1To John Adams from John Morton, 29 November 1802 (Adams Papers)
Having furnished the respectable Editon of the Medl. Repository with a summary Accot. of the City of Hava. I beg a presumption to request your acceptance of a Copy of that article from their last number. You will perceive Sir that, as there stated, it is but a summary; but as I intend collecting all my Notes into one View, I shall at a future day beg your acceptance, also, of that collection....
2To John Adams from John Avery, Jr., 12 June 1805 (Adams Papers)
I have the honor to inform you, that Your Excellency has been, this day, elected President of the Massachusetts Society for promoting Agriculture, and I with great pleasure transmit this notification— I am Sir with great Esteem and / Respect— / Your very huml. Servt. MHi : Adams Papers.
3From John Adams to John Beale Bordley, 25 April 1803 (Adams Papers)
At the request of our mutual Friend Mr van der Kemp, I have inclosed to you his learned Memoir, on the Use of Copper among the Greeks. I hope you have got the better of that painfull disorder which once afflicted you, and that your Friends are all prosperous and happy. With great Esteem and regard / your most obedient PHi : Adams Papers.
4From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 20 June 1807 (Adams Papers)
Inclosed is the Certificate of forty Shares in the Fire and Marine Insurance Company. The third part of the Capital which is to be paid off, you will please to receive in shares of the Boston Bank, if you approve of it, and hold them as you propose. I am your affectionate / Father MHi : Winthrop Family Papers.
5To John Adams from John Sinclair, 22 June 1801 (Adams Papers)
I have now the pleasure of inclosing, the plan of a new Town I am erecting in the north of Scotland, where you will see the place destined for erecting a monument to the memory of our much respected friend General Washington. I hope that you have received the copies of the Generals letters to me, transmitted to you some months ago. At present they are a singular publication, but must be an...
6To John Adams from John Redman Coxe, 19 March 1802 (Adams Papers)
Having received from you by the hands of your Son, the very acceptable Donation of the 2nd & 3d vol of your Defence of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America; which renders the work complete, I am directed by the Society to transmit their thanks for your assistance, in thus advancing the design of their institution. I have the honour to be, / Your obedient servant, MHi...
7From John Adams to John Churchman, 3 September 1801 (Adams Papers)
I have received your favour from Rhode Island, and in Answer to it, take this opportunity to Say, that I was early made Acquainted with the Theory of your Universal Variation Chart and have always wished you Success in the Pursuit of it: that I have been acquainted with you many years, that I never knew or heard of any Thing to the disadvantage of your Character: and that I have always...
8To John Adams from John Sinclair, 3 June 1802 (Adams Papers)
I expected to have had the Honour of hearing from you before this time, on the subject of the publication of General Washingtons Letters, but I hope to have that pleasure soon. In the interim I beg to send an engraving of the proposed Monument and a plan of the new town of Thurso in which it is proposed to be erected. You will also herewith receive a paper on Longevity. Permit me to request...
9From John Adams to John Adams Smith, 27 March 1806 (Adams Papers)
I am much pleased with the temper and spirit of your Letter of February 28th: The subjects of your future Examination, are judiciously chosen and I hope you will acquit yourself to your own satisfaction as well as that of your Instructor’s. I know of no Characteristic of a weak head a dull discernment and superficial reflection more remarkable than the opinion you mention of many young Men who...
10John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 31 January 1804 (Adams Papers)
This prohibition of the admission of slaves into Louisiana, is like the drawing of a jaw tooth. We have expedient after expedient introduced to answer this purpose— Breckenridge has at last concentrated all his wisdom on the subject in the Amendment, which I now inclose you.— This is a tolerably good device to reconcile the two parties of slave and anti-slave, into which the majority are...
11To John Adams from John Trumbull, 16 September 1805 (Adams Papers)
Returning to Hartford in the course of our Circuit, I found your letter, of July 27th. & August 5th: which had lain a month in the Post Office. From some appearances, I am led to believe that a correspondence so free as ours has been, cannot with perfect safety be carried on at present—I will however answer some of your enquiries. The letter You remark on, relative to the capture of...
12John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 28 March 1801 (Adams Papers)
It is my intention during the short time that I expect to remain here, to send you from time to time such new publications in the french language, as may fall in my way, and appear to promise entertainment or matter of interesting meditation for you. With this design I purpose to combine another, which I am at least desirous to render of some utility to my Country— The translation from Juvenal...
13To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 4 July 1806 (Adams Papers)
I enclose you a letter, which I received last Monday, and by which you will learn the distressing misfortune which has befallen me—I have not communicated it to you before, from the wish that it might not come to the knowledge of my brother’s wife, at a moment when it might too much affect her—I have another letter from Washington, one day later than the one enclosed; my wife was then as well...
