Minutemen

The so-called Minutemen were militia members in the American Revolutionary War who had undertaken to turn out for service at a minute's notice. In Massachusetts the minutemen were enrolled by an act of the provincial congress of the 23rd of November 1774, and in Boston alone they numbered 16,000 prior to the outbreak of the war. The Americans who fought in the opening action of Lexington were minutemen.

In comemmoration of the Centernary of the first successful armed resistance to British forces in what would become the Revolutionary War, Daniel Chester French, in his first major commission, produced one of his most well known statues (along with the Lincoln Memorial), the Concord Minuteman. Inscribed on the pediment is the opening stanza of Ralph Waldo Emerson's Concord Hymn with the immortal words, "Shot heard round the world."

See also:

• Minutemen (punk rock band)
• minuteman missile

External link

• Who Were the Minutemen? (ushistory.org) (http://www.ushistory.org/brandywine/special/art01.htm)

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Original article based on an article from a well-known encyclopedia published in 1911 - please update as needed