John Adams was the third president of the United States. He is a descendant of John Alden and Priscilla Mullins and thus a distant relative of the contributor, Richard Neal Heywood.
John Alden's descent from John Alden and Priscilla Mullins follows.
John Alden and Priscilla Mullins
Ruth Alden and John Bass
Hannah Bass and Joseph Adams
John Adams and Susanah Boylston
John Adame and Abigail Smith President of the USA
John Quincy Adams President of the USA
Richard's descent from John Alden and Priscilla Mullins follows.
John Alden and Priscilla Mullins
Hannah Bass and Josiah Rawson
Mary Polly Rawson and David
Warren Leland
Hannah Rawson Leland and
Benjamin Heywood
Joseph Leland Heywood and Martha
Spence
Joseph Neal Heywood and Sarah
Francelle Coleman
Leland Heywood and Margaret
Smurthwaite
Richard Neal Heywood and Carma Smith
Note: Orson Wells and Marilyn Monroe were also descendants of John Alden and Priscilla
Note: A Priscilla Mullins Bio follows that of John.
Adams was born in the village of Braintree
(Quincy), Mass.,
on Oct. 30 (Old Style, Oct. 19), 1735. His parents and ancestors had been
honored members of the community since its founding. His father, John Adams, was
influential in town business, serving as selectman and officer of the militia;
his mother, Susanna Boylston Adams, was known for her devotion to family and
church. The Adams clan had arrived from England about
1640 and settled on land that their descendants were still tilling in John's
boyhood.
JOHN ADAMS
Biography
 |
| John Adams |
John Adams, 2d Prsident of the United States. He devoted his life to politics,Boston
and Philadelphia
and later in the founding of the republic. He served as a Massachusetts delegate to the Continental Congress, as a diplomat
in the struggle to win European recognition of American independence, and as Vice President and President of the United
States during its critical, formative years, participating with distinction
first in the revolutionary activities.
Adams' diaries, letters, and books provide
invaluable information about the politics of his time. His writings reveal the
mind of an astute observer and philosopher--a very human one whose warmth, wit,
and playfulness captivate the reader. His reputation as an intelligent and
courageous statesman endures; but his name has been overshadowed by
others--perhaps because he was not uniquely connected with any single great
event.
Boyhood and Education
Adams was born in the village of Braintree
(Quincy), Mass.,
on Oct. 30 (Old Style, Oct. 19), 1735. His parents and ancestors had been
honored members of the community since its founding. His father, John Adams,
was influential in town business, serving as selectman and officer of the
militia; his mother, Susanna Boylston Adams, was known for her devotion to
family and church. The Adams clan had arrived
from England
about 1640 and settled on land that their descendants were still tilling in
John's boyhood.
Besides receiving the informal instruction of village life, Adams attended dame and Latin school. In spite of his
inclination to be a farmer, his schooling prepared him for college and a career
in the ministry. With some special tutoring in Latin from Joseph Marsh, a local
scholar, John passed his entrance examinations for Harvard College
in 1751 and began four absorbing years of study that excited his imagination.
"I was a mighty metaphysician, at least I thought myself such"; he
was a mighty scientist, debater, and orator, too. As he examined career
possibilities, the ministry soon appeared less interesting to him than law,
medicine, and public service. At graduation in 1755 he was still undecided, and
he accepted a teaching position in Worcester
while he contemplated the future.
Early Public Career
The career of a schoolmaster was most unsatisfying for Adams.
His pupils were "little runtlings" who barely knew their ABC's, and
his students noted that he was preoccupied with other matters. His position,
however, enabled him to meet the intellectuals of Worcester, including James Putnam, its most
distinguished lawyer. Adams finally decided to
make a career of the law and apprenticed himself to Putnam. Since the intense
young man was not interested in being a country lawyer, he returned as soon as
possible (in 1758) to Braintree,
where family connections could win him introductions to the Boston bar.
Lawyer Adams began his career in Braintree writing wills
and deeds and taking an interest in town affairs. Although local matters were
important to him, his law practice began to take him farther and farther from Braintree. On his way to
and from Plymouth
he would stop at Weymouth
to visit Abigail, the young daughter of the Reverend Mr. William Smith. John
and Abigail were married on Oct.
25, 1764, and he loved her deeply throughout their long marriage.
