutenant Oliver Crosby, the remainder of the town's third company, both of the latter in Colonel Green's regiment. A Thomas Ditson and a Samuel Ditson are on Stickney's roll.

After the fight at the North Bridge the British column turned back toward Boston, and at Meriam's Corner, where the Bedford road meets the Lexington road east of Concord village, the Billerica men joined the minute-men and militia of Reading, Chelmsford and other towns in the attack on its flank and the long pursuit that followed. Frothingham, followed by Hazen, wrote that a body of militia from Billerica and its vicinity came up there under Colonel William Tompson, which suggests that the older men of the alarm list turned out as well as the minute-men. Some Billerica men served in the Bedford company, which arrived earlier; when its captain, Jonathan Wilson of Bedford, was killed during the retreat, the command fell to his Billerica lieutenant, Edward Stearns.

Nathaniel Wyman, killed on the same day, was counted by Frothingham as a Billerica man. Hazen placed him in the Bedford company and thought him probably from Billerica, though his name was also credited to Lexington, and Coburn describes him as a native of Billerica serving in Captain Parker's Lexington company. No other Billerica man was killed, and John Nichols (Nickles) and Timothy Blanchard were wounded. Within weeks Bridge was colonel of a regiment at Cambridge with Stickney as captain of the Billerica company, and Ditson himself went on to serve in the army; he is on Hazen's list of Billerica soldiers for 1775, 1777 and 1779.

People

• Thomas Ditson Jr.: Billerica farmer tarred and feathered in Boston by soldiers of the 47th Regiment on March 9, 1775; on Stickney's minute company roll for April 19, 1775.
• William Tompson: Colonel and selectman; minute-men passed muster before him; Frothingham says he led Billerica militia to Meriam's Corner on April 19, 1775.
• Jonathan Stickney: Lieutenant of the minute-men in March 1775; captain of Billerica's minute company in Col. Bridge's regiment on April 19, 1775.
• James Lewis: Lieutenant of the Billerica minute-men, March 1775, and on Stickney's company roll for April 19, 1775.
• Solomon Pollard: Militia captain before whom the minute-men were to pass muster, March 1775.
• Edward Farmer: Militia captain; minute-men passed muster before him; led a Billerica company of 35 men in Col. Green's regiment on April 19, 1775.
• Oliver Crosby: Lieutenant leading twelve men of Billerica's third company in Col. Green's regiment on the April 19, 1775 alarm.
• Edward Stearns: Billerica lieutenant of the Bedford company who took command when Capt. Jonathan Wilson was killed on April 19, 1775.

References

1. Hazen, History of Billerica (1883), p. 233: December 1774 militia companies, Committee of Inspection, and the March 1775 vote raising fifty minute-men (continues p. 234).
2. Hazen, p. 234: minute-men officers; Thomas Ditson Jr. tarred and feathered March 9, 1775; remonstrance to Gage; March 20 town meeting; bayonets voted April 14.
3. Hazen, p. 235: the alarm of April 18-19, 1775 reaching Billerica, the Ditsons on the Woburn Road, the march to Concord, Meriam's Corner, Colonel Tompson's command.
4. Hazen, p. 236: Edward Stearns takes command of the Bedford company after Capt. Jonathan Wilson's death; Nathaniel Wyman killed; John Nickles and Timothy Blanchard wounded.
5. Hazen, p. 244: list of Billerica soldiers in the Revolution, including Thos. Ditson Jr. (services 1, 4, 6) and other Ditsons.
6. Hazen, p. 245: end of the soldier list, Nathaniel Wyman marked killed April 19, 1775, and the key: (1) service in 1775, minute-men, Lexington and Cambridge.
7. Hazen, Genealogical Register, pp. 40-41: Ditson family; Thomas Ditson Jr. born April 30, 1741, son of Thomas and Elizabeth (Lawrence) Ditson; his experience in Boston.
8. Force, American Archives, 4th ser., vol. 2 (1839), cols. 93-94: Boston newspaper report of March 13, 1775, and the sworn deposition of Thomas Ditson Jr. on his seizure and tarring.
9. Force, American Archives, 4th ser., vol. 2, cols. 153-154: remonstrance of the Selectmen of Billerica to General Gage on the treatment of Thomas Ditson by the 47th Regiment.
10. Force, American Archives, 4th ser., vol. 2, cols. 177-178: letter of Samuel Adams describing the Ditson affair, the Billerica remonstrance and Gage's answer.
11. Frothingham, History of the Siege of Boston (1851), p. 50: Thomas Ditson Jr. of Billerica tarred and feathered March 9 by the 47th under Colonel Nesbit, to the tune of Yankee Doodle.
12. Frothingham, Siege of Boston, p. 72: Colonel William Thompson (Tompson) with militia from Billerica and vicinity joins the attack near the Bedford road on the British retreat.
13. Frothingham, Siege of Boston, p. 74: Capt. Jonathan Wilson and Nathaniel Wyman of Billerica among those killed on the retreat from Concord.
14. Frothingham, Siege of Boston, p. 81: casualty list for April 19, 1775; Billerica wounded, John Nichols and Timothy Blanchard.
15. Coburn, The Battle of April 19, 1775 (1912), p. 96: forces joining at Meriam's Corner, including Billerica's Lt. Crosby (12 men), Capt. Edward Farmer (35) and Capt. Jonathan Stickney (54).
16. Coburn, Battle of April 19, 1775, p. 101: Nathaniel Wyman, a native of Billerica and member of Capt. Parker's Lexington company, killed on the Battle Road.
17. Coburn, Battle of April 19, 1775, muster rolls p. 16: roll of Capt. Jonathan Stickney's minute company, Col. Bridge's regiment, April 19, 1775, including Thomas and Samuel Ditson.
18. Coburn, Battle of April 19, 1775, muster rolls p. 15: Billerica rolls of Lt. Oliver Crosby's men and Capt. Edward Farmer's company in Col. Green's regiment on the April 19 alarm.
19. Journal of the American Revolution (2022), Thomas Ditson: Puritan to Bumpkin to Patriot: Ditson and Clancy depositions, remonstrance of March 16, 1775, and Ditson's later service.