PARKERSBURG — Local observances are planned for the midnight ride warning the British were coming 250 years ago.

The Capt. James Neal Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution is encouraging residents on the evening of April 18 to place two lights in the windows of their homes and in courthouses and church steeples to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the heroic ride.

The Marietta Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution is planning a reenactment of the ride that evening at Muskingum Park.

“A lot of people don’t realize that 90% of the people here have ancestors who served in the Revolutionary War, lots of them in Lexington and Concord who raised the alarm,” said Jean Yost, secretary of the Marietta Chapter.

On the evening of April 18, 1775, starting in Boston, the Sons of Liberty arranged for a signal from the tallest church steeple in Boston to inform Concord of the British regulars’ route of march, one if by land and two if by sea. Two lanterns were seen in the Old North Church steeple signifying the British would be coming across Boston Harbor.

As Paul Revere and William Dawes rode through the surrounding towns, others joined by ringing church bells and firing warning shots. Realizing the British were going to Concord, they came upon Samuel Prescott on the way there and Prescott offered to help warn residents of the British expedition.

Revere was captured, questioned and released by the British. Dawes and Prescott were not captured.

Of the three, Prescott made it to Concord to warn of the coming British.

The famous poem “Paul Revere’s Ride” written in 1860 by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow doesn’t mention Dawes or Prescott.

Minutemen assembled on town greens along with other militia companies, and by the time the British crossed Boston Harbor, word had already reached Concord. The battles at Lexington and Concord, the “shot heard ’round the world,” was the beginning of the American Revolution.

Next year also marks the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776, that declared freedom from British rule. The war ended eight years later.

The observance of the events of April 18, 1775, will be held at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Muskingum Park near the Start Westward monument. Three riders on horseback and British regulars are planned, Yost said.

Dawes’ grandson Henry Dawes, who settled near Marietta.

The event is among other observances, which includes the 200th anniversary of the visit by the Marquis de Lafayette of France to Marietta.