Adams' legal practice often took him to Boston, where he became
well acquainted with James Otis, Jr., and his distant cousin Samuel Adams. With
them he attended the clubs of tradesmen and joined the "Sodalitas" an
a founding member. This group of Boston
lawyers mixed scholarly discussions of law with debates on the legality of the
Stamp Act of 1765. Out of these meetings came Adams'
anonymous articles for the Boston
Gazette, later reprinted as A Dissertation on Canon and Feudal Law.
In these he traced the origin and rise of freedom. The rights of Englishmen, he
wrote, were derived from God, not from king or Parliament, and would be secured
by the study of history, law, and tradition.
Adams expressed these views in political
form when he drew up for Braintree
a protest against the Stamp Act that became a model for similar remonstrations
elsewhere in New England. He assailed the
stamp tax as an unnecessary burden upon the people and an unconstitutional
levy--"no free man can be separated from his property but by his own act
or fault." These ideas gave him much prominence in Massachusetts. Braintree recognized him now as a leading
townsman by electing him a selectman, but legal work kept him in Boston, so he gave up his
post as selectman and moved there in 1768.
Though Adams was always ready to speak out
for liberty, he maintained his political independence and offered his talents
to anyone in trouble. His most dramatic case occurred in 1770 when he and
Josiah Quincy defended the British soldiers accused of murder in the Boston
Massacre. It was an incident of justice versus unlawful authority, but the
culprit this time was the Boston
mob that provoked the incident. For taking the case Adams
was sharply rebuked in the patriot newspapers, yet he was privately
congratulated on winning this case for liberty.
Since May 1770, Adams had been a Boston representative in
the legislature (General Court). Associating daily with men deeply concerned
about liberty, he was troubled by the issues confronting the colonies. These
preyed upon his mind, and he decided in 1771 to leave public life. After 16
months of semiretirement, partly taken up in travel and bathing in the mineral
springs of Stafford, Conn., and partly in farming, he returned to
Boston.
Rise to Leadership
The radicals were happy to have Adams
available for consultation and as a writer for the newspapers. They elected him
to the Governor's Council in May 1773, only to have him ejected by the governor
for his partisanism. He was, indeed, involved in patriotic maneuvers, and he
rejoiced when Bostonians dumped the hated tea into the harbor in the Boston Tea
Party of 1773. Britain's
retaliation drew him into full partnership with the radicals, and he became a
delegate to the First Continental Congress in 1774.
During the next three years in
Philadelphia,
Adams pushed Congress into decisive action
that was to separate the colonies from
Britain. He urged successfully the
appointment of George
WASHINGTON as
commander in chief of colonial forces and the creation of a naval force to
challenge
Britain's
supremacy of the seas. In committee and on the floor of Congress, he laid down
principles of foreign policy, helped write the resolutions of
May 10, 1776, that declared
America
independent, and defended the Declaration of Independence during debate in
Congress.
As chairman of the Board of War and Ordnance for nearly a year (1776-1777), Adams attempted to equip the army. Important to the
revolutionary cause also were his extensive correspondence and his published
writings. His Novanglus papers (1774-75) and his Thoughts on
Government (1776) outlined principles of liberty and order for the
Americans.
In Diplomatic Service
In 1778, Adams was sent to replace Silas
Deane, one of the American diplomatic agents in Paris negotiating a commercial and military
alliance with France.
Before he arrived, however, the American commissioners there had successfully
concluded the negotiations. Adams returned to Braintree in time to be
chosen a member of the Massachusetts
constitutional convention; he composed most of the articles of the state
constitution accepted by the convention in 1780.
Adams' work on the state charter was barely
completed when he was appointed a minister plenipotentiary in anticipation of
peace negotiations with Britain.
In Paris, while
awaiting the start of negotiations, he was expected to be patient and
inconspicuous--a role unsuited to his nervous, passionate temperament. With
blunt advice for all parties, Adams irritated
the French officials by meddling in policy matters, and he angered Benjamin
Franklin by comments on his behavior. Finally giving way to their hostility, he
withdrew to the Netherlands
where he secured recognition of American independence and negotiated a loan and
treaty of amity and commerce.