14From John Adams to John Marshall, 17 July 1806 (Adams Papers)
Yesterday I received from the Post Office your obliging Letter of the Sixth of this month. It is not necessary for me to recurr to my Letter Books, and examine the few Letters I wrote to General Washington, before I assure you, that I Shalt take no offence at your inserting in your History, parts or the whole of them. They were written under great Agitation of Mind, at a time when a cruel...
15To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 30 November 1807 (Adams Papers)
I received a few days since your very kind letter which I am ashamed of answering by a few lines; but by some accident I have fallen from a state of almost total idleness into an overwhelming flood of business, which leaves me scarcely a quarter of an hour of the day or of the Night—I sent you last week a copy of a volume in the form of a bill which I reported upon the Aggression business and...
16From John Adams to John Trumbull, 6 February 1805 (Adams Papers)
Colonel Humphreys and Col Tudor did me the honor of a Visit on Saturday and We had much Conversation about you, which made me feel as if I was Sitting at my Fire Side among my Children whom I had not found together for many Years. I was highly rejoiced to hear of your health, and the honor Esteem and respect which the Men of Connecticutt, which the Men of Connecticutt, have at length the Sense...
17To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 5 January 1805 (Adams Papers)
I have now two letters from you, and one from my mother, which ought to be answered more particularly, than my time will admit—The business of the Session has been delayed, untill such an accumulation has taken place, as will very much hurry the close of our Time—And although I might perhaps without injury to the public, suffer the business to be done without taking much trouble about it...
18To John Adams from John Coxil, 28 December 1802 (Adams Papers)
I have been vary anxious and try‘d to send these Bricks that I engaged to you. I have obtained fair promissis from those with which I contracted to carry them, that they would be faithfull to come at those times they repeatedly set. After a multiplied series of disappointments the Bay thro’ which they must pass has frozen over which cuts off the expectation of getting them freighted, (or...
19From John Adams to John Davis, 11 April 1804 (Adams Papers)
I received Yesterday your favour of the ninth. Of Mr Baron I know neither the Person nor the Character: but it Seems to me that a demonstration will not be the less mathematical for the Nation or the Morals of the Author. The Accademy can not know the Manners of all their correspondents, and if the Cause of Truth and Science is really promoted by a bad Man even whom they know to be Such, I...
20John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 18 April 1801 (Adams Papers)
I enclose herewith the second number of my Gazette, which completes the Journal for the month of March. By the last post I sent to Hamburg a letter for my mother with the information, that on the 12 th: inst r: my wife was delivered of a son. But she was then extremely ill, & I wrote under the impression of great alarm on her account. She has since very much recovered, & as I am assured quite...
21To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 19 November 1804 (Adams Papers)
I have received your kind favour of the 6th: instt: and shall be careful to enclose the more important documents which may be printed from Time to Time— I hope my dear Mother has ere this entirely recovered from her illness. I had a letter from Mr: Shaw, one day later than your’s, in which he gives me a yet more flattering hope of her being on the recovery. Although the more my brother’s...
22From John Adams to John Sinclair, 24 May 1805 (Adams Papers)
A natural history of this country has been long desired, by every inquisitive mind. Although the calls of my profession, and the more serious demands of the political interests of my country, turned my attention, almost half a hundred years ago, from investigations of this nature, yet I have never been insensible to their pleasures and advantages. In 1779, called upon to frame a constitution...
23John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 1 May 1801 (Adams Papers)
I have received, and communicated to this Government, my recall from the mission here— I shall hasten my departure as much as possible; but the situation of my wife who is still confined to her bed, renders it uncertain when she will be able to travel at-all, and yet more when to undertake the voyage. If a favourable opportunity from Hamburg for Boston occurs I shall give it the preference—...
24To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 27 January 1808 (Adams Papers)
I have already written you a very long letter in answer to your favour of the 8th: instt:—and after writing it, upon reading it over concluded the best disposition I could make of it would be to burn it—Accordingly the flames have consumed it, and I must begin again. Your answers and observations upon my inquiries respecting the impressment of our seamen by the British are of the highest...
25John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 16 May 1801 (Adams Papers)
M r: Welsh proposes to return home by the way of Amsterdam, and will be the bearer of this letter— With it, I enclose the 4 th: number of the Gazette, and copies of former letters to yourself and to my dear mother. I wish I could promise myself a more speedy departure than that which I anticipated in my last Letter to you; but we can no longer form a hope of my wife’s immediate recovery— There...
