161To John Adams from François Adriaan Van der Kemp, 12 April 1818 (Adams Papers)
Since I was gratified with your favour of march the 10, another of my intimate acquaintances—whom you may, perhaps, may recollect to have Seen in Holland, H. de Roo, van Wulverhorst is gone—the harvest for gathering my frends Seems to be at hand—two more, Vreed-en Cau, are yet left—and this week my Son communicated to us the death of his youngest Boy—only Six years—of uncommon bodily strenght...
162From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 15 April 1818 (Adams Papers)
I HAVE received your obliging favour of the 8th, but cannot consent to your resolution to ask no more questions. Your questions revive my sluggish memory. Since our national legislature have established a national painter—a wise measure, for which I thank them, my imagination runs upon the art, and has already painted, I know not how many, historical pictures. I have sent you one, give me...
163To John Adams from Justin Griswold, 22 April 1818 (Adams Papers)
I am requested by the old Revolutionary Gentlemen of this vicinity, to ask the favour of your Hon. to give your, and your son: John Quinsey’s ages, for their gratification— Your conceding to the above will oblige / theirs, and—, / Your obedient / Hum. Sert.— MHi : Adams Papers.
164From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 23 April 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have Seldom read so much good sense, in so few Words as in your Letter of the 5th. Your Judgment of Mr Wirts Biography of My Friend Mr Henry, is in exact Unison with my own. I have read it with more delight than Scotts Romances in Verse and Prose or Miss Porters Scottish Chiefs and other Novels. I am sorry you have introduced me. I could wish my own Name forgotten, if I could devellope, the...
165To John Adams from William P. Gardner, 29 April 1818 (Adams Papers)
A Stranger to you, an Apology is justly due on my part for the Liberty I take in addressing this Letter. The Hand of time will, ere a period but short in it’s Duration must elapse, sweep from this sublunary stage of Existence the few remaining revolutionary Patriots who, by their wisdom in Council and their valour in the field plannd and establishd the Liberty and independence of our happy...
166To John Adams from Richard Rush, 2 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
An old Scotch woman, in North-Shields, signing herself Ann Hewison, has sent me a manuscript Quarto of what she calls extracts from the diary of William Langborn, an American officer, kept during his travels through several parts of Europe. I copy, word for word, the following passages. London July 18. 1786. “Saturday—Did myself the pleasure, agreeably to yesterdays invitation, of dining with...
167From John Adams to Justin Griswold, 3 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I was born on the nineteenth of October 1735, and consequently was eighty two years of age, on the thirtieth of October 1817. My Son John Quincy, was born on the eleventh of July 1767, and consequently will be fifty one years of age, on the eleventh of July next. If this information can afford any gratification to the old revolutionary Gentleman of your vicinity, everyone of whom I love, it is...
168To John Adams from François Adriaan Van der Kemp, 8 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
Although only a few moments of day light are left me, I Shall take hold of these to indulge a pleasurable feeling—in cordially thanking your kindness. for Sending me the Trans. Vol. iii Both parts visited first the North—last night Part. i was returned—Part ii—was received the week before. But—my Dear friend!—How willingly I acknowledge my obligations to you—yet I must complain—you did...
169From John Adams to William P. Gardner, 11 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have received the Letter you did me the honour to write me on the 29th of April and I thank you for the Communication. I have So little intercourse with the World that I have never Seen and I know nothing of Mr Benjamin Owen Tyler’s Edition of the declaration of Independence. You allude to some Person who is determined to omit my Name. If you mean Mr De la Plane, he is certainly not to blame...
170From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 12 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
In my Letters to you, I regard no order. And I think, I ought to make you laugh Sometimes: otherwise my Letters would be too grave, if not too melancholly. To this End I Send you Jemmibellero “the Song of the Drunkard” which was published in Fleets “Boston Evening Post” on the 13th. of May 1765. It was universally agreed to have been written by Samuel Waterhouse, who had been the most...
