Nathan Meriam House

The Battle Road begins

This early 18th century house sits at the junction of two roads: Lexington Road, running east, and Bedford Road coming from the north. Not far from the house, Lexington Road narrowed to cross a small brook. In the early afternoon of April 19, 1775, the retreating British column was attacked here by militiamen from the towns of Reading, Chelmsford and Billerica who had just arrived on the Bedford Road. In order to cross the brook, the British column pulled in their flank guard. This allowed the militiamen to get close enough to fire upon them and inflict casualties. From this point on the fire would not cease until the British regulars arrived at Charlestown, 18 miles away!

The family members living at Meriam’s Corner included Nathan and Abigail, in their fifties, in one house with seven children between the ages of 11 and 29. A yeoman farmer, Nathan served as town selectman. In the other house Josiah and his wife Lydia, both 49, lived with ten children between the ages of 7 and 27. Josiah was a Sergeant in Capt. Joseph Hosmer’s Minute Company in Concord and his 19 year-old son, also named Josiah, was a private in the same company.

Meriam family oral tradition holds that on that morning, “when the alarm was given in Concord that the British soldiers were coming, Josiah Meriam, with his sons, Josiah, Jr., and Timothy, went to the village, and later were among the forces at the North Bridge, and probably crossed the meadows and appeared again at the encounter near the house. Joseph, Josiah’s youngest son, then seven years old, remained at home, as he always said, ‘to take care of the women’ and soon went with them to a place of refuge behind the hill. The British soldiers entered the house, helped themselves to whatever breakfast they could find, taking the unbaked pies from the oven…”