1Commission as Surveyor of Albemarle County, 6 June 1773 (Jefferson Papers)
To all to whom these Presents shall come, Greeting: Know ye, that we the President and Masters of the College of William and Mary in Virginia, by Virtue of a royal Grant from their late Majesties King William and Queen Mary, of the Office of Surveyor General of the Colony of Virginia to the said College, have constituted and appointed, and by these Presents do constitute and appoint Thomas...
2From James Madison to William Bradford, 20 January 1775 (Madison Papers)
Your very acceptable favours by Mr. Rutherford arrived safe but I perceived by the date, had a very tedious passage which perhaps may be attributed to the craziness of the Vessel in which you embarked them. I ought to mention in particular that I did not receive them till after I wrote my last as an apology for my not then acknowledging it I entirely acquiesce in your Opinion of our friend...
3From James Madison to Richard Paterson, 24 March 1770 (Madison Papers)
Recievd of Mr. Richard Patterson by order of Mr. Adam Hoops twenty two Shillings and six pence on acct. of Mr. Robert Patterson. Richard Paterson’s mercantile establishment in Princeton, situated on Main Street next to the well-known tavern of Jacob Hyer at the sign of Hudibras, appears to have had an important place in the life of the college. Paterson (d. 1781) was the father of William...
4From James Madison to John Boyle, 17 May 1771 (Madison Papers)
I wrote to you not long since by Mr. Armstrong but as it is uncertain whether you have seen him, I take this opportunity by Mr. Wallace to acquaint you with a mistake you made in a piece of Cloth I bought of you last winter, occasioned I believe by your giving me the remnant accidentantly instead of the measured piece. When I carried it to the Taylors I found it to be one whole yard short of...
5From James Madison to James Madison, Sr., 23 July 1770 (Madison Papers)
I reciev’d yours dated June 4th. & have applied to Mr. Hoops as you directed; he says you must suit yourself in paying him, & if you should let him have a bill of Exchange it must be on your own terms: Forty Pounds £40. New Jersey Currency is the Sum I shall have of him before I get home. my frugality has not been able to keep it below that, consistant with my staying here to the best...
6From James Madison to James Madison, Sr., 9 October 1771 (Madison Papers)
In obedience to your requests I hereby send you an answer to your’s of the 25th. of Sept. which I recieved this morning. My Letter by Dr. Witherspoon who left this place yesterday week contains most of what you desire to be informed of. I am exceedingly rejoiced to hear of the happy deliverance of my Mother & would fain hope your rheumatic pains will not continue much longer. The Bill of...
7From James Madison to William Bradford, 10 June 1773 (Madison Papers)
I had the pleasure of Mr Wallace’s Company & your letter on Tuesday last. He left me to Day but not without requesting me to make mention of his kind remembrance of you when I should write to you. He professes a warm affection for you and you know the sincerity of his professions. I am much obliged to you for your information concerning my friends. I received a Line or two with yours from Mrss...
8From James Madison to William Bradford, 28 April 1773 (Madison Papers)
I received your Letter dated March the 1st. about a Week ago and It is not more to obey your demands, than to fulfill my own desires that I give you this early answer. I am glad you disclaim all punctiliousness in our correspondence. For my own part I confess I have not the face to perform ceremony in person and I equally detest it on paper though as Tully says It cannot blush. Friendship like...
9From James Madison to William Bradford, 1 July 1774 (Madison Papers)
I am once more got into my native land and into the possession of my customary enjoyments Solitude and Contemplation, though I must confess not a little disturbed by the sound of War blood and plunder on the one Hand and the Threats of Slavery and Oppression on the Other. From the best accounts I can obtain from our Frontiers The Savages are determined in the extirpation of the Inhabitants,...
10From James Madison to William Bradford, 23 August 1774 (Madison Papers)
The receipt of your’s of the first inst. was peculiarly acceptable to me; the enjoyment of your Company at Philada. has so revived & increased my pristine Affection for you, that I found great pleasure in that token of you[r] Affectionate Kindness. And tho’ it is with the utmost chearfulness I emancipate you from the bondage of a punctual correspondence yet I find I cannot do without an...
