Bird Island

Although no longer in existence today, Bird Island can be seen on this 1883 map of Boston Harbor.

Boston Public Library

Quick Facts

Location:

Inner Harbor

Designation:

Logan International Airport

OPEN TO PUBLIC:

No

MANAGED BY:

Massachusetts Port Authority

Once an island of considerable size, Bird Island has long since disappeared into East Boston and Logan Airport.  

Early town records show that a Thomas Munt collected hay from the island in 1650. In 1658, the town leased the island to James Euerill and Rich Woody for a period of sixty years.  

During the early colonial period, the island saw a great deal of tragedy. Like Nixes Mate, the city placed the bones of pirates, or those convicted of similar crimes, on display on Bird Island. According to Edward Rowe Snow, more than 15 "notorious pirates" had been buried on the island. In 1724, the crew of pirate John Philips killed him and then took the vessel into Boston. Captured, and placed on gibbets (gallows like structure to display dead bodies), the crew served as a warning sign to others.  

In 1726, the town executed John Battis and his son, along with three Indigenous people in Charlestown. After their deaths, the town moved them and buried them on Bird Island.  

In some cases, executions even occurred on the island. Around 1704, pirate John Quelch and fifteen of his crew faced piracy charges in Boston. Sentenced to death, the men had an escort of forty musketeers and two ministers. Executed on Bird Island, a newsletter described their death rather harshly, saying: "So to appearance they dyed very obdurately and impenitently, hardened in their sin." 

As late as 1790, Bird Island remained a grassy islet, though heavy materials removed from the island almost leveled it completely.¹ The former island became known as the Bird Island Flats. In the 1930s, the Commonwealth of Massachusetts approved dredging to take place near and on the Bird Island Flats. By 1981, the former island had been vacant for seven years when Massport released a $125 million dollar development plan for the Bird Island Flats. Though shrouded in controversy because of its location and cost, the Bird Island Flats eventually got absorbed into Boston Logan Airport.² 

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Footnotes:

1. Moses Foster Sweetser, King’s Handbook of Boston Harbor (Cambridge, MA: Moses King, 1883), 152-176; Edward Snow, The Islands of Boston Harbor (Carlisle, MA: Commonwealth Editions, 2002), 79-81. 

2. Rushworth M. Kidder, "Airport ‘81: Good old Boston Politics vs. Developers," last modified July 21,1981, accessed April 13, 2023; Commonwealth of Massachusetts. House. No. 352 HOUSE.