The death of Joseph Warren at Bunker Hill in 1775, as portrayed by artist John Trumbull.
On January 20, 1981, President Ronald Reagan gave his first inaugural address on the steps of the United States Capitol. As he did with many of his speeches, Reagan told the stories of influential Americans who helped build the nation’s character. He discussed one such American, who Reagan referred to as “a man who might have been one of the greatest among the founding fathers.” That man was Dr. Joseph Warren.
Warren was born the oldest of four boys in Roxbury, Massachusetts, in 1741. His father, Joseph Sr., was a farmer who was killed in an accident when Warren was young. Joseph Jr. possessed great intelligence. He studied at Harvard, where he graduated at 14 and went on to become a physician.
He had an excellent reputation as a physician. At age 22, he inoculated hundreds of Boston residents against smallpox, one of the most feared diseases of the time. Warren cared for patients from all classes of Boston society, including John and Abigail Adams and their children. While Warren was regarded as one of the best doctors in New England during the Revolutionary Era, his true passion seemed to be reserved for the cause of American liberty.
Starting in 1767, Warren’s voice became his greatest asset after he began to speak out against increased British taxation. After the passage of the Townsend Acts, which increased British authority to tax and regulate the American colonies, Warren spoke against these laws in a series of articles in the Boston Gazette under the pseudonym “A True Patriot.”
It was the March 5, 1770, event later called the Boston Massacre, where five colonists were killed and another six wounded after British soldiers opened fire on them while guarding the Customs House in Boston, that heightened the fervor of many colonists in Boston, including Joseph Warren. On the second anniversary of the Boston Massacre in 1772, Warren spoke in front of a large crowd to commemorate the event. Among many standout portions of his address that day, Warren said the following: “Public happiness depends on a virtuous and unshaken attachment to a free constitution.” Warren concluded, “May this Almighty Being graciously preside in all our councils.– May he direct us to such measures as he himself shall approve, and be pleased to bless. May we ever be a people favoured of God. May our land be a land of liberty, the seat of virtue, the asylum of the oppressed, a name and a praise in the whole earth, until the last shock of time shall bury the empires of the world in one common undistinguished ruin!”
The colonists’ goals varied in the early years of the Revolutionary Era. Most knew nothing of a life outside the British Crown and remained loyal to the British King George III. Others like Warren sought a new course that, at a minimum, sought a return to the autonomy colonists enjoyed before the implementation of taxes placed upon them without their consent and the removal of British soldiers from Boston. This eventually became the idea that the American colonists should govern themselves, free of British rule.
Warren joined the Sons of Liberty, a group led by Samuel Adams that included John Hancock and Paul Revere, among many others. Their purpose was to resist the increase of British authoritarianism. The British called such men “rebels,” while history now calls them American Patriots. Few were more committed Patriots than Warren.
On December 16, 1773, members of the Sons of Liberty dumped 342 chests of British tea valued at $18,000, or the modern equivalent of 1.7 million dollars, into Boston Harbor after the British passed a tax on American tea but exempted the British-owned East India Company from the tax. Warren was believed to have participated in planning what became known as the Boston Tea Party, but not the actual event. In response, the British passed the Coercive Acts, which the colonists called the Intolerable Acts. These Acts closed Boston to merchant shipping, increased the presence of British soldiers, required the quartering of British soldiers by colonists, and made British officials immune from criminal prosecution. This heightened tension in Boston. In response, Patriots, including Warren, formed the Massachusetts Provisional Congress, a group that met secretly to discuss how to resist British rule.
In September 1774, all the colonies except Georgia met in Philadelphia at the First Continental Congress to discuss how to respond to the Intolerable Acts and the increased British military presence in Boston. Massachusetts was represented by John Adams, Samuel Adams, Robert Treat Paine, and Thomas Cushing. While not an attendee, Joseph Warren still greatly influenced the Congress. He was the principal author of the Suffolk Resolves, which called for colonists to ignore the Intolerable Acts, boycott British goods, and raise militias. The First Continental Congress endorsed Warren’s plan.