171To John Adams from Isaac H. Jackson, 16 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
Though satisfied you are always willing to give information; yet as an entire stranger I must beg you will pardon the liberty taken of intruding on you, in requesting the name of the author of a poem written I imagine in Massachusetts about the year 1768 ns , entitled “An Address to a Provincial Bashaw”. The strong language in which it is written induced me many years since to copy it from...
172To John Adams from Benjamin Owen Tyler, 16 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have executed and published an elegant copy of the Declaration of American Independence, being the first and only copy ever published with facsimilies of the signatures of that ever venerated band of patriots who signed it, among whom you Sir were the foremost, and as your Illustrious compatriot Thomas Jefferson expressed in a letter to a gentleman in this city, “the pillar of its support on...
173To John Adams from Thomas Jefferson, 17 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I was so unfortunate as not to recieve from mr Holly’s own hand your favor of Jan. 28. being then at my other home. he dined only with my family, & left them with an impression which has filled me with regret that I did not partake of the pleasure his visit gave them. I am glad he is gone to Kentucky. rational Christianity will thrive more rapidly there than here. they are freer from...
174To John Adams from William P. Gardner, 19 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I yesterday had the pleasure to receive the Letter which you did me the Honor to address to me under date of the 11 Instant for which you will be pleased to accept my thanks.—It is indeed highly grateful to my feelings to have the honor of a friendly Letter from one of the most illustrious founders of the American Republic.—I observe that your Hand is tremulous, the enevitable Consequence of a...
175To John Adams from William Tudor, Sr., 20 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
Did Mr. Otis write more than two political Pamphlets? One his spirited “Vindication of the House of Representatives” printed in 1762. And the other that “Of the Rights of the Colonies asserted & proved” in which he strangely concedes the Authority & Right of the British Parliament to make Laws binding upon the Subjects however distant their Situation, & variant their Circumstances, in all...
176To John Adams from Daniel Putnam, 21 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
However untimely or improper may the thought an address of this kind, from an obscure, individual to the President of the U. States, I cannot repress the impulse which urges me to trespass on the high duties of your exalted station, and to solicit your condescention to a short vindication of my Fathers memory from the foul aspersions cast on it by a man who has held stations of high...
177To John Adams from Daniel Putnam, 23 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
Will you allow me Sir, the honor of presenting, and afford me the gratification of perusing the pamphlet herewith forwarded? containing an account of the Battle of Bunker Hill by Major Genl. Dearborn, and a feeble endeavour on my part, to repel the charges therein made, against the character and conduct of the late Major Genl. Israel Putnam. In ordinary cases, I have deemed the pamphlet in its...
178From John Adams to Benjamin Owen Tyler, 24 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have received your Copy of the declaration of Independence for which I thank you. It is elegantly and exquisitely executed— I should think that our Harvard Colledge ought to be as proud of it, as of the Manuscript Copy of the Aphorisms of Hypocrites lately presented by Mr Nichols of London through Mr Boylston of Prince Princeton, which is said to be worth in England fifteen hundred Guineas.—...
179From John Adams to Thomas Jefferson, 29 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
As Holly is a Diamond of a Superiour water it would be crushed to pouder by Mountainous oppression in any other country. Even in this, he is a light shining in a dark place. His System is founded in the hopes of Mankind, but they delight more in their Fears. When will man have juster notions of the Universal eternal cause? Then will rational Christianity prevail. I regrett Holly’s misfortune...
180From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 1 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
No Man could have written from Memory Mr Otis’s Argument of four or five hours against The Acts of Trade as Revenue Laws Writts of Assistants, as a tyrannical Engine to execute them the next day after it was spoken. How awkward then would be an attempt to do it after a lapse of fifty seven years? Nevertheless, Some of the heads of his discourse are So indellibly imprinted on my Mind, that I...
181To John Adams from William P. Gardner, 4 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have received the Letter which you did me the honor to write to me under Date the 29 ult. I am happy to find that Mr. Delaplaine has succeeded in obtaining a good Likeness of you for his national work the Heads and Lives of illustrious Persons of America.—I hope he will meet with that encouragement which the magnitude and usefulness of the work so justly merit.—I shou’d be glad to see the...
