In May, 1644, while the civil war was raging in England, a parliamentary man-of-war of 24 guns, Capt. Thomas Stagg, sailed into the harbor and demanded the surrender of a Bristol ship of 100 tons then in port. All the townspeople assembled on Windmill Hill to watch the expected hostilities. The Bristol craft, however, prudently surrendered.

In June, two years before, the windmill was struck by lightning, shattering the sail, breaking the standard and riving off the boards of the sides, beside setting on fire the sacks in the mill. "The miller, being under the mill upon the ground chopping a piece of board, was struck dead; but company coming in found him to breathe, and within an hour or two he began to stir, and strove with such force, as six men could scarce hold him down. The next day he came to his senses, but knew nothing of what had befallen him."

The surrender of Quebec was celebrated by a great bonfire on Copp's Hill. "45 Tar Barrels, 2 Cords of Wood, a mast, spars, and boards, with 50 lbs. of powder were set in a blaze; this, with a similar illumination on Fort Hill, was paid for by the province, together with 32 Gallons of Rum and much Beer."

In 1765, the year of the repeal of the Stamp Act, Copp's Hill was the scene of the part of the celebration of the anniversary of the powder plot on Nov. 5, as thus told in the Massachusetts Gazette: "About noon the Pageantry, representing the Pope, Devil and several other Effigies were brought in stages and met at King-street, where the Union (between the factions from the north and south ends) previously entered into by the leaders, was established in a very ceremonial manner, and having given three huzzas, they interchanged ground." After parading, they "proceeded to the Tree of Liberty, under the shadow of which they refreshed themselves for awhile and then retreated northward, agreeably to the plan. They reached Copp's Hill before six o'clock, where they halted, and having enkindled a fire, the whole Pageantry was committed to the flames and consumed. This being finished, every person was requested to their respective houses." This was the customary observ

ance of the day.

On January 24, 1793, a barbecue was held on Copp's Hill in honor of the French Revolution. After the feast the horns of the ox were fixed to a pole sixty feet high and triumphantly raised in Liberty Square.

Copp's Hill figured quite conspicuously in the Revolution. Works were erected by the British on the summit, near the southwestern corner of the ground. They were hastily thrown up and never completed, comprising but a few barrels of earth arranged as parapets. There was a small earthwork to the rear designed as a shelter for infantry. The battery consisted of

three 28-pounders, on carriages, which were left spiked after the evacuation. Here Clinton and Burgoyne witnessed the Battle of Bunker Hill and directed the fire of the little battery. One of the shells from Copp's Hill, aiding the fire of the ships in the harbor, is said to have started the conflagration in Charlestown. Traces of the works remained on the hill until the summit was lowered in 1807. It was from the North Battery below, that Clinton rushing down the hill when he saw his veterans quailing, took boat and crossed over to the Charlestown shore to aid Howe.

On the south corner of the new burying-ground, added in 1809 and fronting on Hull street, stood the old gun-house of the Columbian artillery, afterwards removed to make room for tombs built in 1827. At the celebration of the completion of the bridge from the old ferry landing to Charlestown in 1786, salutes were fired from Copp's Hill, as well as from the Castle and Breed's Hill.

The gas-works at the foot of Copp's Hill, the most prominent feature of the neighborhood, were erected in 1828, and gas first made in December of that year. It was not used to illuminate the City in general until 1834.

All this time the change in the character of the surroundings of Copp's Hill which we described in the beginning has been slowly going on, the old houses decaying or being replaced and all but a few of the old families removing far from the vicinity. There still dwell on Copp's Hill a number of the Dodds, Goddards, Pitmans and Adamses of the early days, but the place generally has acquired a new and changing appearance.

Perhaps the earliest example of the term "Copp's Hill," in our printed records, is found in the "Selectmen's minutes of January 21, 1725-26."