On October 11, 1774, the Massachusetts Provisional Congress met and formed a Committee of Safety to train militia and gather military supplies, as Warren had sought in the Suffolk Resolves. Joseph Warren was one of the eight committee members.
By 1775, tensions between the British and many parts of their American colonies had reached dangerous levels. The anniversary of the Boston Massacre was commemorated on March 6, as March 5 fell on a Sunday. Samuel Adams wanted someone he could trust to speak at the event, so he asked Warren to give a speech as he had done three years earlier. Warren showed up to the speech dressed in a toga, in the spirit of Ancient Rome, when a toga represented the virtues of the ordinary citizen. British soldiers were in attendance and listening. Violence was a real possibility, but thankfully, that did not occur. Warren specifically stated he was not calling for independence, as doing so would have been treason. However, he still spoke plainly. Warren stated that day, “Our country is in danger, but not to be despaired of. Our enemies are numerous and powerful – but we have many friends. Determine to be free and Heaven and earth will aid the resolution. On you depend the fortunes of America. You are to decide the important question on which is suspended the happiness and liberty of millions yet unborn. Act worthy of yourselves.”
By April 1775, Boston was under martial law, and British General Thomas Gage, tasked with bringing the unrest under control, commanded the increasing number of British soldiers in Boston. Joseph Warren used his medical practice to gather intelligence on British troop movements. In other words, he ran a spy ring. It did not take long for this spy ring to prove useful.
On April 18, 1775, Joseph Warren noticed the large numbers of British soldiers preparing to leave for the Massachusetts countryside to seize weapons and possibly capture John Hancock and Samuel Adams, who were targets of British authorities. He immediately sent his friends Paul Revere and William Dawes on their rides to warn those in the neighboring towns of Lexington and Concord that British soldiers were headed their way. They were joined by a third rider, Samuel Prescott. Contrary to belief, the three riders shouted, “The regulars are coming out!” not “The British are coming!” as the story is often portrayed. Revere reached Lexington, where Adams and Hancock were staying at the residence of Reverend Jonas Clark, and warned them that British soldiers were on the way. A British patrol later stopped and detained Revere, although he was ultimately released. Prescott and Dawes continued their rides to warn others. Adams and Hancock were safe, and the militias began to prepare themselves for the approaching British soldiers.
The next day, April 19, 1775, the “shot heard round the world” was fired at Lexington, Massachusetts. Another exchange of gunfire occurred at Concord a little later that day. The American Revolution had begun. As British soldiers began to retreat to Boston, many militiamen and other colonists began to take up arms and fire at them. Warren, who had called for the training and deployment of militia, was among them. As British soldiers returned fire, an eyewitness described a bullet that narrowly missed Warren. There was no turning back for Joseph Warren. He was in the fight.
The Bunker Hill Monument in Charlestown, Massachusetts.
After the start of the Revolution, Warren was named president of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. He oversaw all its committees, including the Committee of Safety. On June 14, 1775, Warren was appointed a major general in the Massachusetts militia despite not having military experience. Three days later, he carried this rank at the first major battle of the Revolutionary War—the Battle of Bunker Hill.
When news of shots being exchanged between British soldiers and Massachusetts militia began to spread, militiamen from other colonies, including Connecticut, Rhode Island, and New Hampshire, began to come to Boston to join the fight against the British. These men, lacking command and organization, largely planted themselves on the hills outside the city. The British commanders, including Thomas Gage, felt they needed to get the situation under control. British soldiers would be vulnerable to artillery fire from the heights above Boston if they did not.
Through his intelligence network, Joseph Warren knew the British were preparing to attack the men on the heights above Boston. On June 16, the Committee of Safety ordered about 800 Massachusetts and 200 Connecticut militia under the command of Col. William Prescott to construct a redoubt (dirt fort) on top of Bunker Hill overlooking Boston. For unknown reasons, Prescott instead built a redoubt at Breed’s Hill, which was lower and more vulnerable to British attack than Bunker Hill. However, the battle that followed was and continues to be known as the Battle of Bunker Hill.
