George Alexander Otis (1781–1863), merchant, broker, and translator, was born in Scituate, Massachusetts. He moved by 1802 to Boston, where he established himself as a vendor of merchandise from England and India. Three years later Otis went into business with his father-in-law, Barney Smith. An accomplished linguist, he spent four years in Europe before returning in 1817 to Boston. Otis resumed his career as a trader there, attempted unsuccessfully to obtain a number of federal appointments, and published translations of three works: Dominique Dufour, baron de Pradt, Europe after the Congress of Aix-la-Chapelle. Forming the Sequel to the Congress of Vienna (Philadelphia, 1820; Poor, Jefferson’s Library description begins Nathaniel P. Poor, Catalogue. President Jefferson’s Library, 1829 description ends , 11 [no. 643]), Botta, History of the War, and The Tusculan Questions of Marcus Tullius Cicero (1839). He became a member of the American Philosophical Society in 1821. Otis later worked as a broker in Boston for a number of years. When his father-in-law died in 1828, Otis came into considerable wealth. Thereafter, he scaled back his business activities and devoted himself to the management of his estate and to his literary studies. Otis died in Boston (Vital Records of Scituate Massachusetts to the Year 1850 [1909], 1:280; Boston Columbian Centinel. Massachusetts Federalist, 25 Dec. 1802; Boston Democrat, 3 Apr. 1805; Boston Commercial Gazette, 11 Aug. 1817; Independent Chronicle & Boston Patriot, 15 Oct. 1817; DNA: RG 59, LAR, 1817–25; APS description begins American Philosophical Society description ends , Minutes, 20 Apr. 1821 [MS in PPAmP]; The Boston Directory [Boston, 1825], 200; Stimpson’s Boston Directory [1832], 252; DNA: RG 29, CS, Mass., Boston, 1840, 1850; Boston Daily Advertiser, 25, 26 June 1863).

On this day Otis sent similar letters to John Adams, John Quincy Adams, and James Madison (MHi: Adams Papers; DNA: RG 59, MLR; Madison, Papers, Retirement Ser., 2:70–1).