51John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 17 April 1799 (Adams Papers)
Somewhat more than a month ago I received the very welcome intelligence that the vessel on board of which you were a passenger had arrived at New-York. Some days later, a letter from M r: Murray mentioned that he had seen your arrival announced in a Philadelphia newspaper of the 15 th: of January.— Soon after, I received from our ever dear and honoured mother a letter of 1. Feb y: fully...
52John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 7 May 1799 (Adams Papers)
I have to acknowledge the receipt since I wrote you last of your two kind favours of 15. November and 1. February last— The latter is the latest letter, from America that I have, and I still continue to receive as I have ever since I have been in Europe, received from you the most recent intelligence both public and private— As in this case the first direct notice of my brother’s arrival came...
53John Quincy Adams to Catherine Nuth Johnson, 28 May 1799 (Adams Papers)
I received some time ago your favour of 29 January which I did not immediately answer, from an apprehension that a letter from me without one at the same time from my Louisa, or at least without some satisfactory information concerning the state of her health would give you more concern than pleasure— She was then unwell, and a few days after, met again with a misfortune which had already...
54John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 1 July 1799 (Adams Papers)
My last letter to you upon private affairs was of April 29. since which I have received none from you, untill last evening, when your’s of 4. to 12. March, from Quincy, and of 11. May from Baltimore, both came to hand.— In the last, you mention having written me, at full length, the week before by the way of London; but this letter I have not received. Your account of the administration of...
55John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 3 July 1799 (Adams Papers)
I received not untill last Evening your kind favour of Feb y: 10. which however is the latest date that I have from you, and this circumstance is of itself sufficient to give me great concern respecting the state of your health— The Boston Newspapers in April, mention likewise that you were again ill; but I have some comfort in hearing by a letter from D r: Welsh to his son, that you were...
56John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 16 August 1799 (Adams Papers)
I received your N. 6. dated 3. June, about three weeks ago, at this place, and should have replied to it sooner, but for a violent fever which seized me on the first of this month, and confined me for about ten days— It was only an intermittent, and paid me no more than five visits; but they were long and severe enough to leave me very weak.— I think myself now altogether recovered, and can...
57John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 21 September 1799 (Adams Papers)
I received at Töplitz, on the 3 d: of last month, your kind favour of 12. June, which I did not immediately answer, because I was then in bed, with a fever, which however confined me, only for about ten days, and since then my health has again been very good.— The principal motive of our Journey to Töplitz, I wrote you before I left Berlin. It was on account of my wife’s health, and with the...
58John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 22 October 1799 (Adams Papers)
My last letter to you, was from Dresden, and dated the 17 th: of last month, since which I have not had the pleasure to receive any thing from you. We spent a month at that place very agreably, & as long as the picture gallery remained open, I did not fail to visit it almost every day. We likewise went to Königstein, & saw also at Dresden the electoral jewels, the library, the old porcellain,...
59John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 18 February 1800 (Adams Papers)
A few days ago, I received your favour of 30. December of the last year; after a long interval during which I had not heard from you; and the communication with England from Hamburg having been for six weeks interrupted by the severity of the season, I was nearly the whole of that time without receiving any information from America— When it came at last, it was in one respect, of a nature...
60John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 25 May 1800 (Adams Papers)
The latest letters I have had the pleasure of receiving from you are of January 5. and Feb y: 8. But M r: Paleske has arrived at London on his way hither, and I expect to see him here in the course of a few days— He informs me that he has letters for me from you. A longer time has elapsed since I wrote you last than I can apologize for with propriety; it is possible that at some future day I...
61John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 28 May 1800 (Adams Papers)
I humble myself in dust and ashes to confess that I must at one and the same time acknowledge the receipt of seven letters from you—viz—of 26 and 30. October and 29. December 1799—of 31. Jany: original and duplicate of 1. and 25. Feby: of the current year— But as if you had meant to make my responsibility less burthensome to me the numbers are not regularly noted— For N. 12 is repeated; and...
62John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 12 June 1800 (Adams Papers)
M r: Paleske arrived here a few days after I wrote you last, and delivered me your letter and the pamphlets together with the dispatches from the Secretary of State, and the letters to my wife; which were extremely acceptable to her, as she had been so long without hearing from her parents. I was much gratified by your anecdotes respecting the proceedings in the Senate upon the Treaty— The...
63John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 19 June 1800 (Adams Papers)
Your letter by M r: Paleske of 28 Feb y: though short gave me great pleasure as it was so long since I had enjoyed that of seeing your hand-writing— I have indeed no right to expect that you should have leisure to write me at large upon any subject, and know that a free communication of your sentiments cannot be indulged, upon public topics.— With regard to private concerns it more properly...
64John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 10 July 1800 (Adams Papers)
I received two days ago your N: 16. dated the 11 th: of May. which you gave to M r: Treat, with injunctions to take special care of it— Now, mark how specially this recommendation was observed— In order to secure your letter from all accident, which might happen to the bag, M r: Treat put it into his own trunk.— But being boarded by the officer of a french privateer, he was obliged to submit...
65John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 16 July 1800 (Adams Papers)
I cannot send you a duplicate without adding a line to it; for there is a pleasure in knowing that our distant friends are well, though but one day later than we have already heard from them We have been spending several days at Charlottenburg with D r Brown’s family, and Louisa’s health which never fails to droop at Berlin in the summer, has derived benefit from it— To morrow morning we set...
