Hezekiah Wyman

Hezekiah Wyman

Revolutionary War legend
“The White Horseman”

When the word was spread among Minutemen to gather in Lexington, Hezekiah Wyman, then 55 years of age, mounted his white horse and, with musket in hand, set off from his Cambridge Street home for Lexington and became a legend.

Like other men from Woburn, Wyman (1720-1779) was too late for the fighting at Lexington Common but, continuing up the road, met with British soldiers returning from Concord. All along the route back to Boston was made the legend of the white horseman who charged again and again against the British, killing and wounding a number of the enemy but always escaping, untouched by the shower of bullets around him. According to the newspaper account (first printed in the Boston Pearl, reprinted in the Woburn Journal, July 29, 1887), “his exploits were well nigh fabulous.”

“When he met the British he began blazing away at them vigorously with his deadly firearm. Mounted on his strong steed, he rode furiously in the direction of the British ranks. his aim was taken at close quarters, and his shots were sent with a constant fatal effect.

“His tall gaunt form, his gray locks floating in the breeze, and the color of his steed distinguished him from the other Americans, and the British gave him the name of ‘Death on the Pale Horse.’ The utmost endeavors of his enemy to kill him were unavailing. He passed through the whole melee unscathed and unhurt.

“Once a bayonet charge drove the old man and the party with which he was acting to a distance from the foe; but he was out of ammunition and was then compelled to pick up some. But he ere long returned to the charge and this time killed an officer, and after that exploit the report of his piece was frequently heard till the close of the fight. “His powerful white horse, careering at full speed over the hills, with the dauntless old man on his back, was continually to be seen. The British learned to dread the frequent appearance of this dire rider at unexpected points along the route of their passage, for his aim was true, and the economical principals in which he was trained forbade his wasting powder or ball.

“He lingered at Arlington long enough to aid in a plot laid by Ammi Cutter for taking the British baggage-wagon and their guards [with the old men of Menotomy] ... The story says that Hezekiah pursued the British even after they had entered Charlestown and that he followed the enemy to their very boats; and then, turning his horse’s head, returned to his home.”

Wyman’s name appears on a list of those who served or paid for others to serve in Captain Samuel Belknap’s company and is listed for five month’s service at Ticonderoga and three months in Jersey. In March 1777 the town of Woburn voted to pay him 8 pounds, 16 shillings, and 10 pence in part for his service in the war.

Wyman survived the war. So did the white mare. Wyman lived out his days, until the summer of 1779, in his house not far from the corner of Cambridge and Wildwood Streets (site of the current 195 Cambridge St.). He owned a large section of land, upon which much of the West Side is now built, where generations of descendants succeeded him. The neighborhood was often called Wyman Plains, and, until recently, the family name was perpetuated through a succession of Wyman schools. (During Wyman's lifetime this area was in South Woburn; in 1850 it was incorporated into the new town of Winchester.)

Written by ELLEN KNIGHT