Built in 1776-1777 by the widow and daughter-in-law of former colonial governor Jonathan Belcher, it is Milton's first known example of Federal style residential architecture.

Its main block is a two-story frame structure, with a hip roof and clapboarded exterior.

Its north and south elevations are symmetrical, with central entries flanked by two bays of sash windows.

[2] The house was built in 1776-1777 on land that had been purchased in 1727 by Jonathan Belcher, who served as colonial governor 1730-1741.

Construction of this house (which preserves part of the foundation of the original homestead in its basement) was complicated by the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War, and was not completed until 1777.