"...that there should be liberty of conscience to all Christians (Papists excepted)." So proclaimed a Concord Town Meeting letter on rights and liberties approved on 19 January 1774.

Many a minute and militia man at North Bridge on 19 April 1775 harbored a historic resentment toward the Pope and his Church. While their Puritan ancestors settled Massachusetts and Concord with a goal of purifying the Anglican church, they also avoided all connections with Catholicism. Not only beliefs but governance of the parish were to be in the hands of its members (Congregational) not bishops, popes or kings.

Anti-Catholic sentiments had always been manifested in Concord. Founder Rev. Peter Bulkeley warned of the scarlet whore of Rome. Royal Governor Andros was believed to have had plans to hand New England colonies over to the Catholic French in a move to destroy Protestantism while King James supposedly harbored a desire to return England to Rome's control. Both men were deposed. Rev. Estabrook preached against anything Popish and once when using a communion plate inscribed with Papal insignia ("IHS", a cross and 3 nails of the crucifixion), had it smashed to pieces by a deacon.

Other activities reflected the ill-will of colonists toward the Roman Church. Most towns celebrated Pope's Day memoralizing the 1605 Catholic plot to blow up Parliament. In Boston, people drank, burned effigies of the Pope and priests and often rioted (the worst in 1764). An early 1700s influx of persecuted French Huguenots to Boston helped inflame Catholic hatred as did atrocities by France's Indian allies during the French and Indian Wars (1755-60). When the victorious British government enacted the Quebec Act of 1774 giving French Canadian Catholics and their Jesuit priests equal religious rights, the American colonists reacted angrily.

At this time, European Catholic nations were experiencing a power struggle among kings, governments and the Church with the Society of Jesus (Jesuits) serving as a focal point. The "Age of Reason" was at its height (1748-63) and Rome's traditional power was waning, challenged by rulers and parliaments as were the Jesuits whose allegiance was directly to the Pope. By June 1773, France and Spain among others had pressured Pope Clement XIV to suppress the Society. Only Russia under Empress Catherine the Great ignored the edict. Soon, these continental religious conflicts would have influence in anti-Papist Massachusetts and Concord.

During March 1775, Irish Catholics among the British units in Boston celebrated St. Patrick's Day (day's "parole" was "St. Patrick" with countersign "Ireland") much to the horror of its citizens. Rumors (unfounded) would accuse Gen. Gage of being a Papist with designs on converting the colonies to Catholicism by the sword. Following events at Lexington and Concord, an American army would invade Canada with the aim of making that British territory a colony. Congress hoped to enlist French Canadian support for this expedition but the Catholics neither forgot nor forgave Protestant New England's intolerance or its reaction to the Quebec Act. Left without assistance, the American forces were defeated and Capt. Theodore Bliss along with a number of his Concord men were captured.

British Parliament declared the colonists as rebels and set about mustering an army to quickly put down the uprising. Negotiations were conducted with Russia to obtain troops to join British regulars in America, but Empress Catherine declined, electing to remain neutral. England hired German mercenaries.

As the Revolution proceeded, France was convinced to ally itself with America following the rebel's 1777 victory at Saratoga. By September 1778, a French fleet was in Boston harbor and by June 1780, a French army landed at Newport, RI. Attitudes toward "papists" and their priests began to change. A prohibition against Pope's Day celebrations was imposed so as not to offend the new allies. A Franciscan monk was even allowed to celebrate a secret funeral Mass in Boston (basement of King's Chapel) for a French officer killed accidentally in a riot.

France and Spain continued pressing the Pope to act against Russia for harboring and aiding Jesuits. Based upon threats returned by Catherine, the French perceived a concern that any retribution against her country might lead to neutrality abandonment in favor of supporting England in her American war. France and Spain wisely chose to soften their stance thus keeping Russia out of the conflict. The allied victory at Yorktown (1781) soon led to a peace treaty and American independence (1783).

Thus did the intolerable Papists and the Russian Jesuits play a fateful role in the American War for Independence which was begun at Concord's North Bridge in a time when they were excepted from a liberty of conscience.

(Footnote: The first public Catholic Mass was said in Concord in 1844 and from 1962-71 the Jesuits operated Xavier High School in town.)