This article is about the island Long Island, Boston. For other islands called Long Island, see Long Island (disambiguation).

Long Island, situated in Quincy Bay in the middle of Boston Harbor, and one of the Boston Harbor Islands in Massachusetts, is part of the City of Boston. It is only accessible by road only over a 4,175 foot causeway ^[1] from the Squantum peninsula of North Quincy to Moon Island and from there, over a 3,050 foot two-lane steel bridge from Moon Island to Long Island. This road is also called the Long Island Viaduct. The island is 1.75 miles long and covers 225 acres.

Long Island was used and populated by Native American Indians, and in the American colonial period. On April 1, 1634, the island was granted to the City of Boston along with Deer Island and Hogg Island (now Orient Heights in East Boston). The rent for these three islands was set at two pounds per year. This grant was confirmed on March 4, 1635 when Spectacle Island was added to the package and the annual rent was reduced to four shillings per year for all four islands.

The Town of Boston leased Long Island to thirty-seven tenant farmers for farming and for the felling of trees. Wood was a hot commodity in this period since it was the main fuel used for cooking and heating of houses in Boston. Long Island derived its name from its length--a mile and three-quarters long and a quarter mile wide. William Wood in his "New England Prospect" reported that this isle abounds in wood, water, meadow ground, and fertile ground. He also noted that local farmers put their rams, goats, and swine here for safety during the corn growing season.

On February 24, 1640, the Boston Town Meeting ordered that Long Island be laid out into lots for farming starting at the eastern point on the island. On September 28, 1641, the Right-Honorable William, Earl of Stirling, filed an ownership claim for Long Island. His colonial agen, John Forest, recorded the Earl's claim against Edward Tomlin and others as intruders on Long Island. This claim was proven baseless by the Court in Boston.

On April 19, 1649, the Court in Boston levied an annual rent of 6 pence per acre on the farms on Long Island with payment due on February 1 each year. The proceeds from these rents were slated for the support of the free school in Boston. Because the Long Island tenants refused to pay these rents, in 1655, Boston officials send a constable out to the island to make the necessary collections.

On March 11, 1667, the Town of Boston deeded the farms on Long Island to the tenants with the stipulation that they pay up their back rent. By this act, the land on Long Island first passed into private hands. During 1672, Joseph and Elizabeth Rock purchased 41 acres on Long Island with a mortgage which they paid off by August 9, 1672. The deed described their property as having houses, outhouses, barns, stables, wharfs, yards, orchards, gardens, meadows, pastures, and fishing rights.

On October 6, 1676, during the panic caused by the French and Indian War, Massachusetts residents collected all of the local Indian population from the surrounding towns and herded them to a dock in Watertown on the Charles River. Here, they were loaded on barges and transported to Deer Island where they were abandoned. Through the freezing winter, the Indians main sustenance was fish and clams taken along the shore and mud flats of the island. Only a scanty thicket on the lee side of the hills protected them from the cold easterly winds. No barracks or other housing were provided to these unfortunate souls. In actuality, thousands of Indians were marooned on Deer Island that winter. Unfortunately, only the converted (praying) Indians were counted and recorded. Unconverted Indians were considered savages and sub-human. The intent of the European population was obvious. Hundreds of Indians perished of starvation and exposure during the winter of 1676-77. Old Ahatton and other chiefs petitioned the Court in Boston for the rights to visit other islands in Boston Harbor to harvest clams and fish because his people were starving to death. In the Spring 1677, the survising Indians were allowed to cross over to Long Island. This is one of the most horrific historical events ever recorded in Boston Harbor.

On April 19, 1689. John Nelson, a resident of Long Island, led Bostonians in a revolt against Governor Sir Edmund Andros, culmanating in the Battle of Fort Hill in Boston. Governor Andros had recinded the Massachusetts Charter and all previous laws and contracts that had been negotiated or enacted in the Massachusetts Colony.

During 1690, John Nelson bought all of the property from the tenants on Long Island with the exception of four and one-half acres owned by Thomas Stanberg, a shopkeeper from Boston. Stanberg was one of the original tenants on Long Island. Nelson was well conected politically being a close relative of Sir Thomas Temple, and the husband of Elizabeth Stoughton, the niece of Governor William Stoughton. On June 4, Nelson martgaged his Long Island property to William and Benjamin Browne from Salem Massachusetts for 1,200 pounds. Henry Mare managed the Browne's house and land on Long Island.

