=140. General Gage and the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts.=—While these actions were taking place in Philadelphia, affairs were drifting to an immediate crisis in Massachusetts. General Gage, now governor of Massachusetts, as well as military commander, was fully inspired with the spirit of his royal master. He promptly sent to Chelsea for military stores and began a system of fortifications. The colonists, easily perceiving the significance of the British general’s action, took similar measures of precaution. In order to be independent of General Gage, they also organized what is known as “The Provincial Congress of Massachusetts”; and this body, on the very day when the First Continental Congress adjourned, authorized the organization of a military force, consisting of all the able-bodied men in the colony. One fourth of these were to be always ready for action, and, hence, were known as minutemen. After making provisions for supplying the army with the necessary equipment and munitions, the Provincial Congress intrusted the conduct of affairs to the general control of a Committee of Safety, of which John Hancock,[66] a wealthy merchant of Boston, was the chairman. [Illustration: JOHN HANCOCK.] [Illustration: STATUE OF MINUTEMAN AT CONCORD.] =141. Gage’s Purpose.=—It was not long before blood was shed. There were certain military stores at Concord, and General Gage determined to seize them. For this purpose he dispatched very secretly about eight hundred men, under Lieutenant Colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn. The expedition had still another object. The king having ordered the arrest of John Hancock and Samuel Adams, these leaders had withdrawn from Boston and were the guests of a friend in Lexington. Gage had learned where they were and had ordered their seizure by the troops bound for Concord. The British force, after taking the greatest precautions for secrecy, left the city on the night of the 18th of April. But the vigilant eye of a patriot, Dr. Warren, had detected the purpose of the movement. =142. The Ride of Paul Revere.=—In spite of Gage’s orders that nobody should leave Boston that night, Paul Revere, a Boston goldsmith, succeeded in crossing the Charles River,—having previously attended to setting an alarm signal in the tower of the Old North Church,—and galloped by the Medford road toward Lexington, shouting at every house that the British were coming.