Paul Revere

American industrialist and propagandist

• Born: January 1, 1735
• Birthplace: Boston, Massachusetts
• Died: May 10, 1818
• Place of death: Boston, Massachusetts

An American revolutionary patriot, Revere also was a prominent silversmith, engraver, and industrialist. He is remembered especially for his service as a civilian messenger, for warning the military of British troop positions and movements, and as a propagandist, producing satirical engravings that criticized British authority.

Early Life

Paul Revere was the third of twelve children born to Paul Revere and Deborah Hichborn Revere. Revere’s father, a French Protestant Huguenot who at an early age had gone to live with an uncle on the Isle of Guernsey in the English Channel, anglicized his name from Apollos De Revoire. After arriving in Boston in 1715, the thirteen-year-old Revere was apprenticed as a silversmith; he eventually opened his own shop and taught the craft to his son.

From age seven to thirteen, the younger Revere attended the North End Writing School in Boston, then he devoted himself to learning silversmithing from his father. Even as a boy, Revere exhibited a strong sense of individual responsibility and dedication to community service, both Calvinist traits. He and several other boys formed a bell-ringers’ association dedicated to the principle that no member should beg money from any person. Revere, though he would become a wealthy craftsman, would always be regarded as a member of the “mechanicks” class, a social status ranked below Boston’s elite. Of middling height, strong, and stocky, Revere displayed great energy and willingness to assume risks. Upon his death, a Boston newspaper described him as always “cool in thought, ardent in action” and “well adapted to form plans and carry them into successful execution—both for the benefit of himself and the service of others.”

At age twenty-one, Revere served as a second lieutenant in a Massachusetts militia expedition against the French in western New York. He did not see any action, however, and after being stationed at Fort William Henry on Lake George from May through November, 1756, he returned to Boston. On August 17, 1757, Revere married Sarah Orne; five months after her death on May 3, 1773, he married Rachal Walker. Each marriage produced eight children; of the sixteen, five died as infants and five more in childhood.

Revere, who took over his father’s shop upon his father’s death in 1754, ran a prodigious business as a silversmith, drawing clientele from his father’s network of customers and from organizations to which he belonged. Revere, who like most silversmiths worked in both gold and silver, has been described as the foremost master craftsman of his time. Before the American Revolutionary War, his shop produced ninety kinds of silver and gold pieces, all reflecting creative design and skilled craftsmanship, and repaired various items. Although the shop specialized in silver tableware such as tea sets, cups, trays, casters, and candlesticks, it also produced small pieces ranging from thimbles, rings, buttons, and buckles to surgeon’s instruments. Revere never sacrificed simplicity of design for elaboration; however, many of his pieces before 1785 carried some rococo-style ornamentation, usually in the form of scrolls and shells.

Always versatile, Revere practiced dentistry, chiefly in the wiring in of false teeth (he never made dentures) and cleaning teeth, and he sold goods imported from England. He also became an accomplished engraver, using copper plates to produce trade cards, book plates, mastheads, and illustrations for broadsides, newspapers, and magazines.

Revere participated in the emerging protest movement against Great Britain from the mid-1760s to the mid-1770s. An active member of Boston’s North End Caucus, the Long Room Club, and the Sons of Liberty Whig Club, he was in the thick of every protest. Apparently content simply to make a contribution, he never rose to a high rank of leadership in the revolutionary movement and never ran for public office.

Revere served as an influential propagandist for the revolutionary cause from the passage of the Stamp Act in 1765 to the beginning of the war, publishing satirical engravings that ridiculed British authority. The best-known copper-plate engraving was a depiction of the Boston Massacre and reads “The Bloody Massacre perpetuated in King Street, Boston, on March 5th 1770, by a party of the 29th Regt.” Though inaccurately depicting the event and appropriating a drawing of the scene by British artist Henry Pelham without giving Pelham credit, the engraving, by placing blame for shedding first blood upon British troops, stirred hearts of patriots everywhere.