Returning to Paris
in October 1782, Adams joined John Jay and
Franklin in the peace discussions. In these proceedings Adams particularly, and
successfully, insisted on the rights of the United States to fish off the
Canadian coast, and he also was interested in extending American territory as
far west as possible. The Treaty of Paris, ending the War of Independence, was
concluded on Sept. 3, 1783.
While the peace treaty was being ratified by Congress, Adams and his son,
John Quincy
ADAMS,
toured
England.
In 1783-1784,
Adams negotiated loans for the
United States
in the
Netherlands
and commercial treaties in
France.
In 1785 he was appointed first
U.S.
minister to
Britain.
His three years in
London
were fruitless in winning trade concessions or putting Anglo-American relations
on a friendly basis. Adams used his time to good purpose, however, by getting
well acquainted with Thomas Jefferson, U.S. minister to France, and writing
A
Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States(3 vols.,
1787). Like
Adams' other writings, this work
was unpolished and somewhat polemical, but it contained a wealth of information
on constitutional theory and was often cited in the Constitutional Convention
of 1787.
Adams strongly approved of balanced
government and praised the British parliamentary system as the "most
stupendous fabric of human invention."
While
Adams favored states' rights and
reform of the Articles of Confederation, he had worried about the continuing
weakness of the national government. In 1788 he welcomed the proposed
Constitution as "admirably calculated to preserve the
Union."
As his thoughts turned homeward, he resigned his unproductive
London post and returned to
Braintree to study, write, and garden. Within
the year, in the first
ELECTION held
under the
CONSTITUTION,
he was chosen vice president of the
United States, confirming his
national position as second only to President Washington.
The First Vice President
As in all of his positions, Adams, who was reelected in 1792, accepted the
responsibilities of the vice presidency with energy and seriousness. He
presided over the
U.S.
SENATE and
cast the deciding vote frequently, often for measures that would increase generally
the powers of the national government or specifically those of the presidency.
Always ready to offer opinions,
Adams lectured
the Senate on its duties. He also published a series of essays,
Discourses
on Davila (1791), which commented broadly on civil disorders, with special
reference to the French Revolution.
As Washington's
"heir apparent," Adams discovered
that even the presidency was being reduced to the level of human passions and
party objectives. According to his philosophy, the position should seek the
man, and knowledge as well as virtue should qualify the man, without regard to
partisanship. Unlike Washington,
Adams had rivals for the presidency, and he
should have been more flexible. Instead, he permitted Alexander Hamilton to
assume leadership of the Federalist party, while he tried to remove himself
from partisan politics by associating even with his party's critics.
Hamilton was
angry over this conduct and sought another candidate to represent the
Federalist party. But the party was embroiled with the Jeffersonian Republicans
in fierce contests over the direction of foreign affairs. This division
centered on the war between England
and France,
with the Federalists favoring the English, and the Republicans, the French. The
climax came during the ratification of Jay's Treaty with Britain in
1794. Its pro-English character offended both the French government and the
pro-French Republicans who carried on a scurrilous newspaper campaign against
Jay and the administration. The bitterness, however, brought a reaction in
favor of the moderates and many leaders, wishing to avoid excess, rallied to
Adams, who had managed to stay out of the dispute.
Hamilton, who had greatly influenced the treaty negotiations, was helpless
but not reconciled to the choice of
Adams as
Federalist candidate for president. During the presidential campaign of 1796 he
secretly tried to substitute Thomas Pinckney for
Adams
and thus divided the party. As a result, the election was extremely close:
Adams won the presidency by three
ELECTORAL
votes (71-68) over the Republican
JEFFERSON,
who, under the electoral system then in use, became the vice president.
The Presidency
Adams entered office on March 4, 1797. Fully aware of his
slender victory, he sought political harmony. His inaugural address, tracing
the progress of the nation, declared his faith in republicanism and called upon
the people to end partisan politics. He tried to reach an accord with Jefferson, conciliate the Hamiltonians, and steer a
peaceful course through the controversy with France over Jay's Treaty. But he
encountered supreme difficulties.
As the first president to succeed another, Adams
had no guidelines to follow on cabinet appointments, patronage, and policy
enunciations. He decided to keep Washington's
mediocre cabinet, partly because he wanted to reconcile the Federalists and
partly because he knew how difficult is was to get good men to serve. The
cabinet was Federalist--and more, Hamiltonian--in loyalty. Adams
did not fully realize the inherent dangers of this situation until 1799, when
the cabinet violated its trust by working against his policies.
