In honor of those who traveled to Boston to run and celebrate and fell instead:
Concord Hymn
Sung at the completion of the battle monument, July 4, 1837
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,
Here once the embattled farmers stood,
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream;
We set to-day a votive stone;
That memory may their dead redeem,
When like our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit that made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free,
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.
May the spirit that made those heroes dare to die be with
us now and always.
