Longfellow House–Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site

The Longfellow House–Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site (also known as the Vassall-Craigie-Longfellow House and, until December 2010, Longfellow National Historic Site) is a historic site located at 105 Brattle Street in Cambridge, Massachusetts, U.S. It was the home of noted American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow for almost 50 years, and it had previously served as the headquarters of General George Washington during the early American Revolutionary War.

The house was built in 1759 for Jamaican plantation owner John Vassall Jr., who fled the Cambridge area at the beginning of the American Revolutionary War because of his loyalty to the king of England. George Washington occupied it as his headquarters beginning on July 16, 1775, and it served as his base of operations during the Siege of Boston until he moved out on April 4, 1776. Andrew Craigie, Washington's Apothecary General, was the next person to own the home for a significant period of time. He purchased the house in 1791 and instigated its only major addition. Craigie's financial situation at the time of his death in 1819 forced his widow Elizabeth to take in boarders, and one of those boarders was Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. He became its owner in 1843 when his father-in-law Nathan Appleton purchased it as a wedding gift. He lived in the home until his death in 1882.

The last family to live in the home was the Longfellow family, who established the Longfellow Trust in 1913 for its preservation. In 1972, the home and all of its furnishings were donated to the National Park Service, and it is open to the public seasonally. It presents an example of mid-Georgian architecture style.

History

Early history The original house was built in 1759 for Loyalist John Vassall Jr.,Calhoun, Charles C. Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004: 124. . owner of a slave-labor sugar plantation in Hanover, Jamaica."John Vassall II, 1738-1797." Center for the Study of the Legacy of British Slavery, University College London. Vassall was a direct descendant of an original patentee of the Massachusetts Bay Company, William Vassall, who established the family's first Caribbean slave-labor plantation in 1648. He inherited the land along what was called the King's Highway in Cambridge when he was 21. He demolished the structure that had stood there and built a new mansion,Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 84. and the home became his summer residence with his wife Elizabeth (née Oliver) and children until 1774. His wife's brother was Thomas Oliver, the royal lieutenant governor of Massachusetts who moved to Cambridge in 1766 and built the Elmwood mansion. Vassall, who kept a number of people enslaved on the property,Bell, J.L. George Washington’s Headquarters and Home, Cambridge, Massachusetts. National Park Service, 29 February 2012. See also "Though Dwelling in a Land of Freedom," Longfellow House Washington's Headquarters National Historic Site, National Park Service. served for a time as a warden of nearby Christ Church.Schutz, John A. Legislators of the Massachusetts General Court, 1691–1780: A Biographical Dictionary. Boston, MA: Northeastern University Press, 1997: 366. Vassall's house and all his other properties were confiscated by Patriots in September 1774 on the eve of the American Revolutionary War because he was accused of being loyal to the King. He fled to Boston and later to England where he died in 1792.Levine, Miriam. A Guide to Writers' Homes in New England. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Apple-wood Press, 1984: 124.

The home was used as a temporary hospital in the days after the Battles of Lexington and Concord. Colonel John Glover and the Marblehead, Massachusetts Regiment occupied the house as their temporary barracks in June 1775.Harris, John. Historic Walks in Cambridge. Chester, Connecticut: The Globe Pequot Press, 1986: 208. General George Washington, Commander-in-Chief of the newly formed Continental Army, initially used the Benjamin Wadsworth House at Harvard College as his headquarters,Benjamin Wadsworth House from Historic Buildings of Massachusetts. but he decided that he needed more space for his staff;McCullough, David. 1776. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005: 41. he moved into the Vassall House on July 16, 1775, and used it as his headquarters and home until he departed on April 4, 1776. During the Siege of Boston, he found the view of the Charles River from the house particularly useful.Calhoun, Charles C. Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004: 125. . The home was shared with several aides-de-camp, including colonel Robert H. Harrison.Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 85. Washington was visited at the house by John Adams and Abigail Adams, Benedict Arnold, Henry Knox, and Nathanael Greene. In his study, he also confronted Dr. Benjamin Church with evidence that he was a spy.Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 87. It was in this house that Washington received a poem written by Phillis Wheatley, the first published African-American poet. "If you should ever come to Cambridge", he wrote to her, "I shall be happy to see a person so favored by the Muses".Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 91.

Martha Washington joined her husband in December 1775 and stayed until March 1776. She brought with her Washington's nephew George Lewis as well as her son John Parke Custis and his wife Eleanor Calvert. On Twelfth Night in January 1776, the couple celebrated their wedding anniversary in the home. Mrs. Washington reported to a friend that "some days we have [heard] a number of cannon and shells from Boston and Bunkers Hill". She used the front parlor as her personal reception room, still furnished with the English-made furniture left behind by the Vassalls.Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 86. The Washingtons also had several servants, including a tailor named Giles Alexander, and several slaves including "Billy" Lee. They also entertained very often. Surviving household accounts show that the family purchased large quantities of beef, lamb, wild ducks, geese, fresh fish, plums, peaches, barrels of cider, gallons of brandy and rum,McCullough, David. 1776. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2005: 42. and 217 bottles of Madeira wine purchased in a two-week period.

