Beyond the Neck: When Somerville was Charlestown

The history of Charlestown is diverse and multi-faceted. The area was inhabited by the Massachusett Tribe who called it Mishawum, before being settled by the English beginning in 1628 prior to the arrival of the Winthrop Fleet in 1630. Not only is it the site of one of the most significant battles of the American Revolution, but it has a rich Irish heritage and a significant naval and maritime history in addition to its indigenous history, which dates to 8000-10,000 BCE.

Historically, the Doctrine of Discovery asserted that a Christian European country could assume ownership of a non-Christian ‘discovered’ land. This uncodified ‘custom’, in effect for centuries, was the British justification for colonization. It should be noted that although King Charles I granted the Massachusetts Bay Company the tract, Squaw Sachem, the hereditary indigenous leader of the rightful inhabitants, sold Charlestown, Cambridge (Newtowne) and Watertown to Governor Winthrop for 21 coats, 19 fathom of wampum, and 3 bushels of corn, as well as a £23 annuity and lifetime rights for she and her people to continue to hunt and fish in the territory.

The original colonial land grant was a massive tract comprised of the current towns of Charlestown, Somerville, Medford, Everett, Malden, Melrose, Stoneham, Wilmington, Reading, Woburn, Burington and Winchester. These towns all eventually separated from Charlestown over a 200-year period, with Woburn being the first to break away in 1642 and Somerville not separating until 1842.

In the 17th century, peninsular Charlestown was surrounded by the Charles River, Boston Harbor and the Mystic River. Like Boston at the time, it was connected to the mainland by an isthmus, a narrow strip of land known as ‘the Neck’ which sometimes flooded during high tide. If not travelling to Charlestown by boat, one had to cross the Neck, now the Sullivan Square area.

The area beyond the Neck was ‘mainland’ Charlestown which today comprises the entire town of Somerville, four times the size of Charlestown. After initially occupying only the peninsula for strategic and safety reasons, the colonists soon began utilizing the mainland tract, which became an integral part of the settlement as the communal Cow Commons, used for grazing and planting. By 1632, a herdsman was hired “to Keepe the Milch Cattle of this Towne in a herd without the neck of land upon ye maine …”. A short time later it was known as the “Stinted Pasture”, the term referring to the regulation and allocation of parcels of land by the town Selectmen. Initially, each family was granted two acres of land, but over the years families were allocated more acreage. Governor John Winthrop was granted a significantly larger 600-acre parcel at Ten Hills in 1631 where he established Ten Hills Farm on the banks of the Mystic River.

Over time numerous dairy farms were established on the Common. The road out of the Charlestown Neck to Cambridge (Newtown) was called Charlestown Lane, initially laid out by Thomas Graves in 1632. In time, it became the route by which dairy farmers (Including H.P.Hood) brought milk into Boston, and it became known as Milk Row. In the later part of the 19th Century, Milk Row became Somerville Avenue. Broadway was historically known as the Road to Menotomy (Arlington) or the Winter Hill Road. By around 1700, there were probably 10 or 15 modest dwellings on the mainland, most near peninsular Charlestown. Eventually brickmaking and quarrying commenced as the tract began to become more industrial than agricultural. Additional roads and range ways were established, crisscrossing the tract. In 1803, the Middlesex Canal snaked through Medford and mainland Charlestown from Lowell, terminating at the Mill Pond adjacent to The Neck.

What is now Somerville was a critical staging area for operations leading up to and during the American Revolution while still part of Charlestown. A seminal event occurred in 1774 at the Powder House, originally built as a stone windmill in 1703-4 at Quarry Hill (now Powder House Square Somerville). In 1747 the windmill was sold to the Province of Massachusetts Bay and converted into a gunpowder storage magazine for both the British government and the surrounding communities. The provincials had become hugely dismayed with British Rule following the Stamp Act of 1765, the subsequent British Occupation of Boston beginning in 1768, and various events that followed. By 1774, the British observed provincials stockpiling weapons and ammunition. The largest stockpile of provincial gun powder in Massachusetts was located at the Charlestown Powder House, and surrounding towns had begun retrieving their expected allocations as a defensive measure.

On September 1, 1774, a situation occurred that nearly started the American Revolution seven and a half months before the Lexington Alarm. By order of General Gage, 260 British troops left Long Wharf in 13 skiffs, rowed up the Mystic River, and marched to the Charlestown Powder House to remove 250 remaining half-barrels of gunpowder as well as two cannons. This event caused a major disturbance, magnified by false rumors that the British had shot and killed several provincials during the removal. The rumor spread rapidly and the following day, 4,000 local militiamen converged on Cambridge in protest. The crowd demanded the resignation of Lieutenant-Governor Thomas Oliver and other officials of the Crown. It was soon realized, however, that rumors of provincial deaths were false and that a battle was not imminent. The crowd dispersed. This act of rebellion became known as the Powder Alarm and was a precursor to what happened the following spring.

On the night of April18th, the British marched through the night to Lexington via Milk Road and the old Concord Road (later Mass. Ave). Their purpose again was to remove or destroy provincial arms and gunpowder. That evening, dispatched by Dr. Joseph Warren, Paul Revere left Charlestown to ride into the countryside to warn that the British were coming. After being forced off his original path by British scouts outside the Neck, Revere altered his route and headed up Winter Hill Road to reach Lexington. William Dawes took a different route, initially riding south through Roxbury.

Following the infamous Concord Alarm and the fighting that ensued the next day, the British retreat to Charlestown was a brutal and bloody running battle, particularly in Menotomy. There was one final skirmish at Prospect Hill as the exhausted British made their way to Charlestown Neck. Throughout the night, the regulars evacuated Charlestown, returning to Boston aboard ferries and long boats, guarded by HMS Somerset. The Battle that had begun in Lexington ended in Charlestown.

Two months later, during the Battle of Bunker Hill, reinforcements were again positioned at Prospect Hill and Winter Hill. That day, Winter Hill became the site of one of the earliest makeshift field hospitals, established by Anne Adams Tufts. Subsequently, the Continental Army established a massive fort at Prospect Hill that became known as The Citadel, used by George Washington as an outlying command post for nine months during the Siege of Boston. Winter Hill continued to maintain its extensive earthwork fortifications. Both Winter Hill and Prospect Hill held Hessian mercenary prisoners after the British surrendered at Saratoga.

The Charlestown mainland was tactically important during the Lexington Alarm, the Battle of Bunker Hill and the Siege of Boston. It served as a critical defensive vantage point due to its location, its abundant high ground and the strategically located Mystic and Miller’s Rivers. Charlestown and Somerville share a profoundly deep historic bond that goes back almost four centuries.

Today’s Charlestown encompasses the original peninsular village and adjacent ‘neck village’, as well as the vastly expanded landmass created by the filling-in of the surrounding waterways that commenced in 1835. Somerville’s boundaries remain largely the same as they were in 1842 when it became a separate town after over 200 years of being part of Charlestown.

Main Sources: The History of Charlestown by Richard Frothingham Jr. (1845), Somerville Past and Present by Edward A. Samuels and Henry H Kimball (1897), Beyond the Neck: The Architecture and Development of Somerville by Carole Zellie (1982); NPS, BostonBasinHills.org, AmericanRevolution.org

© Nancy Hayford Kueny