| Revere, Paul 1735-1818. American silversmith, engraver, and Revolutionary hero. On April 18, 1775, he made his famous ride, celebrated in a poem by Longfellow, to warn of the British advance on Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts. |
A hero of the Revolutionary War. On the night before the Battle of Lexington and Concord in 1775, Revere, a silversmith by trade, rode across the Massachusetts countryside warning the other colonists that British troops were moving toward them to seize military supplies and arrest revolutionaries. Revere got his information about the British through signal lights placed in a church tower by a friend (see One if by land, and two if by sea). Those whom he warned were ready to fight the British the next day.
Note: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow told the story of the “midnight ride,” though not with complete accuracy, in his poem “Paul Revere's Ride.”