DISTANCE: 2.5 miles (4.5km)
TIME: A half day
START: Haymarket T Station
END: Community College T Station
POINTS TO NOTE: This route follows on from the end of Route 1, and the two can be linked for a full day’s itinerary. An alternative way to access or leave this route is by hopping on the Inner Harbor Ferry, which connects Charlestown Navy Yard with Long Wharf beside the Aquarium. Ferries run daily, every 15 minutes Mon–Fri between 6.30am and 8pm, every 30 minutes Sat–Sun between 10am and 6pm, and cost $3.50.
Much of the North End’s charm as a neighborhood comes from its improvisational quality, with a hodgepodge of buildings – some quite attractive, others not, and many dating from the late 1800s, when they were used as tenement houses for European immigrants.
Hanover Street is the area’s main thoroughfare, but around it spreads an archaic and confusing street plan. The North End is one of those places where it is easy to get lost, and probably best that you do. All kinds of unconventional spaces, not to mention many delicious delis, cafés, and restaurants can be discovered in the neighborhood’s less traveled areas.
St Stephen’s Church and the Old North Church
Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications
Italian fare abounds in the North End
Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications
Paul Revere House
iStockphoto
Rose F Kennedy Greenway
Begin the walk at Haymarket T Station. Until only a few years ago the raised expanse of the Fitzgerald Expressway (also known as the Central Artery) cut the North End off from the rest of the city. Now that the ‘Big Dig’ has buried the road underground, the cleared land forms a ribbon of parks through the city, known collectively as the Rose F Kennedy Greenway. Rose Fitzgerald Kennedy, mother of President John F. Kennedy, was born in the North End in 1890, and her funeral was conducted at St Stephen’s Church on Hanover Street in 1995.
Hanover Street
Head southeast through the park until you reach Hanover Street. On either side, as the street cuts through the park, are railings inscribed with historical dates and quotations about the area from past residents.
As Hanover Street enters the North End it is almost wall-to-wall with cafés and restaurants. For an espresso to power your way stop at Caffé Paradiso, see 1 [map]. A bit further along the street, you will come to Caffé Vittoria, see 2 [map], and The Daily Catch, see 3 [map], which are both also recommended.
Inside Boston’s oldest church
Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications
Old North Church
Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications
Paul Revere House
Turn right on Richmond Street and then left to enter cobbled North Square, where at no. 19 you will find the Paul Revere House 1 [map] (www.paulreverehouse.org; daily mid-Apr–Oct 9.30am–5.15pm, Nov–mid-Apr 9.30am–4.15pm, Jan–Mar, closed Mon). Built in 1680, this two-story dwelling, with an overhanging second floor, is downtown Boston’s oldest wooden house. Revere, then a silversmith, took up residence in 1770, and the house is furnished today much as it was when it was home to him and the first Mrs Revere, who bore him eight children, and then, when she died, to the second Mrs Revere, who produced a similar brood. It is from here that Revere started his historic horse ride that warned, ‘the British are coming!’
Pierce-Hichborn House
Next door is the restored Pierce-Hichborn House (open for guided tours only once or twice daily; see Paul Revere House website for details), which belonged to Nathaniel Hichborn, Revere’s cousin. The asymmetrical, three-story brick building, built between 1711 and 1715 in the new English Renaissance style, was a radical departure from the Tudor-style wooden dwellings built in the previous century.
St Stephen’s Church
Exit North Square via Prince Street, following the red bricks of the Freedom Trail back to Hanover Street. Turn right and walk two blocks north to reach St Stephen’s Church 2 [map], with its white steeple. Built in 1804 as a Congregationalist Meeting House, this dignified structure is the only one of five Boston churches designed by Charles Bulfinch that still stands. In 1813 it became a Unitarian church, and in 1862 it was acquired by the Roman Catholic archbishopric. Eight years later, when Hanover Street had to be widened to accommodate traffic, the church was moved back 12ft (3.7m) and raised 6ft (1.8m); then, in 1965, it was restored to its original level.
