Munroe Tavern (Lexington, Massachusetts)
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Munroe Tavern is a Revolutionary War site, located at 1332 Massachusetts Avenue, Lexington, Massachusetts, that played a prominent role in the Battle of Lexington and Concord. It was first opened by William Munroe (d.1719) who had been exhiled to the United States in 1651 and is now preserved as a museum by the Lexington Historical Society. It is open weekends starting April 16 and daily May 30–October 30. An admission fee is charged.
Although the Tavern dates from 1695, its most significant role in American history unfolded within the span of 1½ hours some 80 years later.
On April 18, 1775, one day before the outbreak of the battle, Munroe Tavern was a meeting spot for colonials, owned by William Munroe, orderly sergeant of Captain Parker's minuteman company, and proprietor of the tavern from 1770 to 1827. At 6:30 p.m. that evening, Solomon Brown of Lexington, who had gone to the market in Boston, returned and reported to Munroe that he had passed a patrol of British soldiers.
Indeed a large force of British troops arrived at Lexington before dawn the next morning, on April 19, 1775, beginning the Battle of Lexington and Concord. That afternoon the tavern served as the headquarters for Brigadier General Hugh Percy, 2nd Duke of Northumberland, and his 1,000 reinforcements. The British occupied the tavern for one and one-half hours, during which time the dining room was converted into a field hospital for the wounded, while exhausted British soldiers consumed liberal quantities of food and drink.
President George Washington dined at the Munroe Tavern when he visited the Lexington battlefield in 1789. An upstairs room now contains the table at which he sat and documents relating to his trip.
In the late 1800s, a Munroe descendant who owned the house rented out part of it to Edwin Graves Champney, a well-known artist.
