On Dec. 13, 1774, four months before his midnight ride to Lexington and Concord, Mass., patriot messenger Paul Revere carried an express from Boston to Portsmouth warning that the British had orders to seize Fort William and Mary.
At the bequest of royal governor John Wentworth, the British planned to reinforce the fort, the only one in coastal New Hampshire. The next day, about 400 patriots seized the fort before the British arrived, capturing precious stores of gunpowder and firing the first shots of the revolution. The attack on the fort brought about the end of royal authority in New Hampshire.
The raids in Portsmouth were the first fully organized, large-scale, armed attack against the authority of the British monarchy.
N.H. Historical Society