Paul Revere Mall
Directly opposite St Stephen’s Church is the Paul Revere Mall, known locally as the Prado. Built in 1933, this spacious brick courtyard is one of the liveliest public spaces in the North End – a sort of Americanized piazza where kids run around, old folks play cards, and footsore tourists take a breather from the Freedom Trail. In addition to a traditional Italian fountain, the Prado features a magnificent equestrian statue of Paul Revere, modeled in 1885 by Cyrus Dallin and cast in 1940. On the southern (left) wall, bronze panels recall the history of Boston and its people.
North End history
On colonial maps the North End looks like an irregular thumb jutting into the Atlantic Ocean, with a canal, called the Mill Stream, cutting it off from the larger Shawmut Peninsula.
By the late colonial period the small cluster of wooden houses had become one of Boston’s most fashionable quarters, with several fine brick homes and some of the richest families in town. Unfortunately, many of the prominent residents were Tories who, when the British evacuated in 1776, hightailed it to Canada and took their money with them. Rich Yankees pulled out too, preferring the more genteel atmosphere of Beacon Hill, then being developed. Artisans, sailors, and tradesmen filled the empty houses, and throughout the 19th century the North End was a working man’s quarter dominated by the shipping industry.
The Irish poured into the neighborhood in the 1840s, and soon dominated the area politically. Eastern European Jews followed the Irish, and by 1890 had established a thriving residential and business district along Salem Street. The Italians – mostly from Sicily and the southern provinces of the mainland – were the last group to arrive in substantial numbers; by the 1920s they had established an overwhelming majority, and have dominated the neighborhood ever since.
Old North Church
At the far end of the Prado a small gate opens to the rear of Christ Church, more popularly known as Old North Church 3 [map] (www.oldnorth.com; daily mid-Nov–Mar 10am–4pm, April–mid-Nov 9am–6pm). Before going into the church, take note on the left of the three-story (originally it was two) brick home of Ebenezer Clough, built in 1712. Next to it is a small garden planted as it would have been in the 18th century, while opposite is a poignant reminder of a more modern event: a Memorial Garden hung with military dog tags for those who have perished in recent wars in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Built in 1723, Old North is Boston’s oldest church. Its interior, painted white since 1912, sports high pew boxes, designed to keep in the warmth of braziers filled with hot coal or bricks, which were placed on the floor on wintry days. The clock at the rear of the church and the four baroque Belgian cherubs that surround it date back to the opening of the church. So does the organ case, although the actual instrument dates only from 1759. It is still played at the service every Sunday at 11am.
The bust of George Washington, in a niche to the left of the apse, was the first public memorial to the great man, and was said by General Lafayette in 1824 to be ‘more like him than any other portrait.’ The church has 37 crypts, containing, it is claimed, 1,100 bodies.
Copp’s Hill gravestones
Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications
Clapboard houses in the Bunker Hill neighborhood
Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications
Copp’s Hill Burying Ground
Exit from the church, and walk northwest up Hull Street for about 150yds/m to Copp’s Hill Burying Ground 4 [map] (daily dawn–dusk), Boston’s second-oldest cemetery (after King’s Chapel), where the gravestones, some ornately carved, poke out of the grass like misshapen teeth. Its name comes from that of William Copp, who farmed on the hill’s southeast slope in the mid-17th century. In the colonial era, the base of the hill, known pejoratively as New Guinea (after the African country of Guinea), was occupied by the city’s first black community, and about 1,000 black citizens are buried in the cemetery’s northwest corner.
Opposite the main entrance to Copp’s Hill Burying Ground, take note of the gray-painted clapboard house at 44 Hull Street. At just 9.5ft (3m) wide, this is Boston’s narrowest home, allegedly built around 1800 by a spiteful man to block the light coming into the neighboring house.
Notable tombstones
In the graveyard’s northeast corner a tall black monument commemorates Prince Hall, who helped found Boston’s first school for black children, and who was also the founder, in 1784, of the African Grand Lodge of Massachusetts, the world’s first black Masonic Lodge. Nearby is the tombstone of ‘Capt. Daniel Malcolm, Mercht,’ who is remembered for smuggling 60 casks of wine into port without paying the duty. He asked to be buried ‘in a Stone Grave 10 feet deep,’ secure from desecration. His body may have been safe, but his tombstone was not: on it are scars made by the Redcoats who singled it out for target practice.