During 1692, John Nelson was captured by the French while on a privateering voyage. He was imprisoned in Quebec. It was common for for local privateers to receive commissions in Boston but were considered as pirates by the other nations of the world--especially the French and Spanish who were the superpowers at the time. While in prison, Nelson learned about secret French plans for attacks against the Massachusetts colonies. Nelson secretly informed the Massachusetts authorities from his prison cell. For this act, Nelson was punished by being transported across the Atlantic Ocean to the Bastille Prison in France. In 1702, after ten years of imprisonment, Sir Purbeck Temple obtained John Nelson's release. Nelson immediately returned home to Nelson's Island as a local hero.

On December 7, 1708, Benjamin Browne, one of the mortagers of Nelson's Island, died, passing control of the island to his brother William. William Browne passed on February 23, 1716. John Nelson died on December 5, 1721. On September 24, 1724, the land-deed given to John Nelson to the Brownes was declared a martgage and was annulled by a legal instrument executed by Colonel Samuel Brown, who acted as executor for the Brownes. The ownership of Long (Nelson's) Island had reverted to Nelson's heirs in seven parts. Two parts went to John and Mary Nelson, heirs of the oldest son, Temple Nelson. One share went to Nathaniel Hubbard by his wife Elizabeth Nelson. One part went to Henry Lloyd by hjis wife, Rebecca Nelson. Another part went to John Steed by his wife, Margaret Nelson, and one part went to Robert Temple by his wife Mehitable Nelson. Robert Nelson bought up an additional four shares.

Robert Temple and the other owners sold the whole of Nelson's Island to Charles Apthorp, a merchant from Boston. The deed described the island as containing 200 acres of land, single houses, buildings, barns, stables, orchards, gardens, pastures, fences, trees, woods, underwoods, swamps, marshes, meadows, arable land, ways, water courses, easements, commoncs, common pasture, passages, stones, beach, flats, immunites, commodies, heriditaments, emoulants, and apportances. The name used for the island changed to Apthorp's Island at this time, although both names are found in various records. Charles Apthorp died on November 18, 1758 at 60 years of age. His heirs sold the island to Barlow Trecothick, and alderman and Lord Mayor of London. Trecothick had married Grizzell Nelson, the oldest daughter of John Nelson.

During the Revolutionary times in 1768, the occupying British forces used Long Island for grazing their sheep, cattle, and swine. The British also harvested the hay from this island's meadows as feed for their horses in Boston.

On July 12, 1775, Colonel John Greaton with a detachment of 136 American soldiers, in 65 whaleboats, raided Long Island where they "liberated" all the sheep and cattle grazing there, and captured 17 British sailors who were guarding the animals. British men-of-war, when alerted about the raid, fired at the whaleboats. A British schooner towing barges, loaded with armed marines, chased the American whaleboats back to their encampment in Squantum and Dorchester. One American soldier was killed on Moon Island. Moon Island was not connected to Squantum at this time and a waterway was open from behind Squantun (Squaw Rock) accross the mouth of the Neponset River to a large rock called Savin Hill.

On Sunday, March 17, 1776, British ships evacuated Boston under pressure from George Washington's forces on the heights on Dorchester (now South Boston). Abigail Adams from her vantage point in Quincy described the sight of the myriad masts of the British fleet as like a forest in the harbor. On board the British ships were 11,000 soldiers and sailors, 1019 self-exiled citizens of Boston, including 102 civil officers and 18 clergymen and 105 loyalists from the country towns.

Instead of immediately departing the Boston Harbor area, the British ships anchored in the outer harbor and continued the blockage of Boston Harbor for the next three months, which was a cause of great concern in Boston and the surrounding towns. British Commodore Banks on his 28-gun "Milford" and several other men-of-war commanded the blockading British fleet. As the blockade persisted, Abigail Adams was quite outspoken about the delay by the Boston authorities in removing the British blockade from the outer harbor. During June, fierce artillery battles were waged between the British ships and American shore batteries that were entrenched on the harbor islands. The embarassment from her remarks may have triggered the following actions:

One June 13, 1776, American General Ward ordered Colonel Asa Whitcomb and 500 cannoneers with a 13-inch mortar and two field cannons to the East Head of Long Island, while similar emplacements were set up on Hull. This installation was named, "Long Island Battery." At a signal from their commander, Brig. General Benjamin Lincoln, both batteries opened fire on the British fleet. When the British flagship, "Milford" was hit, Commander Banks ordered the rest of the British fleet to sea.

