In late 1774 King George had become alarmed that the buildup of arms and ammunition in the northern colonies might lead to rebellious outbreaks, and he ordered all munitions in forts and large caches of gunpowder to be seized and secured by British troops. Boston Harbor had already been closed in punishment for the Boston Tea Party and when gunpowder stores there were removed it raised the hackles of colonists in Portsmouth, what became known as the Powder Alarm. Patriots had already safely removed and hidden gunpowder stores at Newport in Rhode Island when the news circulated that troops from Boston would march north to secure the gunpowder at Fort William and Mary in Portsmouth (now known as Fort Constitution). Four months before his famous Concord ride, Paul Revere rode north to warn patriots of this, and locals took action.
On December 14, 1774, locals led by patriot John Langdon stormed the fort, which guarded the mouth of the busy seaport, and overwhelmed the six-man British detachment guarding it. They took 96 barrels of gunpowder, which they quickly distributed around local towns. The next day, another group led by John Sullivan raided the fort again and took their 16 cannons. In one of the first direct acts of the RevWar, and the only battle to occur in New Hampshire, patriots had secured a significant stash of arms that would become a determining factor in an early battle, the Battle of Bunker Hill.
It being less than one hour from our campsite at Sea Coast Camping & RV in North Hampton NH, we, of course, took a side trip to see the New Hampshire capitol building in Concord. Remember the rule of “capitol” vs. “capital”? CapitOl refers to the building, capitAl refers to virtually everything else including the city, a discussion about the entity without specifying the building, etc. I’m glad we cleared that up. Disclaimer: we used AI to clarify it, so it’s still possible that whole explanation is a hallucination caused by faulty voltage.
The capitol (building) was closed because it was Saturday, but we still got to take pictures. The capital (city) was open and having a farmers’ market. We parked in the Governor’s spot (free) but after a spirited discussion eventually relented and moved to a pay spot ($1.50). If his office is closed, my argument goes, he’s not likely to show up for work. Especially him being a government employee and all. We will note that the New Hampshire Capitol is the oldest state capitol still being used for legislative sessions. It looks substantial enough to last for quite a bit longer.
We also walked through the Old North Cemetery where there are graves from patriots who fought in the American RevWar. Buried there also is our 14th President Franklin Pierce and most of his family, minus one of his sons (all three died in childhood). It isn’t known where his youngest son is buried, he died at 3 days old in Amherst Massachusetts. We know these fun facts because we ran into Heidi Smith of Laconia New Hampshire, who was in the cemetery researching for her new book on First Lady Jane Pierce, including discovering the final resting place of Franklin Pierce, Jr. Heidi was a fountain of knowledge, even informing us that there was a slave, Nancy (who only goes by her first name like so many modern day entertainers ala Cher, Sting, Madonna, SnoopDog), buried there, unusual for an old New England cemetery. And Sarah Thompson, Countess of Rumsford, is also interned there. I hope you can get more excited about that than I am as I have no idea how important it is to be a Countess, and I have no clue where the hell Rumsford is. I’m also not wasting any AI tokens on a search…
We found many headstones of RevWar patriots but alas didn’t find Nancy as we had to scoot quickly when a sudden squall blew up and we had to run for the truck.
Just down the street from the capitol is a massive stone church which was a gift to the First Church of Christ the Scientist of Concord. The gift is from Mary Baker G. Eddy, the founder of the Christian Scientists. There must be some serious tithing going on for Ms. Mary to have enough of it to gift a church this grand.
There is a statue commemorating Concord New Hampshire native Christa MCauliffe, the first educator astronaut, who tragically was lost in the failure of the space shuttle Challenger 73 seconds after liftoff on January 28, 1986.
And there is a plaque commemorating a United States tour by General Lafayette, ally to the Continental Army during the RevWar, taking a belated victory lap around the colonies new states in 1825. Without his French troops, we would probably all still be talking like Sir Paul McCartney and drinking warm beer.
Fun Fact: we have learned during our tours of state capitols that all 50 in the United States have a replica of the Liberty Bell, and that while the bell is a cast duplicate, the crack is mostly painted on. Use this little-known gem to blow the minds of all your trivia opponents.
We returned on our trek via Portsmouth so we could make a stop at Trader Joe’s. Any time we get within the gravitational pull of a 100-mile radius around a TJ’s, we pull in to replenish our fruit stocks and add another bag of two of the Very Berry Granola. At that point, we were quite close to Kittery Maine, home to our favorite lobster house, Warren’s (no relation). We popped across the bridge and parked, put our name on the wait list, and then discovered that Warren’s (no relation) Lobster House had gone out of business in 2025 (thank you Covid), been bought by a real estate developer, and reopened as Warren’s (no relation) Seafood Restaurant, NOT AFFILIATED IN ANY WAY WHATSOEVER WITH THE PREVIOUS ESTABLISHMENT BY A SIMILAR NAME AT THIS LOCATION, so their disclaimer poster says. Anyway, there was an enormous crowd and a 30-minute wait, and we had by then driven 1900 miles to have our lobstah, so we stayed and ate. And it was good, boy was it good.
Next up, Bah Hahbah (Bar Harbor) and Acadia National Park
Onward!
Tippy is back! After his lawyer dumped him for a more lucrative and promising case, he then realized Parental Leave was off the table, and he got hungry, negotiations took a favorable turn for the blog and he caved. At least I think that’s why he caved. Side note: Chester hired Tippy’s lawyer to go after his temporary boss, and then I hired Chester’s lawyer to pursue a racketeering case against both of them. Second side note: Tippy’s Chester’s lawyer has some really big biker-looking friends, too. Real fun guys!
MUDDSCAPE 