After seeing what the American militiamen constructed in only a day, Thomas Gage knew he had to send British soldiers up the hill quickly to destroy it. He did just that.
On June 17, 1775, it would not be easy to name anyone more committed to the Patriot cause than Dr. Joseph Warren. It has been said that Warren woke up that morning with a severe headache. This did not stop him. He put on what had been described as his “Sunday best” or what some believed were his wedding clothes and joined the American militia on Breed’s Hill after hostilities had begun. His attire only made him stand out and become a bigger target for the British. As a newly appointed general, Warren was immediately offered command when he joined the American forces on the afternoon of June 17. He declined. Someone of his rank was not expected to join the frontline volunteer soldiers. However, this is where Warren placed himself.
What followed over the next few hours were some of the bloodiest moments of the Revolutionary War. A superior force of British soldiers, the best-equipped and trained in the world, began a frontal attack up the hill towards the American position. The Americans repelled them. The British reformed and attacked again. They were repelled again. The Americans had limited gunpowder and knew they could not hold their position much longer. The American defenders retreated on the third British attack as fierce hand-to-hand fighting took place. There are different versions of what happened next. It is most commonly believed that a British officer recognized Joseph Warren while he was covering the American retreat and targeted him. We know for sure that Warren took a bullet below his left eye, killing him instantly. The legendary doctor, orator, head of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, major general, friend of John Hancock, Samuel Adams, Paul Revere, John and Abigail Adams, father of four, and American Patriot, was dead.
Joseph Warren
While the battle was a British victory, there were over a thousand British casualties, with 282 killed, including a large number of British officers. American casualties were listed at 450, but one stood out. Thomas Gage said, upon learning that Joseph Warren was killed, that “his death was worth the death of 500 men.” The British did not have mercy on Warren’s corpse, apparently stabbing it beyond recognition and throwing it in a shallow grave. Only later, after the British evacuated from Boston, did his friend Paul Revere identify the body as Warren.
In his writings, Joseph Warren seemed prepared for his impending death, writing to his mother, “Where danger is, dear mother, there must your son be. Now is no time for any of America’s children to shrink from any hazard. I will set her free or die.” Because of statements like these, many historians refer to Warren as a martyr of the Revolution. Historian Christian Di Spigna refers to Warren as a “founding martyr.” Whatever his motivations to be in the center of the fighting, Joseph Warren’s death shocked the colonists of Massachusetts and other colonies, making the Revolution more personal for many. The number of colonists joining the Patriot cause and the independence movement grew after he was killed.
Abigail Adams wrote to her husband John at the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia to notify him about the battle and the death of Joseph Warren. She said, “My bursting heart must find vent at my pen. I have just heard that our dear friend Dr. Warren is no more but fell gloriously fighting for his country-saying better to die honourably in the field than ignominiously hang upon the gallows. Great is our loss…and the tears of multitudes pay tribute to his memory.”
A British Loyalist named Peter Oliver declared at the time that George Washington would have been “an obscurity” had Warren lived. While it’s difficult to agree, this statement does provide context for how many felt about Warren’s potential greatness. Interestingly, George Washington took command of the newly formed Continental Army shortly after the Battle of Bunker Hill.
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and John Adams became signers of the Declaration of Independence, and are names most Americans recognize. There is every reason to believe Warren would have remained active in the Revolution and American founding had he lived and become “one of the greatest founding fathers,” as Ronald Reagan believed. He deserves greater name recognition.
Dr. Joseph Warren lived a life he believed was “worthy of himself.” We living Americans, the “millions left unborn,” reap the benefits.
Recommended Reading: The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton 1775 – 1777 by Rick Atkinson
Warren sounds like the lesser-known Paul Revere.