Cambridge Common - Where Washington Took Command
Photo: Daderot, public domain (cropped)
A stop on Harvard Yard and Cambridge, a free self-guided tour.
This park has been public ground since 1630, when the first settlers used it as shared pasture and a militia training field. Its great moment came in 1775. After the fighting at Lexington and Concord, colonial soldiers camped here in makeshift shelters, and on July 3 George Washington took command of the Continental Army in Cambridge.
You may hear that he did it beneath a great elm on this spot. That is a legend. No record from the time places the ceremony under the tree, and historians have long doubted it. The Washington Elm fell in 1923; a plaque in Garden Street, at Mason Street, marks where it stood.
The Common holds harder memories too. In 1755, two enslaved people, Mark and Phillis, were executed here after being accused of poisoning the man who enslaved them. Look for the Prince Hall Monument, honoring the Black abolitionist leader, a Civil War memorial with a statue of Lincoln, and the Irish Famine Memorial.
Getting here: Walk west past the Science Center plaza, cross Massachusetts Avenue at the light, and enter the green park beyond, about seven minutes.
Did you know?: The Common once covered about 85 acres; today it is about 8.5.
Photo op: Frame the Civil War memorial with the open lawn and old trees of the Common behind it.
More on Wikipedia: Cambridge Common · Washington Elm · Prince Hall · Continental Army
Stops on this tour
- Harvard Square - Crossroads of Cambridge
- Johnston Gate - Harvard's Front Door
- Massachusetts Hall - Harvard's Oldest Building
- John Harvard Statue - The Statue of Three Lies
- Widener Library - A Memorial in Books
- Memorial Church - A Steeple for the Fallen
- Sever Hall - Whispers in the Brick
- Harvard Art Museums - Three Museums Under Glass
- Memorial Hall - Gothic Tribute to the Union
- Cambridge Common - Where Washington Took Command
- Christ Church and Old Burying Ground - Colonial Corner