Eagle Feathers #167 – The Rebels and the Royalls

By Bob (Monty) Doherty

Medford’s Isaac Royall House abuts Tufts University’s campus on its northern perimeter. Today the site includes a beautifully gardened colonial estate and the only former slave quarters still in existence in New England. It has been over 380 years since John Winthrop of Somerville’s Ten Hills and the first Governor of Massachusetts originally built on this site.

During the Revolutionary War, the mansion provided shelter for many historic personalities. Some of its residents were:

• General John Stark and his wife Molly – He was one of the heroes at the Battle of Bunker Hill, the Battle of Bennington and other major conflicts. He was the source of New Hampshire’s motto, Live Free Or Die.
• General George Washington – He was the commanding General of the Colonial Army and later, first President of the United States. He interrogated English prisoners in the Royall House and drafted plans for the “Siege of Boston.”

• General Charles Lee – Lee was Washington’s second in command and for a short time had his quarters at the Royall House, which he nicknamed Hobgoblin Hall. As ordered, he moved to Sycamore Street in Somerville to be closer to his troops and Washington’s headquarters in Cambridge.
• General John Sullivan – He crossed the Delaware with General Washington at the Battle of Trenton and fought in other revolutionary conflicts. He later became Governor of New Hampshire.

Isaac Royall, Jr. inherited a huge fortune including the Royall Estate when his father died. The family’s wealth was acquired through his father’s dealings in rum, sugar cane and the Atlantic Slave Trade. In 1732, two years before he died, Isaac Royall, Sr. brought 27 slaves to Medford from Antigua. For forty years, the Royalls lived royally. They owned the 600-acre Ten Hills Farm in Somerville and Medford, which spanned today’s Sullivan Square to Medford Square and Broadway to the Mystic River. The Royalls funded Harvard’s first professorship of law that was named after him and also funded its law school.

The Royalls became vast landowners, and some of their holdings became the 42.5 square mile town of Royalston, Massachusetts. This town is exactly ten times the area of Somerville and is named after Colonel Isaac Royall, Jr.

John Singleton Copley was America’s first major artist. When he was only 20 years old, the Royall daughters sat for him. This fine image along with the Royall estate was confiscated. The painting now belongs to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston.

When the American Revolution began, Isaac Jr. became a Tory, or English loyalist. He sided with the British Crown and fled colonial America with his family. Despite his declaration of patriotism during the war, his citizenship was denied. He never returned to America and died in 1781 in England.

Today, the Royall House is designated as a National Historic Landmark.