Robert Keayne

Transcript

Home of Harvard founder

I WAS wondering down River Street a few weeks ago and came across an interesting plaque put up in 1923, commemorating the site of the house where a person called Robert Keayne was born in 1595.

Over the past few weeks research has revealed much about the man, who was the co-founder of the Ancient Artillery Company of Massachusetts in Boston, USA.

Robert Keayne was the son of John Keayne, a Windsor butcher practising in London.

He later went to live in London and was a member of the Honourable Artillery Company and also the Merchant Taylors Guild in 1623.

In 1617 he married Anne Mansfield and had one son called Benjamin, in 1619.

Keayne, together with his family, arrived in Boston from London in 1635 on a ship called The Defence.

His profession in Boston was a tailor and he lived above his shop.

Keayne belonged to the First Church congregation, where he listened to preachers whom he had first heard in London, such as John Cotton, who had come over to the USA in 1637.

While working as a tailor, Keayne was found guilty and fined £200 by a Puritan court for overcharging customers, which he regretted most of his life and even wrote about it in his will.

In 1638 he helped to establish the Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company of Massachusetts, serving as its first captain.

Keayne also served on the main governing body of Boston and as representative to the Massachusetts General Court and was pointed House Speaker in 1646.

In 1639, the General Court rewarded Keayne’s service to the colony both before and after his emigration with a grant of 400 acres of land.

At his death Keayne, in 1656, left a 53 page will covering a large range of topics including leaving a large sum to establish the first Town House – a building to ‘be used by the town and county government and be shared by the military company, with convenience for a market and conduit nearby’. It also included a covered market.

Keayne also contributed to a town library and was a founder of Harvard University.

When he was buried in Boston in the King’s Chapel burying ground a plaque was installed in central Boston in 1925 commemorating his achievements.

On the first Monday in June the Ancient and Honourable Artillery Company leads a procession to the gravesite, laying a wreath in Keayne’s memory – an event which has taken place every year to this day in memory of the Windsor-born man.

BIRTHPLACE: The plaque in River Street.

Plaque Text (Inscribed in Stone)

CAPTAIN ROBERT KEAYNE

BORN IN WINDSOR ENGLAND 1595
MEMBER OF THE HONOURABLE ARTILLERY COMPANY OF LONDON 1623

DEVOTED CITIZEN OF BOSTON
FROM 1635 TO DEATH IN 1656
LIBERAL CONTRIBUTOR FOR A TOWN LIBRARY
FOR THE MAINTENANCE OF A FREE SCHOOLMASTER
FOR INTRODUCING PURE WATER TO BOSTON AND
FOR THE FOUNDATION OF HARVARD COLLEGE

FOUNDER OF THE FIRST TOWN HOUSE LOCATED
WHERE OLD STATE HOUSE NOW STANDS

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