Shirley-Eustis House - Roxbury MA - Wikipedia Entries on Waymarking.com

The house was from 1747-1751 on 33 acres (130,000 m2) in Roxbury by William Shirley (1694-1771), appointed Royal Governor of Massachusetts Bay Colony and Commander in Chief of British forces in North America by King George II. The house is attributed to architect Peter Harrison, and is one of four remaining Royal Colonial Governors' mansions in the United States.
In 1763 the mansion was inherited by his son-in-law Eliakim Hutchinson, Chief Justice of the Court of Common Pleas for Suffolk County, and one of Boston's richest men. After Hutchinson died in 1775, the house was occupied by Colonel Asa Whitcomb's Massachusetts Sixth Foot Regiment, and in 1778 was seized as Loyalist property. It then sat unoccupied until purchased in 1782, then passed through a succession of owners, including the widow of a French planter in Haiti, a real estate speculator, and a China merchant, until it was acquired by Congressman William Eustis, Secretary of War under President James Madison during the War of 1812, Ambassador to Holland 1815-1818, and the first Democratic-Republican Governor of Massachusetts from 1823-25.

After his wife's death in 1865, the estate passed to relatives who auctioned off the house's contents. In 1867 its site was subdivided in 53 lots and sold. The mansion was also sold, and moved about 60 feet (18 m) to make way for Shirley Street. By 1886 the house was occupied by more than a dozen tenants; it was abandoned in 1911.

In 1913 William Sumner Appleton, who had recently founded the Society for the Preservation of New England Antiquities, founded Shirley-Eustis House Association to save the house, which was then used for storage of antiquities.

It was declared a National Historic Landmark in 1960.

Extensive restoration began in the 1980s, and in 1991 the house opened to the public. The restoration, which included restoring the grounds to include an orchard, period perennial beds, parterre gardens, and a large lawn, won a Boston Preservation Alliance award for the best-restored small-scale structure in the City of Boston.

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Date Logged Log User Rating   10/30/2009 nomadwillie visited it