Peter Salem was born a slave in Framingham. He was freed from being a slave when he joined Edgells Minuteman company. In the War of Independence Peter Salem shot British Major Pitcairn at Bunker Hill. He also fought at Concord, and Saratoga. After the war he went from house to house to make baskets. He died in 1816. He is buried at the Old Burying Ground.

    Peter the Venerable (1092-1156), abbot of the abbey of Cluny, probably born in Montboissier, France. Peter was educated in the abbey of Soucilanges and was 20 years old when he was appointed professor and prior of the monastery at Vézelay, and later at Domène. In 1122 Peter was elected general of the order and was appointed abbot of Cluny. During his 35 years as abbot, Peter initiated widespread measures of reform at Cluny, and his influence was also felt throughout Europe in ecclesiastical and lay circles. Peter's work, however, was somewhat limited by the unsuccessful attempt of the Abbot Pontius, his deposed predecessor, to seize the abbey, as well as by the dissension existing between the monks at Cluny and the monastic order of Cistercians .Because of their high regard for each other, Peter accepted the attacks made on his order by Cistercian monk Saint Bernard of Clairvaux and took the occasion to write the rules of discipline of the Congregation of Cluny (1146-1148), abolishing the chief abuses censured by the Cistercians. Peter was largely responsible for averting a Church schism following the papal elections of 1130 by supporting the cause of Innocent II at the General Council of Pisa in 1134. He also welcomed French theologian Peter Abelard to the monastery at Cluny after Abelard's doctrine had been condemned at Soissons. On a visit to Spain in 1141 he commissioned Peter of Toledo to translate the Qur'an (Koran); this work was for many years the only Latin translation in existence. Peter the Venerables scholarly writings are among the most important historical documents of the 12th century, and, besides numerous letters, sermons, and even verse, he also wrote theological treatises on the divinity of Christ and on miracles.Salem had been sold by Belknap to Major Lawson Buckminster, who freed Salem. Salem became one of the Minutemen heroes of the American Revolutionary War. On April 19, 1775, he fought at Concord, Massachusetts. A week later, he enlisted in Colonel Nixon's Fifth Massachusetts Regiment. He served in Captain Drury's company and fought with Drury at the Battle of Bunker Hill. At dawn on June 17, 1775, General William Howe ordered fire on the Americans' fortifications, but this did not end in victory. Howe struck again at the central redoubt and was again repulsed. With reinforcements, he struck the third time and drove the Americans northward across Bunker Hill. The Colonials had 400 dead and wounded men; the British lost more than 1,000. Salem was credited with the shot that killed Major John Pitcairn.

     Salem re-enlisted in 1776 and fought at Saratoga and Stony Point. General George Washington forbade blacks from soldiering. After Virginia' s governor, Lord Dunmore, freed slaves to serve the British, Washington reversed his own orders, and in January 1776, Salem re-enlisted. After the war, Salem built a cabin near Leicester, Massachusetts, and worked as a cane weaver. He died in 1816 the Framingham poorhouse. He is buried at the Old Burying Ground.