With Federalists about him,
Adams found
partisan politics impossible to avoid, though he favored Republicans Benjamin
Rush and Elbridge
GERRY
with appointments. As relations with
France worsened, he had to
recommend preparations for defensive warfare while negotiations for peace
continued. These measures irritated the Republicans, but
Adams
was not deterred. He held to his policy of peace and preparedness even after
the French Directory insulted American envoys and began detaining American
vessels. In January 1798 he proposed the creation of a navy department and
asked for funds to put the military on a war footing.
Four bills to control subversion, the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798, were
also passed. One of the acts imposed severe penalties on those who criticized
the government. These harsh measures, formulated in a time of fright, were
approved by Adams. Although a score of
journalists were punished for their attacks on the administration, the laws were
not ruthlessly applied. The opposition, however, made them appear cruel and
turned them into symbols of Federalism.
Adams' reprisals against French seizures of
American shipping were popular for a time, and the Federalists won the 1798
congressional elections. Though Congress did not declare war, Adams
pushed ahead with military preparations, selecting Washington, Henry Knox,
Charles C. Pinckney, and Hamilton, in that order, to be the ranking generals of
the army. But while Adams was visiting in Quincy (which had been set off from
Braintree in 1792), the cabinet secured Washington's backing to move Hamilton
ahead of his colleagues and make him second in command (actually, commander
since Washington was not expected to take the field). Adams
grasped the significance of this maneuver. He saw lawful control of the army
shifted to Hamilton and, more, the naked specter of militarism. Hamilton and
the cabinet wanted to prolong the crisis with France and use the opportunity to
consolidate the Federalist party and spread the war into Spanish
America.
By the time Adams fully realized what was
happening, he had advice from Europe that France would
resume negotiations. In February 1799 he abruptly nominated William Vans Murray
as a special envoy, to the amazement of the Hamiltonians. Debate over the
action was bitter, and Adams compromised by
agreeing to name a commission instead of a single delegate, but he withstood
the pressure of Hamilton, the British minister, and some members of his
cabinet. The commission finally concluded a treaty with France on Sept. 30, 1800. Adams had succeeded in preventing a war with France and
preserving his country's neutrality.
The treaty negotiations had split the party, and the Federalists now openly
considered the effect of this division on the 1800 election. When two cabinet
members, Secretary of State Pickering and Secretary of War McHenry, revealed
their disloyalty to
Adams, he forced their
resignations without any political finesse. His abrasive action infuriated the
Hamiltonians, who vented their feelings in public, matching the president's
undiplomatic conduct. The Republicans, led by Jefferson and Aaron
BURR, enjoyed the
Federalist predicament.
Adams was temperamentally
unable to assume the responsibilities of a party boss or to dramatize the
achievements of his administration. The election results reflected this
weakness. The Federalists lost the presidency to Jefferson and the Republicans
by eight electoral votes (73 to 65) and also lost Congress.
Later Years
Adams left the presidency in 1801 for the
private life of Quincy.
Though he remained bitter toward Hamilton and the Federalists, he regained his
sense of humor and served his country in a different way. He became president
of the Massachusetts Society of Arts and Sciences, of the Massachusetts Society
for Promoting Agriculture, and of other societies.
Adams also wrote articles for the Boston Patriot
reviewing events of his administration, and he corresponded with many people in
the spirit of Cicero's
Letters. His correspondence on politics, history, national affairs,
religion, and philosophy was designed to guide posterity in maintaining the
principles of 1776. His letters to Jefferson and Benjamin Rush are monuments of
erudition, revealing a charming personality that could be crusty, petty, and
lovable within the space of dozen lively lines.
John Adams died in Quincy,
Mass., on July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of
the Declaration of Independence. Jefferson
died the same day.
John A. Schultz
University of Southern
California
For Further Reading
The Adams Papers, edited by Lyman H.
Butterfield and others, includes diaries, family and general correspondence,
and state papers of John Adams and other members of the family. Begun by the
Massachusetts Historical Society (Harvard University Press) in 1961, and
expected to comprise 100 or more volumes, the project includes:
The Diary
and Autobiography of John Adams, 4 vols. (1961);
Legal Papers of John
Adams, 3 vols. (1966); and
The Earliest Diary of John Adams (1966).
