Lincoln Minute Men
The Town of Lincoln, Massachusetts, re-established its company of Lincoln Minute Men in 1966, and charged it with the duty of keeping alive the history and the principles of the original minute men of 1775, with particular focus on educating youth. Membership in the Lincoln Minute Men is open to all interested individuals and families. Multi-generational family participation is encouraged, celebrated and commonplace in our ranks. The Lincoln Minute Men welcomes all people, regardless of age, gender, or town of residence.
The original Lincoln Minute Men included fifers (the Mason brothers, Joseph and Elijah, whose house stood at the Bloody Angle on the Battle Road), and Daniel Brown as their drummer. It has been said of the modern Fifes & Drums of the Lincoln Minute Men that they play in the Massachusetts style, with a Gaelic accent. Like all musicians, they play for the sheer joy of it. But they also see their music as a path back into history, to the times and lives of Joseph and Elijah Mason and Daniel Brown. So the modern Fifes & Drums perform only music from the era of the American Revolution. In the spirit of brotherhood, the Lincoln fifers have embraced the challenges and frustrations of performing with the same six-hole fifes that Joseph and Elijah Mason would have used. The rope-tension drums played by the Lincoln drummers would have been familiar to Daniel Brown, right down to the gut strings stretched across the bottom that give snare drums their crisp snap.
The Fifes & Drums of the Lincoln Minute Men invite you to follow them on their musical path back into history. Each year on Patriots’ Day weekend, the Lincoln Minute Men host “The Lincoln Salute: A Concert of 18th Century Fife & Drum Music,” featuring some of the best fife and drum groups from New England, the United States, and abroad.