26From John Adams to John Davis, 26 February 1806 (Adams Papers)
Inclosed are Mr Spauldings Bill of Mortality for Portsmouth for 1805 and a Letter from Mr Benjamin Henfrey to me a total stranger to his Name as well as Person. Please to communicate both these Papers to the Academy at their next meeting. I hope Something will be done to be communicated to the Public, if nothing Should be decided among the Candidates for Count R Præmium, as Soon as may be...
27From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 14 December 1804 (Adams Papers)
In my Letter of the 14th Ult. I believe I misunderstood the Presidents Position. His Expression that the Judges ought to hang American Citizens who should commit homicide &c meant no more than to express his opinion that the Fact amounted to a Capital Offence. His opinion that it is a Capital offence to resist French Revenue Laws, in the West Indies is totally unfounded. The President was also...
28To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 28 March 1806 (Adams Papers)
I have two letters from you which ought to have been answered some time since, but I have only one apology for the delay, which I have so often mentioned that I am almost ashamed to repeat it. I have no time for writing except when the Senate is in Session, and when such business is before them, as I can suffer to proceed without paying much attention to it.—We have now come to sit on...
29From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 18 March 1808 (Adams Papers)
Your luminous Letter of the 27th of Feb. and 6. March are is before me. Was this an homogenious Nation under a consolidated Government, the Provision in the Constitution of Massachusetts would be Sufficient. But in a Confederation like ours there is danger. In Holland they have thought unanimity necessary in all most every Thing. Under our old Confederation, a Concurrence of nine States out of...
30To John Adams from John Marshall, 6 July 1806 (Adams Papers)
I have taken a liberty which may require an apology. Thinking it necessary, I have, without your permission, inserted in the life of General Washington parts of letters written by you to him at the time of his appointment to the command of the army which was to be raised in 1798. I have ventured to do this because I thought it impossible that the act could be offensive to you, & because I had...
31John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 15 March 1804 (Adams Papers)
You will see by the folio sheet I inclose to you, that the House of Representatives have not yet done with the Government of Louisiana.— The fourth Section is the only one in which there seems much difficulty to the Legislators of the day— Many attempts were made to vary that here, and they are renewed in the House— They sport with Louisiana, as a Cat sports with a mouse— But to help our...
32To John Adams from Rev. John Disney, 24 August 1807 (Adams Papers)
Among the papers of my late friend Mr.mr Brand-Hollis; I have been greatly gratified by the perusal of several letters from you, and by two from Mrs. Adams addressed to him. It is probable that I may print a Memoir of my munificent friend, in which I should greatly wish to introduce these letters, in testimony of the friendship which subsisted between the parties, and from my conviction of...
33From John Adams to John Adams Smith, 14 December 1808 (Adams Papers)
It is a long time since I had a Letter from you. In the last I think you prophesied “Wonders in November.” I understood you to mean, a wonderful revolution in the sentiments of the people, and a restoration of the Federalists to the Government of the Nation. But the month of November is past, and there appears, notwithstanding all the terrors and horrors of the Embargo a wonderfull adherence...
34From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 6 November 1804 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for my Letter from N.Y and the Pamplet inclosed. Commodore Morris’s Defence contains Information which appears to be wanted by our President and all his Ministers, by his senators and Representatives, by his Officers and Men of his Navy, and by the commercial Citizens of our Country. To be sure to protect the Commerce and Seamen in the Atlantic and Mediterranean and blockade...
35To John Adams from John Murray Forbes, 25 April 1801 (Adams Papers)
On my return to this Country permit me to take the earliest opportunity to express to you the warm sense of grateful obligation which I feel for your attention to my Wishes & those of my friends, in the nomination of me to the Commercial Agency of the U. S. at Havre de Grace in France—This place promises to an American House even greater Commercial advantages than that of Bordeaux which I had,...
36To John Adams from John Davis, 9 April 1804 (Adams Papers)
You may probably recollect a paper communicated to the Academy, some years since, demonstrating the falsity of a mathematical Problem by Mr Winthrop, which was published in the 1st. part of the IId. Volume of the Memoirs. The communication referred to was by Mr. George Baron , an Englishman then residing at Hallowell, now at New-York. It was committed to President Willard and Professor Webber...
37John Quincy Adams to John Adams, 4 September 1801 (Adams Papers)
After a passage of 58 days from Hamburg we have this day landed here, where we purpose to stay five or six days— My wife will then go to spend a few weeks with her parents at Washington, and I shall hasten towards Quincy where I hope within three weeks to present myself before you— Her health though yet very infirm is better than we could have expected, and your little Grandson is as hearty as...
38To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 24 January 1805 (Adams Papers)
You will find, in the multitude of public documents, which I constantly transmit to you, the only apology I have to offer, for the irregularity which has crept upon the returns to your most valuable letters—Though I find it utterly impossible even to read all these papers, yet I feel it an indispensible duty to peruse with attention the greater part of them, and some of them require even a...
