It took nearly a fortnight to reach Boston.
Washington had ridden only twenty miles on his long journey when the news reached him of the fight at Bunker Hill.

The question which he asked anxiously shows what was in his mind: "Did the militia fight ?" When the answer was "Yes," he said with relief, "The liberties of the country are safe." He reached Cambridge on the 2d of July and on the following day was the chief figure in a striking ceremony.

In the presence of a vast crowd and of the motley army of volunteers, which was now to be called the American army, Washington assumed the command.
He sat on horseback under an elm tree and an observer noted that his appearance was "truly noble and majestic." This was milder praise than that given a little later by a London paper which said: "There is not a king in Europe but would look like a valet de chambre by his side." New England having seen him was henceforth wholly on his side.

His traditions were not those of the Puritans, of the Ephraims and the Abijahs of the volunteer army, men whose Old Testament names tell something of the rigor of the Puritan view of life.

Washington, a sharer in the free and often careless hospitality of his native Virginia, had a different outlook.