The British are coming! One if by land, two if by sea!

April 18

Paul Revere had his famous ride on this day in 1785. He knew the British were leaving their positions in Boston to investigate the rumors of stores of weapons in Concord and to try and capture patriot leaders Samuel Adams and John Hancock, thought to be hidden in Lexington. Along with Revere, William Dawes also rode his horse through the countryside sounding the alarm. The instructions were to put on lantern in the steeple of Boston's Old North Church if the British were advancing their troops over land and to put two lanterns if they were going by boat over the Charles river to Cambridge. For the record their were two lanterns that night. This would be the first night of the American Revolution, which would end up going on for 8 more years.

Also on this day the great San Francisco earthquake of 1908 happened. Although a very powerful earthquake, that caused large amounts of damage to buildings, the vast majority of the carnage associated with this earthquake was caused by the fires in the aftermath. San Francisco was one of the first cities to install natural gas lighting in much of the metropolitan area. These lines burst into flame, destroying much of the city and contributing to  many of the 3,000 deaths. Before the earthquake, San Francisco was known as the Paris of the west coast of the United States. Although still a remarkable city, this event set the city back in its development.
Lastly, journalist Ernie Pyle was killed by the Japanese while covering the battle of the Pacific while on the island of Ie Shima. If you haven't read any of Pyle's work I highly recommend it. He did a great job of getting primary sources for his stories. Meaning he would interview the soldiers on the front lines of battles while they were still going on. He never hesitated to put himself in harms way in order to report the day to day goings on of the war. He risked his life to cover the beach landings at Normandy and even flew in bombing raids over Europe. When the war in Europe was winding down he requested to go to the Pacific to cover the war there. Here's his book.