University of Virginia Library

7472. REVOLUTION (American), Battle of Lexington.—

Within this week we
have received the unhappy news of an action
of considerable magnitude, between the King's
troops and our brethren of Boston, in which it
is said five hundred of the former, with the
Earl of Percy, are slain. * * * This accident [430] has cut off our last hope of reconciliation, and
a frenzy of revenge seems to have seized all
ranks of people.—
To Dr. William Small. Washington ed. i, 198. Ford ed., i, 453.
(May. 1775)

 
[430]

Commenting on this passage, Parton, in his
Life of Jefferson, says: “We may judge of the
strength of the tie between the mother country and
the Colonies, by the fact that so un-English a mind
as Jefferson's clung with sentimental fondness to
the union long after there was any reasonable hope
of their preserving it.” Dr. Small, Jefferson's professor
and friend at William and Mary College, was
then living in England.—Editor.