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  ~Lewis and Harriet Hayden House~

The brick townhouse on 66 Phillips street may go unnoticed to a busy passerby save for a small mounted plaque- however its important history has earned it a spot on both the Black Heritage and Women's Heritage trails. Lewis and Harriet Hayden were prominent abolitionists in the mid 1800s whose home was an integral station on the Underground Railroad as well as a meeting place. Lewis met abolitionists in 1844 who smuggled them to liberation in a carriage, painting their faces white with flour, and they settled briefly in Detroit before moving to Boston so as to help other fugitives fleeing enslavement. One example were William and Ellen Craft, an interracial couple who had fled from Georgia and were being tracked by bounty hunters. The Haydens scared off the hunters by claiming that they had kegs of gunpowder hidden in the home which would explode if they dare trespass. Lewis was also an active member of the Anti-Slavery Society and a recruiter of African American men for the Civil War. In 1873 he earned a seat in the Massachusetts General Assembly. Harriet, who unfortunately often goes unrecognized, bequeathed their estate to a scholarship that still exists today.