{"nrhp_refnum":"74000388","name":"Eliot Burying Ground","other_names":["Eustis Street Burying Ground","First Burying Ground in Roxbury"],"category":"site","location":{"address":"Eustis and Washington Sts.","address_restricted":false,"city":"Boston","county":"Suffolk County","state":"MA","lat":42.332064098000046,"lon":-71.08130714999999,"geom_source":"nps_gis"},"listed_date":"1974-06-25","is_nhl":false,"nhl_designated_date":null,"areas_of_significance":["Landscape Architecture","Art","Social History"],"significance_levels":["state"],"summary":{"what_it_is":"A colonial-era burying ground at the corner of Washington and Eustis Streets in Roxbury, Boston, established in the 1630s as Roxbury's first cemetery. It covers about 0.8 acre and is enclosed by a pudding stone wall built in 1856, with an adjoining former brick firehouse.","why_significant":"The nomination argues significance from the ground's early establishment, its funerary art, and the notable people buried there, including Governor Thomas Dudley and the minister John Eliot. Its markers show a shift from Puritan death imagery to neoclassical urns and willows. It also served as the site of the first American defensive work, Burying Ground Redoubt, during the siege of Boston.","narrative":"Eliot Burying Ground, at Washington and Eustis Streets in Roxbury, Boston, is the first cemetery established in that town, laid out from common land soon after Roxbury's founding in 1630. Roughly triangular, it is wrapped by a pudding stone wall with a granite cap and iron gate from 1856. Its paths wander among irregularly set stones, tombs and mature trees, since few markers were rearranged in the 19th century. The earliest tomb belongs to the Dudley family, and Governor Thomas Dudley is buried here. The Parish or Eliot Tomb of 1687 holds John Eliot, minister and translator of the Bible for Native peoples. The slate and stone markers trace a change from winged death's heads to urns and willows. During the siege of Boston, Americans built the Burying Ground Redoubt across the adjoining streets. A former Italianate firehouse occupies the site of the old hearse house at the southern edge.","period_of_significance":"17th Century (specific date 1630); 19th Century also marked","architect_builder":null,"architectural_style":"Former firehouse is Italianate","criteria":[],"status_note":"Condition listed as good and altered; owned by the City of Boston Parks and Recreation Department. Plans to rehabilitate the adjoining former firehouse as a small museum were being contemplated.","vacant_flag":null,"machine_generated":true,"model":"claude-sonnet-5-5","prompt_version":"v1.0-2026-10-29","generated_at":"2026-10-29 02:11:53.539254-05","source_pdf":"https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/opastorage/live/76/7970/63797076/content/electronic-records/rg-079/NPS_MA/74000388.pdf"},"photo":{"url_800":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/74000388/73bb31653c-800.webp","url_1600":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/media/74000388/73bb31653c-1600.webp","licence":"CC BY 3.0","author":"Tim Pierce","credit_html":"<a href=\"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eliot_Burying_Ground_1.jpg\" rel=\"noopener\">Tim Pierce</a>, <a href=\"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0\" rel=\"license noopener\">CC BY 3.0</a>, via Wikimedia Commons","source_page":"https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Eliot_Burying_Ground_1.jpg"},"district":null,"sources":{"nps_snapshot_date":"2026-05-22","nara_catalog":"https://catalog.archives.gov/id/63797076","wikipedia":"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliot_Burying_Ground","wikidata":"https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q5361218"},"indexable":true,"url":"https://nationalhistoricalregister.com/massachusetts/suffolk-county/eliot-burying-ground-74000388/"}