The Concord Hymn
Ralph Waldo Emerson
By the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled;
Here once the embattled farmers stood;
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps,
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream that seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream,
We place with joy a votive stone,
That memory may their deeds redeem,
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
O Thou who made those heroes dare
To die, and leave their children free, —
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raised to them and Thee.
In 1837, this hymn was sung to the tune "Old Hundredth" during the
4th of July celebration of the town of Concord, Massachusetts, for the
dedication of the Obelisk, a battle monument commemorating the battle of
Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, erected near the North Bridge where
the initial battle took place. By 1837 the bridge had been lost to a
The first stanza is inscribed on the base of
Daniel Chester French's Minute Man Statue.