Charlestown
The Freedom Trail’s red-brick route leads you along Hull Street to Commercial Street, where you turn left and then right to cross the Charles River on the Charlestown Bridge 5 [map].
Ahead lies the city’s oldest settlement, established in 1628, two years ahead of Boston. In 1630 it was the seat of the British government, and on its Breed’s Hill the bloody Battle of Bunker Hill was fought on June 17, 1775. The area’s prosperity was later tied up with the Navy Yard founded in 1800. At times (usually wartimes), it was the busiest shipbuilding and repair yard in the US, but in 1974 demand slowed to the point where the facility was forced to close – a third of it was taken over by the National Park Service.
Crossing the bridge provides an excellent view on the left of the Charlestown Locks, which control the water level between the river and the Inner Harbor, and, rising majestically in the background, the Leonard P. Zakim Bunker Hill Bridge (www.leonardpzakimbunkerhillbridge.org), one of the most striking contemporary structures in the city.
Paul Revere Park
Below the bridge on the Charlestown side of the river is pretty little Paul Revere Park 6 [map], part of the HarborWalk. Take the steps down to the park and follow the walkway under the Charlestown Bridge and past the hotel on Tudor Wharf toward the Charlestown Navy Yard.
City Square
Before exploring the Charlestown Navy Yard, you could take a breather at Sorelle Bakery and Café, see 4 [map], facing onto City Square, to the northwest. In the square’s center a small circle of greenery preserves the foundations of the Great House, dating from 1629 and believed to have been John Winthrop’s home and the colony’s brief seat of government. The house became the Three Cranes Tavern in 1635, and was destroyed during the Battle of Bunker Hill.
Charlestown Navy Yard
Walk for 100yds/m or so along Constitution Road toward the entrance of Charlestown Navy Yard 7 [map], whose most famous resident is the USS Constitution. Just inside the entrance is the Visitor Center (www.nps.gov/bost; daily Sept–June 9am–5pm, July–Aug 9am–6pm), where you can find out about free tours of the ship and its neighbor, the restored naval destroyer USS Cassin Young, which served in the Pacific during World War II. Elsewhere in the National Park Service administered area you can wander around the old buildings and dry docks used to mend ships. Escape the crowds at the little-visited Massachusetts Korean War Veterans Memorial, where you can listen to recordings of veterans remembering the conflict.
USS Constitution
Boston-built and first sailed from here in 1797, the USS Constitution 8 [map] (www.nps.gov; daily 10am–6pm; tours every half-hour) is the world’s oldest warship still in commission. It keeps this status thanks to an annual July 4 ‘turnaround,’ when tugs pull it out into the harbor. During its active service between 1797 and 1855, the USS Constitution was a victor in 42 battles.
On board, Navy enlistees in 1812 uniform conduct guided tours and answer questions. During the busy summer months lines to tour the USS Constitution can be long.
Opposite the ship is the USS Constitution Museum 9 [map] (www.ussconstitutionmuseum.org; daily 9am–6pm), which simulates the experience of life below decks. You can place your hands on a ship’s wheel, climb into a hammock, or hoist the sail on a moving ‘deck’ while the sounds of shipboard life echo all around. Also on show in the museum is a walk-through model of a keel and ribbing, and a continuous audiovisual program that depicts a bloody sea battle of 1812.
The USS Constitution
Richard Nowitz/Apa Publications
Colonel Prescott statue and Bunker Hill Monument
Abraham Nowitz/Apa Publications
Bunker Hill Monument and Museum
Exit the Navy Yard back onto Constitution Road and turn right to reach Chelsea Street. Duck through the nearby underpass beneath the Tobin Bridge, emerging on Lowney Way. Turn left and then immediately right onto Chestnut Street. Continue along Chestnut Street to the Bunker Hill Monument ) [map] (www.nps.gov; daily 9am–4.30pm, July–Aug until 5.30pm), a 220ft (67m) -high granite obelisk crowning Breed’s Hill. The battle was fought just north of the monument.
