Page 32 - ASM Book 9/2020

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Eyewitnesses Explained What They Saw
Artists Visited Lexington and Concord to Make Battle Scene Engravings
Weeks after the Battle of Lexington and Concord, Amos Doolittle, a young Connecticut engraver, visited the battlefields with a desire to recreate the scenes. He returned later with his friend, Ralph Earl, a portraitist. Doolittle interviewed the eyewitnesses to let them explain what they saw on that fateful day. Earl made sketches of the scenery, homes and
buildings.
Earl used his sketches
to paint the battlefield scenes. He filled in the troop positions and battle details with the information Doolittle had collected from the eyewitnesses. Doolittle assisted Earl by posing
as local minutemen and Redcoats by holding a musket in his hand.
Back in his New Haven
shop, Doolittle transferred
Earl’s color drawings onto
copper plates for printing.
They produced four scenes
from the April 19 battles.
On December 13, the printed
sets were ready to sale. Each
print contained the phrase,
“neatly engraved on copper
from the original paintings taken on the spot.”
These are the only known contemporary portrayals of a Revolutionary War battle.
First-Hand Details Inspired Battle Engravings by Amos Doolittle, 1775
“In Lexington the enemy set fire to
Deacon Joseph Loring’s house and barn, Mrs. Mullikin’s house and shop, and Mr. Joshua Bond’s house and shop, which were all consumed. They pillaged almost every house they passed by, breaking and destroying doors, windows, (looking) glasses, etc., and carrying off
clothing and other valuable effects.”
- Salem Gazette, April 25, 1775