On Fox News Sunday, Sarah Palin was asked about the version of Paul Revere’s ride she offered during her visit to Boston, Mass., last week. Palin rejected claims that she’d flubbed her history, and criticized what she called a “gotcha” question.
“You realize that you messed up about Paul Revere, don’t you?” host Chris Wallace asked.
“You know what, I didn’t mess up about Paul Revere,” Palin said. She went on:
Here’s what Paul Revere did. He warned the Americans that the British were coming, the British were coming and they are going to try to take our arms so we have to make sure that we were protecting ourselves and shoring up all of our ammunitions and our firearms, so that they couldn’t take them. But remember that the British had already been there, many soldiers, for seven years in that area. And part of Paul Revere’s ride, and it wasn’t just one ride — he was a courier, he was a messenger — part of his ride was to warn the British that were already there that, “hey, you are not going succeed, you are not going to take American arms. You are not going beat our own well-armed persons, individual private militia that we have.” He did warn the British, and in a shout-out gotcha type of question that was asked of me I answered candidly. And I know my American history.
Meanwhile, The Boston Herald found at least one historian, Boston University professor Brendan McConville, to kinda, sorta back Palin’s account of Revere warning the British and warning shots being fired (though he called her “lucky.”) Patrick Leehey, research director of the Paul Revere House, expressed doubts that Palin was referring to the actual historical data in her comments.
To help her luck, Palin’s supporters have apparently taken to Wikipedia, and are editing the entry on Paul Revere to better fit the former Alaska governor’s account, prompting one user to write that “someone has added false information in an effort to support Sarah Palin’s FALSE claims about Paul Revere.”
Watch:
Ed. note: this article originally said Leehey was the expert who called Palin “lucky.”
