slaughter, will, without the least doubt, take the first opportunity in
their power to ravage this devoted country with fire and sword. We
conjure you, therefore, by all that is dear, by all that is sacred, that
you give all assistance possible in forming an army. Our all is at
stake. Death and devastation are the instant consequences of delay.
Every moment is infinitely precious. An hour lost may deluge our country
in blood, and entail perpetual slavery upon the few of your posterity
who may survive the carnage. We beg and entreat, as you will answer to
your country, to your own consciences, and, above all, as you will
answer to God himself, that you will hasten and encourage, by all
possible means, the enlistment of men to form an army, and send them
forward to headquarters at Cambridge, with that expedition which the
vast importance and instant urgency of the affair demand."

Two days after the fight, the Massachusetts Committee of Safety resolved
to enlist 8,000 men, an event which our old friend Liberty Bell
celebrated by a vigorous tolling. All over the colonies a spirit of
determination to resist spread like lightning, and the shot that was
heard around the world was certainly heard very distinctly in every nook
and corner of New England, and of the old Atlantic States. Naturally,
there was at first a lack of concentration and even of discipline; but
what was lacking in these features was more than made up for by bravery
and determination. As John Adams wrote in 1818, the army at Cambridge at
this time was not a National army, for there was no nation. It was not
even an army of the United Colonies, because the Congress at
Philadelphia had not adopted or acknowledged the army at Cambridge. It
was not even the New England army, for each State had its separate
armies, which had united to imprison the British army in Boston. There
was not even the Commander-in-Chief of the allied armies.