66John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 20 July 1800 (Adams Papers)
As I have bespoke your company, upon our journey into Silesia, I begin this letter at our first resting station from Berlin— Hitherto we have indeed seen little more than the usual Brandenburg sands, & perhaps you will find our tour as tiresome as we have found it ourselves— I cannot promise you an amusing journey, though I hope it will prove so to us; & if at the sight of this my first letter...
67John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 26 July 1800 (Adams Papers)
Yesterday morning early we took our departure from Freystadt, & came to this place; a distance of eight german miles; five of which are in single stage from Sprotau here— The face of the country has visibly & greatly improved as we came along; & although we still had to wade through miles of sands more, or less deep, we were frequently relieved by patches of good roads, & by beautiful fields...
68John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 3 August 1800 (Adams Papers)
At the close of my last letter I left you, in a cool refreshing shade, in the view of the Kockelfall, from which we proceeded the same evening to this inn— It was, as you may suppose a fatiguing day; though not so much so, as one or two we have gone through since, & several, which still await us— This village in one respect resembles an American country, more than any other spot I have seen in...
69John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 7 August 1800 (Adams Papers)
The reason, which induces travellers, who purpose a visit to the Riesenkoppe, to pass the night before at the Hempel’s baude is, that they may ascend the mountain in the morning early enough to see the sun rise, from its summit— Such was our own intention; but when we rose at two o’clock in the morning, Louisa, found herself suffering so severe a headache, that she was obliged to give up the...
70John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 9 August 1800 (Adams Papers)
Since our return to this place we have indulged ourselves with a few days of rest. The morning after we came back, I went over the lutheran church, which is the handsomest building in the town, & makes a conspicuous figure in all the views from the neighbouring hills. It is built in the shape of a cross, painted white, & roofed with red tile. These colours shew to great advantage here, as they...
71John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 16 August 1800 (Adams Papers)
From the cloister at Grussau (the day before yesterday) we returned to dine with M r Ruck at Landeshut— It was a formal dinner of thirty persons according to the fashion of the country; we sat down soon after one, & rose from table just before six. The whole of this time is employed in eating; for the ladies & gentlemen rose together, & there was little wine drunk. But as only one dish is...
72John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 20 August 1800 (Adams Papers)
The shortness of my paper, & of my time yesterday abridged my discription of the natural ruins at Adersback, one of the most curious objects we have yet viewed upon this journey. As I was closing my letter, the king & queen passed under our windows, on their way to Furstenstein. There, a double entertainment combining the fashionable amusements of antient & modern times, a carousel & a...
73John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 24 September 1800 (Adams Papers)
I continue to number my letters, although the series containing our Silesian tour is closed, so that untill our return to Berlin, you may know whether you receive all those I write— At Dresden from which my last to you was dated, we spent six days, in the course of which I renewed my acquaintance with the picture gallery, made an excursion one afternoon to Tharandt, through the valley of...
74John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 20 December 1800 (Adams Papers)
I suppose you flatter yourself, that having more than three months ago got safely out of Silesia, you are to hear nothing further about it; but indeed I shall not let you off so cheap. There still remains a very short geographical, statistical, & historical account of this interesting province, which I feel it my duty to write— Whether you will conceive it your’s to read it, I need not...
75John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 25 November 1800 (Adams Papers)
Many months have pass’d since I received a line from you, or from my dear mother. From my brother Thomas I have no letter of a later date than July, and from the department of State I have but one dated since last February.— Perhaps I am to impute the greater part of this seeming oblivion of my american correspondents to my own remissness during the last winter— For six months however I have...
76John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 3 December 1800 (Adams Papers)
I had been almost three months without receiving a line from you, or from any other of my correspondents in America; and although upon coolly considering circumstances I was sensible that this was the natural fruit of my own neglect of writing during the last Winter, yet as one’s feelings never make the allowances which sober reason requires, I began to think it strange to be so long without...
77John Quincy Adams to Joshua Johnson, 10 December 1800 (Adams Papers)
It is so long since I did myself the pleasure of writing to you, that I scarcely know how to apologize for the omission; and unfortunately for me, my remissness has appeared to you greater and more culpable than it really was, as the letters which I have repeatedly written to you, have failed to reach you, from what cause I am altogether ignorant.— Being so distant even from every sea-port...
78John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 7 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I received only three days ago your N: 22. dated the 6 th: of December, and containing the melancholy tidings of the death of our unhappy brother at New-York. I had been informed of it two days earlier by a letter from my excellent friend M r: Murray at the Hague, who had seen an account of it in a New-York Gazette.— Of the situation in which he has left his wife and children you say nothing,...
79John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 14 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I last week informed you that I had withdrawn from Amsterdam all the stocks I held there, and had remitted to M r: King, in London fourteen hundred pounds sterling, for which I authorised you to draw, and requested you to place the proceeds in the most advantageous manner; but not in any institution or fund depending upon our national Union; for the generality of our Countrymen are so far from...
80To George Washington from John Quincy Adams, 29 October 1798 (Washington Papers)
I have the honor to enclose herewith, a letter from a young Gentleman who bears your name, and who flatters himself with being (though distantly) related to you. He is by birth an Hollander, but of a family originally English, which went over from England, and settled in the United Netherlands, sometime near the beginning of the present century. At the commencement of the present War, he...