Washington left the house in April 1776.Calhoun, Charles C. Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004: 126. . Nathaniel Tracy had made a great fortune as one of the earliest and most successful privateers under Washington, and he owned the house from 1781 to 1786. He then went bankrupt and sold it to Thomas Russell, a wealthy Boston merchant who occupied it until 1791.

Craigie family and boarders Andrew Craigie had been the first Apothecary General of the American army, and bought the house in 1791.Levine, Miriam. A Guide to Writers' Homes in New England. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Apple-wood Press, 1984: 124–125. He hosted Prince Edward, Duke of Kent and Strathearn in the ballroom; Prince Edward was the father of Queen Victoria.Harris, John. Historic Walks in Cambridge. Chester, Connecticut: The Globe Pequot Press, 1986: 209. Craigie married Elizabeth while living in the house; she was the daughter of a Nantucket clergyman and only 22 years old, 17 years younger than he.

Craigie overspent trying to restore the home, and left Elizabeth in great debt when he died in 1819. She took in boarders to support herself,Wagenknecht, Edward. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Portrait of an American Humanist. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966: 7 most often people connected to nearby Harvard University.Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 89. Short-term residents of the home included Jared Sparks, Edward Everett, and Joseph Emerson Worcester.Brooks, Van Wyck. The Flowering of New England. New York: E. P. Dutton and Company, Inc., 1952: 153 Sparks moved into the home in April 1833 while he was preparing a biography of Washington based on original documents. He recorded in his journal: "It is a singular circumstance that, while I am engaged in preparing for the press the letters of General Washington which he wrote at Cambridge after taking command of the American army, I should occupy the same rooms that he did at that time.""The George Washington Papers: Provenance and Publication History" at the Library of Congress Another lodger was Sarah Lowell, an aunt of James Russell Lowell.Hansen, Harry. Longfellow's New England. New York: Hastings House, 1972: 48.

Longfellow moved to Cambridge to take a job at Harvard College as Smith Professor of Modern Languages and of Belles Lettres,Williams, Cecil B. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. New York: Twayne Publishers, Inc., 1964: 72–73 and rented rooms on the second floor of the home beginning in the summer of 1837. Elizabeth Craigie initially refused to rent to him because she thought that he was a student at Harvard, but Longfellow convinced her that he was a professor there, as well as the author of Outre-Mer, the very book that she was reading.Wagenknecht, Edward. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Portrait of an American Humanist. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966: 6–7

Longfellow's new landlady had earned a reputation for being eccentric and often wore a turban. In the 1840s, Longfellow wrote about an incident where canker-worms were devastating the elm trees on the property. Elizabeth Craigie "would sit by the open window and let them crawl over her white turban. She refused to have the trees protected against them & said, Why, sir, they have as good a right to live as we—they are our fellow worms". He wrote to his father in August 1837, "The new rooms are above all praise, only they do want painting."Hansen, Harry. Longfellow's New England. New York: Hastings House, 1972: 35. The rooms that he rented were the same ones once used personally by George Washington while it was his headquarters, and he wrote to his friend George Washington Greene: "I live in a great house which looks like an Italian villa: have two large rooms opening into each other. They were once Gen. Washington's chambers".

The first major works that Longfellow composed in the home were Hyperion, a prose romance likely inspired by his pursuit for the affections of his future wife Frances Appleton, and Voices of the Night, a poetry collection which included "A Psalm of Life". Edward Wagenknecht notes that it was these early years at the Craigie House which marked "the real beginning of Longfellow's literary career".Wagenknecht, Edward. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: Portrait of an American Humanist. New York: Oxford University Press, 1966: 8 His landlady, Elizabeth Craigie, died in 1841.Ehrlich, Eugene and Gorton Carruth. The Oxford Illustrated Literary Guide to the United States. New York: Oxford University Press, 1982: 39.

Longfellow family

Joseph Emerson Worcester leased the property from Elizabeth Craigie's heirs after her death, and he rented the eastern half to Longfellow.Calhoun, Charles C. Longfellow: A Rediscovered Life. Boston: Beacon Press, 2004: 167. . Nathan Appleton purchased the house in 1843 for $10,000; Longfellow married his daughter Frances, so Appleton gave him the house as a wedding gift.Wilson, Susan. Literary Trail of Greater Boston. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2000: 109. Longfellow's friend George Washington Greene reminded them "how noble an inheritance this is — where Washington dwelt in every room".Tharp, Louise Hall. The Appletons of Beacon Hill. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1973: 239. Longfellow was proud of the connection to Washington and purchased a bust of him in 1844, a copy of the sculpture by Jean-Antoine Houdon.Howard, Hugh. Houses of the Founding Fathers. New York: Artisan, 2007: 90.