On December 16, 1773, Revere joined other patriots in what would become known as the Boston Tea Party. Barely disguised as American Indians, the group dumped casks of tea belonging to the British East India Company into Boston Harbor. Revere then carried the news to New York City, becoming the official courier of the Massachusetts Provincial Assembly and the Boston Committee of Correspondence. In May, 1774, he rode to New York City and Philadelphia, bringing word of the parliamentary law that closed the port of Boston. In September, 1774, he carried the radical Suffolk Resolves, drawn up by delegates from Boston and other towns in Suffolk County, to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia; Congress quickly committed all the colonies to the document, which called for the them to cease trade with Great Britain and to prepare for armed defense. In December, 1774, Revere relayed news to patriots in New Hampshire that the Massachusetts governor and general, Thomas Gage, was planning to reinforce the small British garrison at Fort William and Mary at Portsmouth; this information led patriots to seize the garrison and its munitions, which were later used by the Americans at the Battle of Bunker Hill (1775).

Life’s Work

Paul Revere was almost unknown in the annals of American history until the publication of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s narrative poem “Paul Revere’s Ride” in The Atlantic in January, 1861. The poem’s publication gave Revere an esteemed place in the pantheon of American heroes. On that fateful night of April 18–19, 1775, Revere rowed across the Charles River, with his oars muffled by petticoats wrapped around them, then galloped by horseback toward Concord to warn of the approach of the British. William Dawes and Samuel Prescott joined him; only Prescott made it to Concord. A less-well-known fact is that two days earlier, Revere had ridden to Concord to warn John Hancock, Samuel Adams, and others of the British troops’ plan to march out of Boston, enabling the removal of much of the munitions from Concord before the British arrived.

Involvement in the war effort distracted Revere from his business enterprises from 1775 to 1779. In 1775, Revere manufactured paper money for the Massachusetts government and the Continental Congress, engraving the plates and building a printing press for the task. He also designed coins, medals, and the first seal of the United States and the state of Massachusetts (the latter remains in use).

Commissioned a major in April, 1776, and lieutenant colonel six months later, Revere was in charge of three artillery companies in the Massachusetts militia. During 1778–79, he commanded the patriot garrison at Castle William in Boston Harbor. Revere served in the expedition of July–August, 1778, commanded by General John Sullivan, which was unsuccessful in ousting British forces from Newport, Rhode Island. His military career came to an end with the Penobscot expedition of July 19–August 15, 1779. A Massachusetts land and naval force was to attack a British base at Castine, Maine, at the mouth of the Penobscot River. When an unexpected and large British reinforcement arrived, the Americans abandoned their ships and fled. Revere was accused of disobedience of orders, unsoldierlike conduct, and cowardice and was relieved of his command at Castle William. Revere insisted upon a court martial, and in February, 1782, he was acquitted on all charges.

After the revolution, Revere’s silversmith shop increased production, creating pieces in the neoclassic style, more restrained than before, and incorporating some classical designs, such as fluted teapots. More table items were produced, especially flatware, and fourteen types of spoons were cast. In 1783, Revere opened a hardware store.

The Revere enterprises expanded in 1788 with the establishment in Boston of an iron and brass foundry that cast cannon for the state and the federal government and produced a variety of other items such as nails and bolts. When the bell of the Second Congregational Church in Boston cracked in 1792, Revere offered to cast a new one himself rather than have the church order a replacement from England. His offer led to the creation of the first large-scale bell factory in America. From 1792 to 1828, the foundry (the bell operation was moved to Canton, Massachusetts, in 1804) produced 950 bells of all sizes and functions, weighing from a few pounds to about 3,000 pounds, and cast with 75 percent copper and 25 percent tin. Revere bells can still be found at many New England churches, including King’s Chapel, Boston.