11Notes on a Brief System of Logick, 1766–1772 (Madison Papers)
MS ( LC : Madison Miscellany). One hundred and twenty-two pages of this copybook are filled with writing in JM’s youthful hand. They are preceded by four almost blank pages and followed by fourteen others devoted to the drawings described in the editorial note below. JM’s great-nephew, James Madison Cutts II, gave this manuscript to the Library of Congress in 1881. On the manuscript’s...
12From James Madison to William Bradford, 17 March 1775 (Madison Papers)
This I expect will be delivered to you by the Revd. Mr Samuel Smith who will inform you of every thing respecting our affairs that I could let you know by Letter. I wrote to you very lately by Mr David Hoops in answer to yours contain[in]g a few lines from Mr Irvin. If it should fail of coming to you it will be proper I should know of it because I there mentioned what I desired as to Dunlap &...
13From James Madison to James Madison, Sr., 30 September 1769 (Madison Papers)
I recieved your letter by Mr. Rosekrans, and wrote an Answer; but as it is probable this will arrive sooner which I now write by Doctor Witherspoon, I shall repeat some circumstances to avoid obscurity. On Wednesday last we had the annual commencement. Eighteen young gentlemen took their Batchelors’ degrees, and a considerable number their Masters Degrees; the Degree of Doctor of Law was...
14From James Madison to Richard Paterson, 3 April 1770 (Madison Papers)
Mr. Richard Patterson Please to let the bearer Mr. Wm. Livingston have fifteen Shillings on acct of your Obliged Humble Servant The date was written over by JM. He may have intended it to be “April 1.” On the back of this draft is the endorsement: “Received this 4 of April 1770 of Richd. Paterson the sum of fifeteen shillings on Acct. of James Madison by me. William S. Livingston.”...
15Collegiate Doggerel, [June 1771–April 1772] (Madison Papers)
Copy by William Bradford in the notebook among his papers in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Filling the first half of this eighty-five page notebook is “Father Bombo’s Pilgrimage to Mecca in Arabia, Volume II,” by Hugh H. Brackenridge and Philip Freneau. This is printed in Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography , LXVI (1942), 461–78. The doggerel in the remainder of the...
16Notes on Commentary on the Bible, 1770–1773 (Madison Papers)
MS ( LC : Madison Papers). With the exception of the extracts from Proverbs, these notes are quoted verbatim, or almost verbatim, from William Burkitt, Expository Notes, with Practical Observations, on the New Testament of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ , first printed posthumously in London in 1724. The pagination of the editorial footnotes is taken from the sixteenth edition of this work,...
17Notes on Salkeld, 1771–1774 (Madison Papers)
In an autobiographical sketch sent to James Kirke Paulding in January 1832 (LC: William C. Rives Papers), JM stated that, following his graduation from the College of New Jersey in the autumn of 1771, he devoted much of his time, both at Princeton and later at Montpelier, to a “course of reading” which “mingled miscellaneous subjects with the subjects intended to qualify him for the Bar.” JM...
18From James Madison to William Bradford, 9 November 1772 (Madison Papers)
You moralize so prettily that if I were to judge from some parts of your letter of October 13 I should take you for an old Philosopher that had experienced the emptiness of Earthly Happiness. And I am very glad that you have so early seen through the romantic paintings with which the World is sometimes set off by the sprightly imaginations of the Ingenious. You have happily supplied by reading...
19Indenture, 16 June 1773—Summary (Madison Papers)
16 June 1773 . JM, James Madison, Sr., Ambrose Madison, and Francis Madison were witnesses to a deed of sale of a farm in Orange County to Henry Gaines by William and Mary Daingerfield. These witnesses, with the exception of James Madison, Sr., also attested a receipt whereby William Daingerfield acknowledged that he had been paid £28 by Gaines for the property. Strangely, £78 is the price...
