Sanctuary Hills

Sanctuary Hills (often referred to as Sanctuary after the Great War) is a location in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Here, the Sole Survivor and their family used to live in the House of Tomorrow before the Great War. After the war, it becomes one of the places the player character may choose to build a settlement in. It is also home to several useful crafting stations such as a chemistry station, a cooking station, a weapons workbench, and an armor workbench.

History
Built sometime in the 2070s, Sanctuary Hills was a friendly suburb of Concord, about a mile away. Located on a small island, and accessible only by a wooden bridge, it consists of 14 prefabricated homes. Here, the Sole Survivor lived with their spouse, child and Codsworth, their robot butler.

On Saturday October 23rd, 2077, many families were just beginning their weekend mornings when their radios and television sets began reporting nuclear detonations in New York and Pennsylvania at 9:42 am. At 9:47 am, Boston was hit by one atomic warhead, and Sanctuary Hills was hit by the atomic blast seconds later. Select citizens that had spaces reserved fled to Vault 111, just through the woods surrounding the community, to escape the atomic fire.

After the war, Sanctuary Hills was reduced to ruins, with its only residents being radroaches, bloatflies and Codsworth, as well as the Vault-Tec rep for a very short period of time. Fortunately, the town has some basis to become a good settlement, for very few critters pass by the area. There are occasional attacks from raiders, or super mutants and sometimes a Wasteland creature or some Gunners, who all have a chance to appear as the Sole Survivor further develops the area. However, they remain at a low level even as the player character levels up, which makes Sanctuary one of the easiest spots to defend.

Layout
Sanctuary Hills is accessible by a small footbridge from Vault 111 and a larger bridge which crosses the nearby river and leads, via road, to Concord. The village itself is built along a single road, which ends in a cul-de-sac, and is populated by several houses which, by 2287, are in various states of decay. To the west of Sanctuary Hills the Misty Lake is located and is the source to the two rivers surrounding the small island of Sanctuary Hills.

There are multiple safes and lootable items to be found in Sanctuary. Starting from the bridge leading out of the community, there is a floor safe (Advanced) hidden under a dresser in the blue house to the north of the road. In the yellow house at the curve of the street, there is a terminal (Novice) and a safe (Novice) with a makeshift bomb on top of it. In the blue house next to the yellow one is a Nuka-Cherry in the fridge, a first aid box in the bathroom, and a locked suitcase (Novice) in the bedroom. In the Sole Survivor's house, the player character can find an issue of Grognak the Barbarian on the kitchen table and the "You're SPECIAL!" book under the dresser in Shaun's room. There is a safe (Advanced) in the first house and a root cellar around the back of the second house down the street, which contains multiple items and a locked safe (Advanced). The house south of the roundabout has a floor safe hidden under the baby bed.

The root cellar is a shelter built under a neighboring property, two houses up from the House of Tomorrow in 2287. It appears that the owner was not able to reserve a space in a vault and so made his own shelter. The door can be found at the back of the house, just before the cul-de-sac in the northeast of Sanctuary Hills. It is next to a bush of wild mutfruit plants. There is a dufflebag containing leveled loot on the roof of the same house, accessible via the fallen tree at the back of the house.

Inhabitants
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In 2287

 * Codsworth (lives in the House of Tomorrow)
 * Preston Garvey (if When Freedom Calls is completed)
 * Jun Long (if When Freedom Calls is completed)
 * Marcy Long (if When Freedom Calls is completed)
 * Mama Murphy (if When Freedom Calls is completed)
 * Sturges (if When Freedom Calls is completed)
 * Vault-Tec rep (if convinced via Charisma check)
 * Sheffield (if convinced in Diamond City)
 * Settler (if recruitment radio beacon is installed)

Pre-War inhabitants

 * Sole Survivor (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Nora/Nate
 * Shaun
 * Codsworth
 * Mr. Able (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Mrs. Able (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Baker (pre-War inhabitant)
 * DiPietro (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Rosa (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Rosa's son (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Jahani (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Russell (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Mr. Whitfield (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Mrs. Whitfield (pre-War inhabitant)
 * Mr Smith (pre-War inhabitant)
 * }

Related quests

 * War Never Changes
 * Out of Time
 * The Molecular Level (optional; only if the Sole Survivor chose to ask for help from the Minutemen)
 * When Freedom Calls
 * Sanctuary

Appearances
Sanctuary Hills appears only in Fallout 4.

Behind the scenes
Sanctuary Hills appears to be set in the same location as the real-world Minute Man National Historical Park, as both are located northwest of Concord across what appears to be the Concord River, the bridge used to access Sanctuary in-game is nearly identical to the real-life Old North Bridge, and the location's map-marker bears a resemblance to the Minute Man statue adjacent to the bridge in real-life (Sanctuary also has a Minute Man statue, albeit adjacent to the wrong side of the bridge). The houses in sanctuary are based on the Lustron prefabricated houses constructed after the second world war in response to the shortage of housing for returning GIs.