Climb the 294 stairs to the top for rewarding views of the city. The bronze statue on a pedestal in front of the monument is Colonel William Prescott, the patriot who uttered the immortal line, ‘Don’t fire until you see the whites of their eyes!’ as an instruction to the troops before the battle.
On the corner of Monument Square and Monument Avenue is the small Battle of Bunker Hill Museum (www.nps.gov; daily 9am–5pm), where, on the second floor, hangs an excellent reproduction of the Bunker Hill Cyclorama, a circular painting that places the viewer at the heart of the battle’s action. The original was shown in 1888 at the now demolished Castle Square Theater at 421 Tremont Street in the South End.
Winthrop Square
From the southeast corner of Monument Square head downhill along Winthrop Street, which leads into picturesque Winthrop Square ! [map]. For a century this was a training field where Charlestown boys learned the art of war. At the northwest corner is a gate flanked by bronze tablets commemorating those killed on June 17, 1775.
Return to Winthrop Street and keep going downhill, past the fire station and across Warren Street until you reach the junction with Main Street. Turn right here and head a couple of blocks to the corner of Pleasant Street, where you’ll find the historic Warren Tavern (for more information, click here) dating from 1780. Both Paul Revere and George Washington once stayed here.
Savings Bank Building
A few yards north, where Main Street meets Austin Street, stands the handsome Victorian Gothic-style Savings Bank Building @ [map] at 1 Thompson Square, built in 1875. The interior has been sensitively adapted into offices, a florist, barber, and café, with the bank’s enormous vaults still left intact.
From here a short walk west along Austin Street and across busy Rutherford Avenue will bring you to Community College Station, behind Bunker Hill Community College, the end of this route.
Alternatively, amble back through Charlestown, admiring its many old homes, toward the Navy Yard to pick up the Inner Harbor Ferry to Long Wharf.
Weekend processions
If you are in Boston in summer, be sure to time your visit to the North End to catch one of the Italian community’s local feasts, or festas, celebrated in honor of saints’ days. They are held almost every weekend in July and August, with Sunday being by far the more exciting day, and usually involve street fairs, brass bands, singers, raffles, food stalls selling sausage and peppers and zeppole (fried dough), and processions in which saints’ statues are carried, often festooned with contributions of paper money. In the Feast of the Madonna del Soccorso (Our Lady of Succor), celebrated in mid-August, the star of the show is the famous flying angel. Portrayed by a little girl on a pulley, she floats above North Street, her arms outstretched to the crowd, and is lowered to the statue and the procession below. The biggest celebrations are the Fisherman’s Feast and St Anthony’s Feast in late August.
Food and drink
1 Caffé Paradiso
255 Hanover Street [map]; tel: 617-742-1768; www.caffeparadisoboston.com; daily 7am–2am; $$
A popular local hangout, this café’s espresso, cannoli, panini, and calzoni are particularly delicious. Sweets are displayed in a glass counter and the TV beams in soccer games from Italy via satellite.
2 Caffé Vittoria
290–296 Hanover Street [map]; tel: 617-227-7606; daily 7am–midnight; $
A quintessential Italian café, with quirky decor that includes almost a museum’s worth of antique espresso machines. All kinds of other beverages are also served, along with traditional sweets.
323 Hanover Street [map]; tel: 617-523-8567; www.dailycatch.com; daily 11am–10pm; $
Cash only at this hole-in-the-wall institution that specializes in Sicilian seafood. The branch at Fan Pier, 2 Northern Avenue (tel: 617-772-4400) is handy for Route 10.
4 Sorelle Bakery and Café
100 City Square, Charlestown [map]; tel: 617-242-5980; www.sorellecafe.com; Mon–Fri 7am–4pm, Sat–Sun 8am–4pm; $
The original is at 1 Monument Avenue, but this branch keeps longer hours and still serves incredible breads and pastries, plus fresh sandwiches and salads.