248 years ago on this day, the American Revolution began. Damsel and I hoisted our flags today in honor of the commemoration of the beginning of the greatest country in the world — a Republic, if we can keep it.
The “secret orders” intention of the British was to arrest American Patriots and Confiscate Weapons and Ammunition — does that sound familiar?
From the Patriot Post – Mark Alexander’s Column:
On the evening of April 18, 1775, General Thomas Gage, acting as the Crown’s military governor of Massachusetts, dispatched a force of 700 British Army regulars with secret orders. These troops, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Francis Smith, were to arrest 53-year-old Boston Tea Party leader Samuel Adams, Massachusetts Provincial Congress President John Hancock, and merchant fleet owner Jeremiah Lee.
But what directly tied Gage’s orders to the later enumeration in our Constitution’s Second Amendment assurance of the innate “right to keep and bear arms” was the primary mission of his Redcoat brigades. They were charged with undertaking a preemptive raid to confiscate arms and ammunition stored by Massachusetts Patriots in the town of Concord.
Patriot militia and minutemen, under the leadership of the “radical” Sons of Liberty, anticipated this raid, and the confrontations with British regulars at Lexington and Concord proved to be the fuse that ignited the American Revolution.
…
In the early dawn of April 19th, their oaths would be tested with blood. Under the command of 46-year-old farmer and militia Captain John Parker, 77 militiamen assembled on the town green at Lexington, where they soon faced Smith’s overwhelming force of seasoned British regulars. Parker did not expect shots to be exchanged, but his orders were: “Stand your ground. Don’t fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here.”
And then, there was the shot heard around the world.
We, as the modern militia must not forget the lessons of the American Revolution: the intention of tyrants is to disarm us and then have their tyrannical ways with the masses. Evil entities wanting to disarm Americans is, unfortunately, still with us. All the unconstitutional anti-gun laws (which includes any gun laws) be damned.
“Stand your ground. Don’t fire unless fired upon, but if they mean to have a war, let it begin here.”