In 1794, A lighthouse was built on the northern head of the island, replaced by a bigger tower in 1819. It was later relocated to fit in with coastal fortifications.

Military use was started again during the Civil War when the island was a camp for conscripts and armament was installed. In the early Endicott Period, the defenses were modernized but were not subsequently used.

Fort Strong, on the northern tip of the island, was established in 1867, and remained in use until it was declared surplus in the 1940s, but was later revived as a radar site in the 1950s.

A resort hotel was located in the center of the island in the 1800s and a Portuguese fishing community grew on the shore.[2]

In 1882 the City of Boston took occupancy of the island for institutional care facilities: firstly an Almshouse, later a residence for unwed mothers, a chronic disease hospital, a nursing school and institutional farm.

Until the 1950s when a bridge was built from the adjacent Moon Island, the only transportation access to the island was by boat. The dedication plaque at the outbound entry to this bridge at Squantum, says it was built in 1950-1951 by the Institutions Department of the City of Boston, and calls it the "Long Island Viaduct". Moon Island is connected to the mainland Squantum peninsula of North Quincy by a causeway.

Long Island is currently used to support social service programs, as it has since 1882, contained in Boston Public Health Commission [3] Long Island Health Campus facilities in 19 buildings on 35 acres. This large campus of buildings presently houses the Long Island Shelter [4] [5] for the homeless in the Tobin Building since 1983, Project S.O.A.R. [6] in the Administration Building since the Fall of 1995, Pine Street Inn's [7] Anchor Inn, Andrew House (which moved there in 1987 from Dorchester, Massachusetts), and others. There are many buildings that are not in use which were once very active. Examples of these are The Curley Building (which once housed a performing arts auditorium for the population), Our Lady of Hope Chapel, and a crematorium, amongst others. Most of the campus was connected by tunnels as were most hospitals and universities at the time.

Boston Fire Department's Engine Company 54 [8] station house is located right on the island, adjacent to the campus.

Historical buildings and cemeteries dating from the Civil War to the Cold War can be found on the island, along with a large checkered red and white pattern water tower used as a navigational aid by the FAA for navigation into Logan International Airport. There is also a working farm.

Unlike most of Boston's harbor islands, Long Island is closed to the general public. There are the remains of Fort Strong and its parade ground, the Long Island Head Light [9] which is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and an abandoned NIKE missile base near the southwest end of the island.

A comprehensive list of most buildings and structures on Long Island follows. [10]

• Buildings
  • NIKE missile facilities (2 buildings - vacant)
  • Department of Environmental Protection and Boston Edison Air Monitoring Stations
  • Farm and greenhouse
  • Laundry building
  • Garage
  • Fire house
  • Morris building
  • Curley recreation building (vacant)
  • Tobin building
  • McGillivray building ^[2]
  • Wards A B C D
  • Richards building
  • Laboratory and morgue (vacant)
  • Incinerator, (behind morgue - vacant)
  • Power house
  • Administration building
  • Nichols building
  • Our Lady of Hope Chapel
  • Building 6 (vacant)
  • Nurses Building (vacant)
  • Sewerage treatment plant
  • Fort Strong power house, incinerator, and tower
  • Long Island Head Light (lighthouse) [11]

• Fortifications
  • Fort Strong: Battery Ward, Battery Hitchcock, Battery Drum, Battery Bassinger, Battery Smyth, Battery Taylor, Battery Stevens

• Other Structures
  • Viaduct (bridge - not open to public)
  • Pier (not open to public)
  • Civil War monument and cemetery
  • hospital cemetery (3,000)
  • unmarked cemetery
  • water tower
  • MWRA (Massachusetts Water Resources Authority) Shaft
  • granite block seawall.

• Cole, William I., "Boston's Pauper Institutions", The New England Magazine, Volume 24, Issue 2, April 1898 [12]

• Boston Harbor Islands factsheet on Long Island
• Fact sheets on Boston Harbor Islands
• Lighthouse on Long Island, Boston Harbor
• Map of Long Island, and Moon Island
• Article on Boston's Almshouse on Long Island in the 1800's
• Military page on Fort Strong, Long Island, Boston.
• Map of Fort Strong, Long Island, Boston, 1905.
• Long Island Head Light(house), Boston.

42°19′12.06″N 70°57′56.70″W / 42.3200167°N 70.9657500°W / 42.3200167; -70.9657500