[74] has recently been erected (1878) with the following inscription: ‘Here stood Cooper's Tavern, in which Jabez Wyman and Jason Winship were killed by the British, April 19, 1775.’ They are generally spoken of as two decrepit men, who came into the tavern for information, and were killed while sitting in the tavern, by the British, who entered the house. The following deposition gives an account of the event:
‘Cambridge, May 19, 1775. We, Benjamin Cooper and Rachel Cooper, both of Cambridge, aforesaid, of lawful age, testify and say that in the afternoon of the 19th day of April last, the King's regular troops, under the command of General Gage, upon their return from blood and slaughter, which they had made at Lexington and Concord, fired more than a hundred bullets into the house where we dwell, through doors, windows, &c.; then a number of them entered the house, where we and two aged gentlemen were, all unarmed. We escaped for our lives into the cellar; the two aged gentlemen were immediately most barbarously and inhumanly murdered by them, being stabbed through in many places, their heads mauled, skulls broke, and their brains out on the floor and walls of the house; and further saith not.’Sketches of Jason Winship and Jabez Wyman are given in the Genealogies. The following phase of the matter is different from the generally received American accounts, which make these two men martyrs to the cause of American Independence.
The account given below of some incidents relating to these two men is extracted from a letter written by the Rev. John Marrett, pastor of the Second Church in Woburn (now Burlington), to his uncle the Rev. Isaiah Dunster, minister of the North Parish of Harwich (now Brewster), dated at the former place July 28, 1775. Both these clergymen were natives of Cambridge and graduates of Harvard College (see Paige, 538, 604). The letter is published entire in a work entitled Henry Dunster and his Descendants, p. 87, &c. The allusions are to the death of Jabez Wyman and Jason Winship, to the adventure of the wife of Deacon Adams, the setting fire to John Cutter's house, the damage to the meeting-house and Mr. Cooke's house, and the killing of Jason Russell and others. ‘As to the two men unarmed that were killed in a house at Menotomy, am not absolutely certain; but take them to be Jabez Wyman, who used to work for Mr. Cooke, and Jason Winship, killed in the tavern that Captain Adams formerly owned, now Cooper at the corner. Wyman was certainly killed there, and I think Winship, but am not certain they were unarmed; but it is likely enough they were; they were drinking flip. Wyman was warned of the danger, but, ’
