History of Charlestown.

1629 site of Puritan leader, John Winthrop's "Great House" in City Square, uncovered during the Big Dig

Originally a Puritan British city during the Colonial era (a time to which many of the neighborhood's structures date), Charlestown was founded in 1628 , and settled July 4 , 1629 , by Thomas Graves , Increase Nowell Rev. Francis Bright, Ralph, Richard and William Sprae and about 100 others who preceded the Great Migration . John Winthrop's company stopped here for some time in 1630 , before deciding to settle across the Charles River at Boston.

On June 17 , 1775 the Charlestown Peninsula was the site of the Battle of Bunker Hill . In fact, the battle actually took place on Breed's Hill, which overlooked the harbor and the town and was only about 400 yards from the southern end of the peninsula; Bunker Hill was near the northwest end of the peninsula, close to Charlestown Neck and about a mile from the Charles River. The town, including its wharves and dockyards, was destroyed by fire during the battle.

Birdseye view of Boston , Charlestown, and Bunker Hill, between 1890 and 1910.

Around the 1860s an influx of Irish immigrants arrived in Charlestown. The neighborhood remained an Irish stronghold in the cultural, economic, and Catholic traditions of neighborhoods like South Boston Somerville , and Dorchester . On October 7, 1873, a vote was held to determine whether Charlestown should join Boston; Boston residents approved the question, 5960-1868, and Charlestown residents also approved, 2240-1947.^[1] Stoneham (1725) and Somerville (1842) were carved out of Charlestown.

During the early 1960s, The Boston Redevelopment Authority (BRA) initiated plans to demolish and redevelop sixty percent of the housing in Charlestown.^[2] In 1963, the BRA held a town meeting to discuss their plans with the community. The BRA's dealings with Boston's West End had created an atmosphere of distrust towards urban renewal in Boston, and Charlestown residents opposed the plan by an overwhelming majority. By 1965, the plan had been reduced to tearing down only eleven percent of the neighborhood, including the removal of the elevated rail tracks.

Throughout the 1960s until the middle 1990s, Charlestown was infamous for its Irish Mob presence. Charlestown's McLaughlin Brothers were involved in a gang war with neighboring Somerville's Winter Hill Gang , during the Irish Mob Wars of the 1960s. In the late 1980s, however, Charlestown underwent a massive gentrification process similar to that of the South End . Drawn to its proximity to downtown and its colonial, red-brick, row-house housing stock, similar to that of Beacon Hill , many upper-middle class professionals moved to the neighborhood. In the late 1990s, additional gentrification took place, similar to that in neighboring Somerville.^{[citation neede} Today the neighborhood is a mix of upper-middle and middle-class residences, housing projects, and a large working class Irish-American demographic and culture that is still predominant.

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