Fort Hill Roxbury

22-98 Fort Ave, Boston, MA 02119

The only road that connected the mainland with Boston on the Shawmut Peninsula passed through Fort Hill, dividing at John Eliot Square into the road to Brookline and Cambridge (Roxbury and Tremont Streets) and the road to Dedham (Centre Street). The district's height overlooking the land connection and its puddingstone outcroppings made it an advantageous location for the Continental Army to build fortifications.

In the summer of 1775, several thousand soldiers in the Continental Army built two forts in the area as part of a circle of defenses that eventually enabled the evacuation of the British from Boston. The goal was to guard Boston Neck, a thin strip of land that served as the only land route between Boston and Roxbury. (See Siege of Boston map)

The Lower Fort was located on two acres of land between Cedar, Highland, and Linwood Streets. The High Fort was an earthwork’s structure that occupied the summit of the hill. The High Fort, or Upper Fort, sat on the highest point in Roxbury. The High Fort is now where the Cochituate Standpipe is.

The secondary picture is a sketch representation of the High Fort taken from Josiah Benton’s powder horn. The following is an anecdote from Francis S Drake’s The Town of Roxbury (1878):

The lower fort stood until 1836, when Alvah Kittredge was building his now-famous house and decided to remove some of the ramparts. While the work was underway Aaron Willard,… a 16-year-old fifer, had slept at his workplace and been rudely awoken by a 24-pound cannon ball tossed by the British into his newly constructed earthen wall. He pointed out the spot where he thought the ball must have landed and Kittredge’s workers were actually able to find the ball! It remained in the Kittredge family as a souvenir, and perhaps it still remains somewhere in a Roxbury basement.

The Revolutionary War resulted in the destruction of many of Fort Hill's colonial-era buildings, and the Dillaway-Thomas is the only surviving pre-Revolutionary structure in the district. It is also said that the Fort Hill neighborhood is named for the High Fort. The current tower was built in 1869. (See Parsonage – Dillaway-Thomas House)

-Source Links-

https://www.nps.gov/places/fort-hill.htm

https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/siege-of-boston-map.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Hill,_Boston

https://boston1775.blogspot.com/2012/03/look-at-revolutionary-roxbury.html