The Bunker Hill Connection - "Don't Fire Until You See The Whites Of Their Eyes"
As the commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution continues, a recreation of the Battle of Bunker Hill has been planned for the weekend of June 21 and 22, 2025, (albeit in Gloucester, Massachusetts, twenty-five miles northeast of the actual site, due to the urban nature of Charlestown in the 21st century, its organizers indicate). As is the case with the Battle of Lexington and Concord , there are multiple connection between the events of June 17, 1775, and the Massachusetts militiamen who escorted the Convention Army from Saratoga to Massachusetts in 1777. Perhaps the most dramatic of these connections is one of the men associated with the order "Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes." Historian and author J.L. Bell, creator of the Boston 1775 blog, examined the origin of this quote in detail in a June 17, 2020, article in the Journal of the American Revolution . Bell traces the Bunker Hill order story back to 180...