Capture of Fort Ticonderoga

In the spring of 1775, a few weeks after Lexington and Concord, a force of Green Mountain Boys led by Ethan Allen, with Benedict Arnold alongside them, crossed Lake Champlain in the dark and landed near Fort Ticonderoga. They entered the gate at dawn and took the sleeping garrison, under Captain William Delaplace, without a fight. The fort held dozens of heavy cannon, mortars and stores, taken along with the nearby post at Crown Point. That winter Henry Knox hauled about sixty tons of these guns across the snow to Boston. Mounted above the town, they forced the British to evacuate in March 1776.

Historians still argue over who led the raid, since Allen and Arnold both claimed command, and Arnold held a Massachusetts commission but had no troops of his own. The famous quotation comes from Allen's 1779 narrative and is thought to have been polished for a public that loved a rousing line. The capture was a bold act, but it was also unauthorised, and the Continental Congress, which opened that same day, had not ordered it. Its most lasting importance was the artillery, which gave the Americans the heavy guns they lacked outside Boston. The fort changed hands again in 1777 when Burgoyne's army retook it, a reminder that its value in 1775 lay in the guns and not the walls.