the town-house to hear accounts from the Lexington fight, and to consider
what action was necessary in consequence of that event. Parson Carey was
about opening the meeting with prayer when hurried hoof-beats sounded up
the street, and a messenger, loose-haired and panting for breath, rushed
up the staircase. "Turn out, turn out, for God's sake," he cried, "or
you will be all killed! The regulars are marching onus; they are at
Ipswich now, cutting and slashing all before them!" Universal
consternation was the immediate result of this fearful announcement;
Parson Carey's prayer died on his lips; the congregation dispersed over
the town, carrying to every house the tidings that the regulars had come.
Men on horseback went galloping up and down the streets, shouting the
alarm. Women and children echoed it from every corner. The panic became
irresistible, uncontrollable. Cries were heard that the dreaded invaders
had reached Oldtown Bridge, a little distance from the village, and that
they were killing all whom they encountered. Flight was resolved upon.
All the horses and vehicles in the town were put in requisition; men,
women, and children hurried as for life towards the north. Some threw
their silver and pewter ware and other valuables into wells. Large
numbers crossed the Merrimac, and spent the night in the deserted houses
of Salisbury, whose inhabitants, stricken by the strange terror, had fled
into New Hampshire, to take up their lodgings in dwellings also abandoned
by their owners. A few individuals refused to fly with the multitude;
some, unable to move by reason of sickness, were left behind by their
relatives. One old gentleman, whose excessive corpulence rendered
retreat on his part impossible, made a virtue of necessity; and, seating
himself in his doorway with his loaded king's arm, upbraided his more
nimble neighbors, advising them to do as he did, and "stop and shoot the
devils." Many ludicrous instances of the intensity of the terror might
be related. One man got his family into a boat to go to Ram Island for
safety. He imagined he was pursued by the enemy through the dusk of the