Other Editions of Adams' Writings Cappon,
Lester J., ed., The Adams-Jefferson Letters, 2 vols. (Univ. of N.C.
Press 1959).
Gibbs, George, Memoirs of the Administrations of Washington and John Adams (1846; reprint, B. Franklin 1971).
Peterson, Merrill D., Adams and Jefferson: A Revolutionary Dialogue (Oxford 1978).
Taylor, Robert J., and others, eds., Papers of John Adams: vols. 1
and 2, September 1755-April 1775 (Harvard Univ. Press 1972)
Adams, James, The Adams Family (1930; reprint, Greenwood Press
1974).
Brown, Ralph A., The Presidency of John Adams (Univ. Press of
Kan. 1975).
Handler, Edward, America and Europe in the Political Thought of John
Adams (Harvard Univ. Press 1964)
Haraszti, Zoltan, John Adams and the Prophets of Progress (Harvard
Univ. Press 1952)
Howe, John, and Tebbenhoff, Edward H., John Adams, ed. by Carol
Fitzgerald, 2 vols. (Meckler Pub. 1987)
Morse, John T., Jr., John Adams (1898; reprint, AMS Press 1979).
Nagel, Paul C., Descent from Glory: Four Generations of the John
Adams Family (Oxford
1983).
Schutz, John A., and Adair, Douglass, eds., The Spur of Fame:
Dialogues of John Adams and Benjamin Rush, 1805-1813 (1906; Huntington Lib.
& Art Gallery 1980).
Shaw, Peter, The Character of John Adams (Norton 1977)
Walsh, Correa M., Political Science of John Adams (1915; reprint,
Ayer 1970)
Source: http://gi.grolier.com/presidents/ea/bios/02pjohn.html (This link is broken)
John Adams. Related Boyhood and Education
Adams was born in the
village of Braintree (Quincy),
Mass., on Oct. 30 (Old Style, Oct. 19), 1735. His parents and ancestors had been honored members of the community since its founding. His father, John Adams, was influential in town business, serving as selectman and officer of the militia; his mother, Susanna Boylston Adams, was known for her devotion to family and church. The
Adams clan had arrived from
England about 1640 and settled on land that their descendants were still tilling in John's boyhood.
Wife: Abigail Adams
Abigail Adams Abigail Smith Adams, 1744-1818 Prolific Writer, Patriot, Abolitionist, and Early Feminist Inheriting New England's strongest traditions, Abigail Smith was born on November 11, 1744 at Weymouth, Massachusetts. It was a coastal town south of Boston. She was the second child of[http://www.umkc.edu/imc/adamsa.htm]
Abigail Smith Adams,
1744-1818
Prolific Writer, Patriot,
Abolitionist, and Early Feminist
We
have too many high sounding words, and too few actions that correspond with
them.
--Abigail Adams
Inheriting
New England's
strongest traditions, Abigail Smith was born on
November 11, 1744 at
Weymouth, Massachusetts.
It was a coastal town south of
Boston.
She was the second child of Elizabeth Quincy Smith and her husband, Reverend
William Smith. On her mother's side she was descended from the 17th-century
Puritan preacher Thomas Shepard of
Cambridge--a
family of great prestige in the colony; her father and other forebears were
Congregational ministers, leaders in a society that held its clergy in high
esteem.
One of
Weymouth's
most prosperous and best-educated citizens, Reverend Smith was easygoing and
friendly. Abigail later recalled that he often advised her to speak kindly,
both to people and about them, teaching her "to say all the handsome
things she could of persons, but not evil." Abigail often went with her
mother to visit the sick and to take food, clothing, and fuel to needy
families. She learned that it was the duty of the fortunate to help those who
were less fortunate--a lesson she remembered all of her life.
As most
New England
schools admitted only boys, girls were taught at home. Few people believed that
girls needed much learning. So Abigail lacked formal education; but her
curiosity spurred her keen intelligence, and she read avidly the books at hand,
including the Bible, history, sermons, philosophy, essays, and poetry. She
would become one of the most well-read women in
America, and among the most
influential women of her day.
Reading
created a bond between "Abby" and young John Adams, a Harvard
graduate launched on a career in law. She was a lovely young lady, but rather
frail. They read and talked together. Then one evening in the middle of a
thunderstorm, John proposed and she accepted. They were married in 1764.
