Old North Church and Christ Church Lantern Belfry

Why is it significant?

You stand before Christ Church in the City of Boston, immortalized throughout American history as the Old North Church. Consecrated in 1723, this Georgian brick sanctuary is the oldest surviving religious building in Boston.

Key Facts

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You stand before Christ Church in the City of Boston, immortalized throughout American history as the Old North Church. Consecrated in 1723, this Georgian brick sanctuary is the oldest surviving religious building in Boston. Its soaring 175-foot white wooden steeple, crowned with an authentic 1740 weathervane crafted by tinsmith Shem Drowne, was the tallest structure in colonial Boston, visible across the Charles River to Charlestown and Cambridge.

It was from the arched upper belfry windows of this church that sexton Robert Newman and vestryman John Pulling Jr. hung two candle lanterns for barely a minute on the dark night of April 18, 1775. The predetermined signal—one if by land, two if by sea—alerted patriot watchers that British regulars were crossing the Charles River in boats toward Lexington and Concord.

Inside the quiet sanctuary, high box pews still bear the names of colonial merchant families who paid annual pew rents to support the parish. In pew number 62 sat royal colonial governor Thomas Gage. Beneath the church floor lies a fascinating subterranean crypt containing thirty-seven brick burial tombs where over eleven hundred early Bostonians rest, including Major John Pitcairn, the British marine commander who fell at the Battle of Bunker Hill. In the belfry above hangs North America's first change-ringing peal of eight church bells, cast in Gloucester, England in 1744. As a teenager, Paul Revere signed an official contract with the church to serve as one of the bell-ringers, learning the acoustic rhythm of bells that later signaled revolution.

Gazing up at the historic steeple against the blue New England sky, you feel the profound weight of the moment that ignited the American Revolution. Every brick and timber resonates with the courageous defiance of citizens who risked everything for liberty.

Walk west along Hull Street to the historic summit of Copp's Hill Burying Ground.