Louisa Catherine Adams to John Quincy Adams, 6 June 1804
Louisa Catherine Adams to John Quincy Adams
Washington June 6th 1804
My Dearest friend
I send you enclosed a couple of Profiles one of which I wish you to present to Mrs: Adams if you think they it will prove acceptable I am told mine is a very fine likeness and Caroline who likewise takes this opportunity of offering one to your mother has I think been equally fortunate the other you can keep or give to Mrs. Whitcomb if you do not want it they were taken by a Mr. Todd. a Philadelphian and are very neatly finished—1
Your last charming letter afforded me the sincerest gratification2 I wish when you send your books back for the winter you would put up Madame de Sevigne’s letters it is so long since I read them I am certain I should to reap both instruction and amusement in a reperusal I am at present studying Miss Hamilton on Education I admire her more than any author I have yet seen her system of Education is formed from the best writers on this subject and by being simplified is render’d more easy to execute Lock & Mrs Edgeworth are the two writers she most approves though she frequently differs from their opinions3 had I a daughter it is the only system I would wish to adopt but it requires a Mother of a superior cast to be able to undertake it &. do it justice.—
Mama has recieved very flattering letters from Mess Thorp & Maitland presenting her with a hundred Pounds and assuring her that the creditors of W. J. M. would do something to render her situation more independant for the rest of her life Mr. Maitland tells her the business was not arranged then but he had great hopes of accomplishing it in a short time as a payment of the Interest was soon to be made which would oblige the Creditors to meet &. he trusts he shall then be able to prevail on them to settle it fir[st]4 Ah my beloved friend you know not have no idea of what a consolation it is to us her Children to know that she may at least be removed from the painful state of dependance to which she is now forced to submit &. that Hellen will partly be relieved from a heavy burthen from which he has supported with unexampled kindness—
The heat is excessive since the first of this month untill then the weather was cold & uncomfortable with Thunder gusts every evening we have had both Strawberries &. peas for some time though I understand they were unusually late this year I presume your garden now begins to supply you & if your Dairy supplies you with Cheese I should very much like to have a little of it here it has been so scarce we have never been able to procure any since you left us
George is much delighted with his drum I intend to trouble your mother with a commission in a short time but not immediately Mrs. Whitcomb did not execute hers with exactitude Pray tell her I wish she would write me the prices of the different articles she purchaced and to send me a White Veil by the first opportunity— It will be better to give the enclosed paper to Mrs. Whitcomb She will then know what I want—5
Adieu my best friend it is so warm I can scarcely write and I fear you will have some difficulty to read this letter I have no news Mr. Custis is to be married the 7th of next month to a Miss Fitzchew Sister of Mrs. Craig whom you met once or twice last Winter6 Mr. Thornton le petit Chargé is gone to Baltimore he sails for England in a couple of days &. Mr. & Mrs. Merry are to set off on their journey to the northward some time next week7 She called on me last evening & complained much of the heat indeed she looked very ill Mrs. M. expects to see you in Boston there are a number of Savants at here one of whom is a Dr. Fothergill from England and another a Baron Rumboul from Prussia8 I am not sure that this is the mans name but Kitty who dined with them at Mr. Maddissons yesterday says it was so pronounced—
Remember me affectionately to your father mother &. Brother The Children send you an hundred kisses with as many as you please from her whose greatest happiness and glory it will ever be to subscribe herself your sincerely devoted and affectionate wife
L C Adams
P.S. George is now standing at the door & crying because a Gentleman passed by whom he took for you without noticing him
RC (Adams Papers); addressed: “John Q. Adams Esqr”; endorsed: “Louisa. 6. June 1804. / 16. June Recd: / 18. Do: Ansd:.” Some loss of text where the seal was removed.
1. The cut-paper profiles of LCA and her sister Carolina Virginia Marylanda Johnson were created by itinerant artist Isaac Todd (fl. 1803–1810), who along with Augustus Day and William Bache had patented a physiognotrace in June 1803. When Todd arrived in Georgetown, D.C., in late May 1804, he advertised “correct profiles” at the cost of 25 cents for four (, 1:429; Washington, D.C., National Intelligencer, 4 June; Mona Leithiser Dearborn, “Isaac Todd’s 1804 Alexandria Profiles,” Alexandria Chronicle, 2:2–4 [Spring 1994]).
2. JQA to LCA, 25 May, above.
3. LCA was then reading Elizabeth Hamilton, Letters on the Elementary Principles of Education, 2 vols., which was first published in Bath, England, in 1801, with the first U.S. edition published in Alexandria, Va., in 1803. Throughout, Hamilton references Lockean principles and those of Maria Edgeworth, Practical Education, 2 vols., London, 1798 (Hamilton, Letters, , No. 4328, 1:39, 105–106, 114, 313; 2:11, 40, 100, 106, 150, 161, 210, 344, 409).
4. These letters to Catherine Nuth Johnson regarding the ongoing settlement of Joshua Johnson’s business affairs have not been found but were from Samuel Thorp, a Johnson family friend in London, and John Maitland of the British firm Fludyer, Maitland, & Co., which was one of Joshua Johnson’s creditors (, 1:22, 52, 53; , 228–229).
5. Enclosure not found.
6. George Washington Parke Custis and Mary Lee Fitzhugh married in Alexandria, Va., on 7 July 1804. Fitzhugh (ca. 1788–1853) was the daughter of William and Anne Bolling Randolph Fitzhugh of Chatham, Stafford County, Va.; her sister was Anne Randolph Fitzhugh Craik (d. 1806), wife of Maryland judge William Craik (Washington Federalist, 11 July; Alexandria Gazette, 16 May 1853; Edmund Jennings Lee, ed., Lee of Virginia 1642–1892, Biographical and Genealogical Sketches of the Descendants of Colonel Richard Lee, Phila., 1895, p. 82; New York Weekly Museum, 11 Oct. 1806).
7. News of Edward Thornton’s departure as the British chargé d’affaires was reported in the Washington, D.C., National Intelligencer, 15 June 1804. For Anthony and Elizabeth Death Leathes Merry’s travels, see JQA to LCA, 23 June, and note 2, below.
8. The visitors to Washington, D.C., were Dr. Anthony Fothergill and Baron Friedrich Wilhelm Alexander von Humboldt. Fothergill (ca. 1732–1813) was an English physician who primarily practiced in Bath before coming to Philadelphia in 1803. He was active in the American Philosophical Society before returning to England in 1812. Humboldt (1769–1859), a Prussian scientist and explorer, traveled to South America in 1799 and spent five years exploring the northern portion of the continent and part of Mexico. He visited the United States on his way back to Europe (, 7:122, 248, 265; ; Andrea Wulf, The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World, N.Y., 2015, p. xii, 94, 95).