Rocky Hill Meeting House

Rocky Hill Meeting House, Amesbury, Massachusetts.

The Rocky Hill Meeting House is an early New England meeting house located at 4 Portsmouth Road, Amesbury, Massachusetts. It is the best preserved example of an original 18th century meeting house interior in New England, and now a nonprofit museum owned by Historic New England and open to the public several afternoons a year.

The meeting house was built to serve west parish of Salisbury in approximately 1785, replacing a c. 1715 meeting house. George Washington greeted local townspeople in this meeting house on his northward journey in 1789. By the 1840s, regular religious services had come to an end. Historic New England acquired the meeting house in 1941.

Its interior has remained virtually unchanged since it was constructed, with the original high pulpit, pentagonal sounding board, deacon's desk, marbleized columns, box pews (complete with graffiti and foot warmers), unfinished stairs to the gallery, and sloping gallery on three sides. The pews have never been painted, the marbleized pulpit and pillars supporting the galleries still feature their original paint, and the building still contains its original hardware.