In late 1774, British General Thomas Gage ordered the predawn removal of powder from the Charlestown storehouse in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, which signaled the end of conciliation between the colonists and the occupying British troops. This seizure of powder for "safekeeping" alarmed patriots as far away as New York and New Jersey. Fiery Colonel Israel Putnam of Connecticut, a courageous Indian fighter, began raising an army of 40,000 volunteers. Wiser strategists, however, were quick to cool his ardor.

"Not yet," one argued. "We are not yet ripe for armed conflict with the British regulars. Cool down and have an eye to your stocks of gunpowder."

Villages and towns throughout the colonies stepped up their secretive storage of powder and musket balls. The mood among the colonists changed and attitudes stiffened against the British troops as acts of Parliament imposed further restrictions on their rights and liberties. The Suffolk Resolves, boldly endorsed by the First Continental Congress, declared what was on the minds of America's patriots, "that force would be used, if necessary, to prevent enslavement of America."

In POWDER ALARM—1774, author Robert P. Richmond re-creates General Gage's move against the Charlestown powderhouse and examines its immediate and long range effects. With the help of information gleaned from official documents and eye-witness accounts, he shows how the powder alarm prepared the colonists for their first, big step toward independence and how the Battle of Bunker Hill was merely a logical extension of the colonists' mood.

From the dust jacket