But Revere was caught. His chief captor examined him, and got slight satisfaction. "I told him, and added that their troops had catched aground in passing the river and that there would be five hundred Americans there in a short time, for I had alarmed the country all the way up." His anxious captors consulted together, and were conducting him back toward Lexington, "when the militia fired a volley of guns, which seemed to alarm them very much." They asked if there were any other road to Cambridge, took Revere's horse, and left him. He hurried back to Lexington, to give Hancock and Adams the news that sent them on their way. Revere himself remained long enough to save a trunk of papers belonging to Hancock. Meanwhile the militia of the town, alarmed by Revere, assembled and waited for the troops. They sent two messengers toward Cambridge to bring certain news, but each of these blundered into the advancing regulars, and were seized and held. The militia waited for some hours, but on hearing no word they were finally dismissed, with a warning to be ready to come together again instantly. Some went to their homes, some to the near-by tavern, to finish out the night. News came at last to Captain Parker that the British were scarcely a mile away, and in such numbers that his company could not hope to oppose them. He called his men together, nevertheless, "but only with a view to determine what to do, when and where to meet, and to dismiss and disperse."[62] The minute men were still standing in their ranks when the British suddenly appeared. The succeeding events caused much controversy at the time. Gage reported "that the troops were fired upon by the rebels out of the meeting-house, and the neighboring houses, as well as by those that were in the field; and that the troops only returned the fire, and passed on their way to Concord."[63] But in number the little company of minute men were, according to Revere, who had just passed through them, "about fifty"; the Reverend Jonas Clark says "fifty or sixty, or even seventy." Had there been even the two or three hundred of the British reports, these men, drawn up without protection on an open green, are scarcely likely to have attacked a force of more than twice their number. The logic of the situation seems against Gage. There is one more factor to consider. It is well enough known that both the British officers, and the Americans as a whole, were under instructions not to fire, and earnest to obey. But what of the British privates? Their eagerness for blood at the time of the Massacre was so great as to account for that tragedy; it was now not likely to be less. There were even among the troops at Lexington two companies from one of the "Sam Adams regiments." When we learn from Lieutenant Barker that after the skirmish "the Men were so wild they cou'd hear no orders," we may even suspect that, as at the Massacre, the men may have taken matters into their own hands.