Abigail was 19. Their marriage proved to be a pairing of the mind and of the
heart, enduring for more than half a century, enriched by time.
The young couple lived on John's small farm
at
Braintree
and later in
Boston
as his practice expanded. In 10 years she bore 3 sons and 2 daughters. 4 of
them were named Abigail, John Quincy, Charles, and Thomas. She looked after
their family and home when John went traveling as a circuit judge.
"Alas!" she wrote in December of 1773, "How many snow banks
divide thee and me...." Long separations them apart while he was off
designing a new nation. She resolutely supported him in his insistence upon the
Declaration of
Independence
and aided him and his cause with loyal zeal. He served the country they both
loved as a delegate to the Continental Congress, envoy abroad, and an elected
officer under the Constitution.
Intelligent and broad-minded, Abigail wrote
hundreds of letters in an excellent English style that recorded the history of
our young country and the many perils it faced on the road to independence. A
terse and vigorous letter writer, she fearlessly expressed her opinions in
private and in public. Her letters--pungent, witty, and vivid, spelled just as
she spoke--detail her life in times of revolution. They tell the story of the
woman who stayed at home to struggle with wartime shortages and inflation, to
run the farm with a minimum of help, and to teach their children when formal
education was interrupted. Most of all, they tell of her loneliness without her
"dearest Friend." The "one single expression," she said,
"dwelt upon my mind and played about my Heart...."
She became a trusted and influential
political adviser to her husband. She was ahead of her time with many of her
ideas.
"...remember
the ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors.
Do not put such unlimited power into the hands of the husbands....
If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined
to foment a rebellion,
and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice or
representation."
She opposed slavery and believed in equal
education for boys and girls, making sure that her own daughter received a good
education.
In 1784, she joined John at his diplomatic
post in
Paris,
while he was engaged in writing the treaty of peace. She observed with interest
the manners of the French. In 1785 she accompanied him to
England. After
his signing the Treaty of
Paris,
Abigail accompanied him in his role as the first minister of the
U.S. to the
court of George III--she filled her difficult role with dignity and tact,
meeting with social discourtesies she long resented. Son John Quincy was doing
a man's work at 14 as secretary and translator for the
U.S. envoy to
Russia. Later
he became John's secretary in
London.
The couple returned happily in 1788 to
Massachusetts
and the handsome house they had just acquired in
Braintree, later called
Quincy, the home for the rest of their lives.
From 1789 to 1801, she lived in a simple
manner as her husband was successively vice president and then president. As
wife of the first vice president, Abigail became a good friend to Mrs.
Washington and a valued
help in official entertaining, drawing on her experience of courts and society
abroad. After 1791, however, poor health forced her to spend as much time as
possible in
Quincy.
Illness or trouble found her resolute, declaring that she would "not
forget the blessings which sweeten life." When John was elected president,
she continued a formal pattern of entertaining--even in the primitive
conditions she found at the new capital in November 1800. The city was
wilderness, the President's House far from completion. Her private complaints
to her family provide blunt accounts of both, but for her 3 months in
Washington in the
partially completed President's House, she duly held her dinners and
receptions.
The
Adamses
retired to
Quincy
in 1801 after John was defeated in his reelection bid by his former friend and
then enemy, Thomas Jefferson. For 17 years they enjoyed the companionship that
public life had long denied them. Abigail died on
October 28, 1818, in
Quincy, leaving her husband a lonely man. She
is buried beside him (who died 8 years later on
July 4, 1826) in the
United First
Parish Church.
Their grandson, Charles Francis Adams,
published his book,
The Familiar Letters of John Adams and His Wife Abigail
During the Revolution, in 1875. It increased interest in her career.
Many of Abigail Adams' letters still exist,
informing and delighting readers today while providing rich clues to the past.
Reading them, we learn about customs, habits, and day-to-day family life of
colonial times. In addition, her letters detail events of the American
Revolution. Her words helps us better understand the history of our nation. She
left her country a most remarkable record as patriot, First Lady, wife of one
President, and mother of another.
Resources on Abigail Adams:
Butterfield, L.H., ed.
The Book of Abigail
and John : Selected Letters of the Adams
Family, 1762-1784.
DeniseKnapp1