Everyone Remembers Paul Revere’s Midnight Ride. But His Forgotten Race to Secure a Trove of Documents Reveals How Government Records Helped Win the War During the American Revolution, both the British and the patriots fought to keep sensitive papers out of enemy hands John Hancock left this trunk of documents at a Lexington tavern. Paul Revere and fellow Bostonian John Lowell recovered the trove of papers and carried it across the village green. Illustration by Meilan Solly / Images via Georgia Historical Society, Museum of Worcester and Massachusetts Historical Society Many Americans are familiar with the story of Bostonian Paul Revere, whose midnight ride on April 18, 1775, alerted the Massachusetts countryside to the presence of British troops in the hours before the opening battle of the American Revolution. But far fewer know that Revere also heroically rescued a vital trunk of paperwork that night.…