182To John Adams from Ann Frances Bulkeley Humphreys, 4 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
It was the wish of my lamented Husband, that after his death, small tokens of his affection & remembrance should be presented to each of his dearest & most esteemed friends… this sacred request of his, must plead my apology to the most valued & most highly venerated of his friends & Patrons, for presuming to write to him this note, & offering him a little braid of General Humphrey’s Hair, with...
183From John Adams to Daniel Putnam, 5 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I received Yesterday your kind Letter of the 23d of May with a Copy of your Letter to President Monroe of the 21. of May. Neither myself, nor my Family have been able to read either with dry Eyes. They are Letters that would do honour to the pen of Pliny. I had before been indebted to the Politeness of Mr Brinley for the Pamphlet. You ask “Whether any dissatisfaction existed in the public mind...
184To John Adams from Hezekiah Niles, 6 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I had the pleasure to publish your letters to Mr. Tudor, presenting subjects for national paintings—much to my own satisfaction & to the gratification of the American people. I respectfully acknowledge the reception of your very interesting letters to Mr. Wirt—they shall have a conspicuous insertion in my next Register. Grateful for the honor conferred by those communications, / I am, sir,...
185From William Wirt to John Quincy Adams, 6 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
The enclosed letter from Mr. Bache, the post-master at Philadelphia, ought, I think, to be communicated to the President of the U.S. As it is not improbable that an application for pardon, in the case alluded to, may follow him, on his tour. Taking it for granted that, some channel of communication between him and your department, during his absence, has been settled between you, I have...
186From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 7 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
No man could have written from memory Mr Otis’s Agument of four or five hours in length, against The Acts of Trade, considered as Revenue Laws, and against Writts of Assistance, as tyrannical Engines to carry them into execution, the next day after it was Spoken. How awkward then, is an Attempt to do it, after a Lapse of fifty Seven Years? Nevertheless, Some of the heads of his discourse, are...
187From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 9 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have promised you, hints, of the heads of Mr Otis’s Oration, Argument Speech, call it which you please, again the Acts of Trade as Revennue Laws, and against Writts of Assistants as Tyrannical Instruments to carry them into Execution.— But I enter on the performance of my promise to you not without fear and trembling; because I am in the Situation of a Lady, Whom you know first as my Client,...
188To John Adams from Daniel Putnam, 15 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
Words are poor, and wholly inadequate to express the grateful feelings of my heart for your excellent letter, couched in terms of no equivocal import, but wiping with a single stroke every pretence of public odium, which envy and malignity had endeavoured to fix on the character of General Putnam. Such testimony, from such a sourse, tho’ of a negative kind, is all the occasion required to...
189To John Adams from George Brinley, 16 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
Col. Danl. Putnam knowing how anxiously I feel for the honor of his Father’s memory, (& my relation); was kind enough to transmit to me, your obliging favour, to him, under date of the 5th inst—As there is no name existing that could give such effect to the Public mind as yours in this case—I have a great desire to obtain your consent to use the third, & perhaps the fourth paragraph—to...
190From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 17 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
The next Statute produced & commented by Mr Otis was the 15th. of Charles the Second, i.e. 1663, Chapter 7. “An Act for the Encouragement of Trade.” Section 5. “And in regard his Majesty’s Plantations beyond the Seas are inhabited and peopled by his Subjects of this his Kingdom of England.” for the maintaining a greater Correspondence and Kindness between them, and keeping them in a firmer...
191From John Adams to George Brinley, 19 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have received your Letter of the 16th. My letter to Col Daniel Putnam of the 5th. is at his and your disposal. You may publish any part of it, or the whole at your discretion. I wish the young Gentleman of the Age would undertake an analytical Investigation of the Constitution of the Army at Cambridge and of the detachment from it at Bunkers Hill and Breeds Hill on the 16 and 17th of June....
