<P> The battle was followed by a war for British political opinion . Within four days of the battle, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress had collected scores of sworn testimonies from militiamen and from British prisoners . When word leaked out a week after the battle that Gage was sending his official description of events to London, the Provincial Congress sent a packet of these detailed depositions, signed by over 100 participants in the events, on a faster ship . The documents were presented to a sympathetic official and printed by the London newspapers two weeks before Gage's report arrived . Gage's official report was too vague on particulars to influence anyone's opinion . George Germain, no friend of the colonists, wrote, "the Bostonians are in the right to make the King's troops the aggressors and claim a victory ." Politicians in London tended to blame Gage for the conflict instead of their own policies and instructions . The British troops in Boston variously blamed General Gage and Colonel Smith for the failures at Lexington and Concord . </P> <P> The day after the battle, John Adams left his home in Braintree to ride along the battlefields . He became convinced that "the Die was cast, the Rubicon crossed ." Thomas Paine in Philadelphia had previously thought of the argument between the colonies and the Home Country as "a kind of law - suit", but after news of the battle reached him, he "rejected the hardened, sullen - tempered Pharaoh of England forever ." George Washington received the news at Mount Vernon and wrote to a friend, "the once - happy and peaceful plains of America are either to be drenched in blood or inhabited by slaves . Sad alternative! But can a virtuous man hesitate in his choice?" A group of hunters on the frontier named their campsite Lexington when they heard news of the battle in June . It eventually became the city of Lexington, Kentucky . </P> <P> It was important to the early American government that an image of British fault and American innocence be maintained for this first battle of the war . The history of Patriot preparations, intelligence, warning signals, and uncertainty about the first shot was rarely discussed in the public sphere for decades . The story of the wounded British soldier at the North Bridge, hors de combat, struck down on the head by a Minuteman using a hatchet, the purported "scalping", was strongly suppressed . Depositions mentioning some of these activities were not published and were returned to the participants (this notably happened to Paul Revere). Paintings portrayed the Lexington fight as an unjustified slaughter . </P> <P> The issue of which side was to blame grew during the early nineteenth century . For example, older participants' testimony in later life about Lexington and Concord differed greatly from their depositions taken under oath in 1775 . All now said the British fired first at Lexington, whereas fifty or so years before, they weren't sure . All now said they fired back, but in 1775, they said few were able to . The "Battle" took on an almost mythical quality in the American consciousness . Legend became more important than truth . A complete shift occurred, and the Patriots were portrayed as actively fighting for their cause, rather than as suffering innocents . Paintings of the Lexington skirmish began to portray the militia standing and fighting back in defiance . </P>

Where did the initial shots of the american revolution ring out