20From James Madison to William Bradford, 5–6 September 1773 (Madison Papers)
If I did not love you too well to scold at you I should begin this with upbraiding your long silence contrary to your express promise and my earnest Solicitations. The Bundle of Pamplets you sent by the Post has miscarried[.] I would not trouble you with sending them again but perhaps if you would enquire of the Post they might still be discovered. I expect this will be handed to you by Mr....
21From James Madison to William Bradford, 25 September 1773 (Madison Papers)
I received yours of the 12 August and give you this repeated Testimony of my punctuality. I got your letter to Mr Wallace at the same time much worn and abused. I have given it a new coat & shall forward it as soon as a safe Opportunity serves. Since you first hinted to me your suspence as to the settled business of your life, I have partook of your anxiety & [though it] has been often in my...
22From James Madison to William Bradford, 1 December 1773 (Madison Papers)
I have had the gratification of receiving both your letters, and the Pamphlets sent by Wilkinson. It is a reflection I am naturally led into whenever I write to you that I always have occasion to be returning my thanks for some kindness received without being able to retaliate. Gratitude is the only fund I can pay you out of which I am sensible your generosity accepts as sufficient: but at the...
23From James Madison to William Bradford, 1 April 1774 (Madison Papers)
I have another favour to acknowledge in the receipt of your kind Letter of March the 4th. I did not intend to have written again to you before I obtained a nearer communication with you but you have too much interest in my inclinations ever to be denied a request. Mr. Brackenridge’s illness gives me great uneasiness: I think he would be a loss to America: His merit is rated so high by me that...
24From James Madison to William Bradford, 24 January 1774 (Madison Papers)
Yours of the 25 of last month came into my hands a few days past. It gave singular pleasure not only because of the kindness expressed in it but because I had reason to apprehend the letter you recd. last from me had miscarried and I should fail in procuring the intelligence I wanted before the Trip I design in the Spring. I congratulate you on your heroic proceedings in Philada. with regard...
25Indenture, 22 September 1774 (Madison Papers)
This Indenture made the twenty Second day of September in the year of our [Lord] one thousand Seven hundred and Seventy four Between James Madison of the County of Orange and Nelly his wife of the one part and James Madison Junior of the said County of the other part Witnesseth that the said James Madison and Nelly his wife for and in Consideration of the Sum of Thirty pounds Current money of...
26Commonplace Book, 1759–1772 (Madison Papers)
This manuscript volume is in part a copybook and in part a notebook, all written by JM in his youth with the exception of the final six lines. On the one hand, there are nearly accurate transcriptions of poetry from two magazines, and, on the other, notes upon selections from three fairly difficult books, supplemented by JM’s comments and other interpolations. At the top of the first page of...
27From James Madison to William Bradford, 26 November 1774 (Madison Papers)
The pamphlets & letters you sent me were safely delivered about ten days after the date of them. I esteem it a singular favor that you should be so thoughtfull of obliging me at a time when your attention must necessarally have been employed on many more important considerations. Your readiness also to serve me on any future occasion demands my acknowledgments. I have no acquaintance in...
28From James Madison to William Bradford, [early March] 1775 (Madison Papers)
I intend to throw this in the way of Mr David Hoopes who I hear is setting out for Philada. As it is uncertain whether he may get it I shall only return a short answer to yours of Jany 4th. [Mr Dunlap’s mistake about price of his paper—the 2 Vol. of Papers too dear & vide lit.] We had a report here a few days [ago] that the New Yorkers had again given way & that the assembly had voted the...
29From James Madison to Reverend Thomas Martin, 10 August 1769 (Madison Papers)
I am not a little affected at hearing of your misfortune, but cannot but hope the cure may be so far accomplished as to render your journey not inconvenient. Your kind Advice & friendly cautions are a favour that shall be always gratefully remembered, & I must beg leave to assure you that my happiness, which you and your brother so ardently wish for, will be greatly augmented by both your...