PAUL REVERE’S OTHER RIDE
By Nancy Grossman
LISTEN now, children, and you shall hear
Of the daylight ride of Paul Revere,
The thirteenth December, of Seventy-Four;
Hardly a student of Portsmouth lore
Remembers that famous day and year ...
Four months before his long-famous ride
On the eighteenth of April, his ride through the night
After spotting the signal across the tide
That troops were afoot, the lantern light -
His "One, if by land, and two, if by sea" -
This peripatetic patriot, free
To drop all his work - news must travel fast!
At values-as-action, no one surpassed.
That wasn’t his first ride, nor either his last.
The British, quite conscious of gathering threat,
To the rebels would leave no shell, bayonet,
No powder keg, cannon, no arms for their cause -
To men who would free themselves of the King’s laws.
Such was the rumor o’erspreading the street,
As patriots eyed King George’s fleet
At anchor in Boston. A December sleet
Did nothing to quell the fast-rising fear
That harsh retribution was fast growing near.
Passing like phantoms fresh from their rest,
Whispers of gunships now nearing the coast
On the minds of the patriots lay uppermost.
British men o’ war, aimed to disarm
Rebels who chafed now at taxes impressed,
At soldiers billeted upon unwelcoming hosts,
At Orders in Council that could only alarm.
Loyalist spies dogged the silversmith’s steps -
Well-known were his travels spreading patriot news,
His stealth, care and haste, all ploys to confuse.
Rewards to the soldier whose guile intercepts
This Liberty’s Son as he hastens again
To the highways, the byways, to hill, dale and glen.
But none would deter him, as once on his way
He took to the road on his galloping bay
Through snow massing high as the hour advanced.
Hurtling, half-blinded, his fortunes he chanced.
To Portsmouth he flew, with reports to convey.
The frigate Scarborough and Cansean sloop,
Precursors laden with soldiers deep,
On good Revere’s mind, where others might creep,
Lent urgency as storm winds did swoop
Up rugged coast, from hamlet to town
From valleys to hills, from the heights at their crown.
Through Newburyport, hoofbeats muffled by snows,