39John Adams to John Quincy Adams, February 1802 (Adams Papers)
I have been confined, with a cold for three Weeks and the family have been generally affected in the same Way: We have not heard from yours for Some time. I long to see you all: but the Weather and the roads will keep Us, at a distance I fear for Some days if not weeks. I have read Seven Volumes of De la Harpe in course, and the last seven I have run through and Searched but cannot find what I...
40From John Adams to John Adams Smith, 15 April 1808 (Adams Papers)
You ask me whether “an armed Vessel of a belligerent Nation has a right to search a vessel of a neutral.” I answer No, except for contraband of war. This exception is established by the law and practice of nations; and confirmed by Treaties. But there is no right to search for men. The King of England acknowledges that he has no right to search for men a neutral ship of war even for deserters...
41John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 12 September 1801 (Adams Papers)
The 11 th. of September is reckoned among the happiest days of my Life: The Navy officers who composed the late Court Martial on Capt Little, came out to visit me, with M r shaw who brought me your favor of the 4 th dated at Philadelphia, informing me of your arrival on that day with my Daughter and Grandson in as good health as could be expected.— You do not expressly say whether you intend...
42To John Adams from John Davis, 11 November 1802 (Adams Papers)
It had been impressed on my mind, that the next meeting of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences would be on the third Wednesday of the present month, and I did not discover my errer until it was too late to give the usual notice. It ought, by statute, to have been held yesterday (the 2d. Wednesday) at Cambridge. I request this in advertence, and would wish to know whether you will authorize...
43To John Adams from John Avery, Jr., 11 April 1805 (Adams Papers)
Agreeably to the Request of the Trustees of the Massachusetts Society for promoting Agriculture, I have the honor to inclose you their Vote, passed this day, for calling a meeting of the visitors of the Professorship of Natural History—The institution will be delivered to you by the Hoñble Mr. Quincy, as also the Subscribers to a fund for the establishment of Said Professorship, for your...
44To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 6 December 1805 (Adams Papers)
I enclosed under a blank cover to you a copy of the President’s Message, on the day when it was delivered, and having now to enclose a letter from my wife to my Mother, and a bill which has already pass’d both houses of Congress I cannot forbear writing a line with it, to recall myself to your kind remembrance. You will perceive that the message is in a style and tone which have not been...
45From John Adams to John Davis, 14 August 1804 (Adams Papers)
The disposition of every member of the Accademy to Show every respect and do every honor to the Memory of their Reverend and Learned Associate Dr Howard is unquestionable, and nothing but the heat of the Season in my present State of Health should prevent me from having the Honor of attending his Funeral with the other Members. It is my request to you, Sir to give public Notice of the...
46From John Adams to John Marshall, 4 February 1806 (Adams Papers)
I have received from you, three Volumes of the Life of our late General and President Washington in a condition of convenience and ornament, which has not yet been exceeded by any of the Arts or Artists of our Country, nor indeed much inferiour to any in the most refined Countries of Europe. I pray you, Sir to accept my best Thanks for this elegant present. Exegisti monumentum ære perennius....
47From John Adams to John Thornton Kirkland, 5 January 1807 (Adams Papers)
Upon the recommendation of General Washington Gen Hamilton and General Pinckney I appointed your brother George an officer in the American army in which he served from its creation to its dissolution in that division of it which was under the general superintendance of Gen Hamilton and the immediate command of Col Smith. When he left the army in 1799 I well remember that several letters or...
48To John Adams from John Quincy Adams, 18 June 1807 (Adams Papers)
The Fire and Marine Insurance Office are now repaying the third part of their capital, to which they were authorized by an Act of the Legislature; and issuing new Certificates to the Stockholders—The old Certificates must therefore be returned into the Office—I will thank you to send me, by the earliest opportunity, your Certificate for the forty shares, which stand in my name, but of which...
49To John Adams from John Davis, 28 September 1804 (Adams Papers)
It has again become my duty to address you on a melancholly subject. The excellent President Willard , whose discourse we so lately heard at the funeral of the lamented Howard is now no more. I am In making arrangements, yesterday, for the funeral, the family requested the Corporation to name the Pall Holders. It is the wish of the Corporation, that you would consent to be one, if you it...
50From John Adams to John Quincy Adams, 19 February 1808 (Adams Papers)
In Answer to your Letter of the 27 of January I request you to make Provision for Advancing me, by Mr Shaw one thousand one hundred and twenty five dollars and fifty Cents, or thereabout, which is the amount of an Obligation I owe to Miss Thaxter, or if you choose and I think there is but one remaining due to that Family. Your Mother has written you on the Subject of Caucus’s. I am not of her...