Revere also discovered a process for rolling sheet copper. In 1801, he built a mill at Canton for copper rolling and brass casting. The copper works eventually became one of the largest industries in the United States. While Revere was in charge, the Revere Copper and Brass Company made copper boilers for steamships and the copper sheeting for the dome of the Massachusetts State House and for the bottom of the USS Constitution (Old Ironsides). In 1811, Revere turned over management of his businesses to his son, Joseph Warren Revere. The Revere Copper Company was chartered in 1828 under his son’s direction. The company went through major reorganizations and mergers in the twentieth century and is now known as Revere Copper Products. Over the years, Revere copper has been used in the making of warships, shells, torpedoes, tanks, telephones, radios, plumbing, and many other items.

An avid joiner, Revere belonged to many community groups. He joined the Masonic order in 1760 and was a founder of the Massachusetts Grand Lodge and served as its grand master (1795–97). He helped establish the Massachusetts Fire Insurance Company and presided over the Massachusetts Charitable Mechanic Association from 1795 to 1799. He served as Suffolk County coroner (1794–1800) and assisted in setting up the Boston Board of Health, acting as its president (1799–1800).

In early 1788, when it appeared that Massachusetts might fail to ratify the US Constitution, Boston mechanics held a mass meeting, unanimously adopting resolutions in favor of ratification. Revere led a delegation from the group to the home of Samuel Adams, a member of the ratifying convention whose support of the Constitution had been wavering. Adams, impressed by the show of support, voted in favor of the Constitution. The action taken by Revere and his associates may well have been the deciding factor for the acceptance of the Constitution in Massachusetts.

After the Constitution went into effect, Revere expected to be appointed director of the mint or a customs house official, but his ambitions were denied, probably because he was a Federalist, opposed to the Jeffersonian Republicans. He thought of himself as a conservative who believed in the liberal principles of the American Revolution, chiefly liberty and opportunity within the confines of law and order. In an 1804 letter to a friend, Revere called himself a “warm Republican,” saying “I always deprecated Democracy as much as I did Aristocracy.” Revere may be regarded as “one of the last of the Cocked Hats.” His conservatism was evident in his persistence in publicly wearing clothes of the revolutionary era—cocked hats, ruffled shirts, knee breeches, long stockings, large shoe buckles, and the like—long after such dress had fallen from fashion.

Significance

Paul Revere was a true patriot hero. He was willing to serve in any capacity—courier, agitator, soldier, propagandist, or artisan—to further the revolutionary cause. When patriot leaders wanted something done, they could depend on Revere. Longfellow’s stirring poem brought Revere a fame that he never sought to achieve.

A master silversmith, Revere operated a shop that produced an astounding amount and variety of silver pieces, setting a high standard of quality for the craft. He was a pioneer in copper-plate engraving and metallurgy and one of America’s earliest large-scale industrialists, running iron and brass foundries and a copper-sheeting mill. Revere, one of the first to inaugurate a factory system in America, put investment capital to use for production, employed new technology, organized and managed a large labor force, made arrangements for acquisition of raw materials needed for production, and provided for transportation of goods to market. Revere founded an enduring, major segment of the copper industry. Daring, persistent, and hardworking, he exemplified what could be attained in a land of opportunity.

Bibliography

Buker, George E. The Penobscot Expedition: Commodore Saltanstall and the Massachusetts Conspiracy of 1779. Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, 2002. Print.

Fischer, David H. Paul Revere’s Ride. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994. Print.

Forbes, Esther. Paul Revere and the World He Lived In. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1942. Print.

Gettemy, Charles F. The True Story of Paul Revere: His Midnight Ride; His Arrest and Court-Martial; His Useful Public Services. Boston: Little, Brown, 1905. Print.

Goss, Elbridge H. The Life of Colonel Paul Revere. 2 vols. Boston: Joseph Cupples, 1891. Print.

Leehey, Patrick M., et al. Paul Revere—Artisan, Businessman, and Patriot: The Man Behind the Myth. Boston: Paul Revere Memorial Association, 1988. Print.

Triber, Jayne E. A True Republican: The Life of Paul Revere. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1998. Print.