192To John Adams from George Brinley, 20 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I did myself the honor to address a note to you under date of the 16th. Inst requesting permission to use part of your Letter to Col. Putnam—Since which I have recd. a Letter from Col. Putnam covering one to you which I forward; saying he had “presumed to make use of part of your Letter without your permission” As Col. Putnam has made use of it—(which I most sincerely hope will meet your...
193To John Adams from Daniel Putnam, 20 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
Words are poor, and wholly inadequate to express the grateful feelings of my heart for your excellent letter, wreched in terms of no equivocal import, but wiping with a single Stroke, every stain pretence of public odium which envy and malignity had endeavoured to fix on the character of Genl. Putnam. Such testimony, from such a source, tho’ of a negative kind, is all the occasion required, to...
194To John Adams from Moses Lloyd Hill, 23 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
Being about to send to the press a work entitled, “Travels through the United States in the years 1812, –13, –14, –15, –16, –17 & 18, including a statistical view of each State at the close of the year 1817,” I have taken the liberty to solicit permission; to dedicate it to you. Among the Sages and Heroes, to whom we owe our national existence; I have ever been taught to revere the name of...
195From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 24 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
Mr Otis Said Such a “Writt of Assistance” might become the Reign of Charles the Second in England, and he would not dispute the Taste of the Parliament of England, in passing Such an Act, nor of the People of England in submitting to it; but it was not calculated for the Meridian of America. The Court of Exchequer had no Jurisdiction here. Her Warrant, and her, Writts never were Seen here. Or...
196To John Adams from William Tudor, Sr., 25 June 1818 (Adams Papers)
I ought sooner to have thank’d you for your last biographical Notices, but you had before left me to take my own time for scribling, & must not complain for my Abuse of the License. The anecdotes you have given of the Destruction of the private Papers of Mr. Otis & Mr. S. Adams has rescued two important facts from being totally lost to Posterity. They confessedly were two very extraordinary...
197To John Adams from William Wildes, 1 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
The citizens of the Towns of Braintree and Weymouth intending to celebrate the anniversary of our national birth on Saturday next, a procession will be formed near the new Meeting-house in Braintree at ten A.M., in which an address will be delivered: after which a dinner will be served in tents on the field—Several corps of Military will perform the duties of the day. The committee of...
198To John Adams from Horace Holley, 3 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
Mrs Adams was kind enough to say to me, when I was last at your house, and when I was contemplating this journey, “You will let us hear from you.” It is grateful to me to remember this remark, and to use the privilege which it confers. You and herself very often rise to my thoughts among the number of those, upon whose characters I delight to dwell as proofs of mental activity, cheerfulness,...
199To John Adams from William Tudor, Jr., 4 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
An indisposition which has considerably impeded my movements for a few weeks past, has prevented my having the honour of paying my respects to you as I have wished to do, and being about accompanying my sister Mrs Gardiner to Kennebec, I shall not be able to make my visit to Quincy till after my return towards the end of the month— I have for some time past thought of an undertaking which the...
200To John Adams from Benjamin Owen Tyler, 4 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
Absence from home has prevented me from receiveing your very interesting letter of the 24th of May until within a few days. If any thing could add to the gratitude veneration, and respect I feel for one of the principal founders of my countrys freedom, it is your the great compliment and respect you pay me in that letter which I shall preserve with the utmost care while I live. The sentiments...
201To John Adams from Henry Colman, 7 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
I take the liberty of sending you my Election Sermon; your silent approbation of which, if I felt confident that I should obtain it, would be the highest reward to which I aspire. The subject belongs to you, as furnishing one of the brightest and most illustrious examples of true, and inflexible and devoted patriotism which has honored this or any other age. I wished to have said this in the...
202To John Adams from William Mumford, 7 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
It will I doubt not be in your recollection, that sometime in the month of October 1797. I waited upon you at your Hospitable Mansion at Quincy, to solicit you for the appointment of Treasurer of the Mint; at which time I presented you my credentials, consisting of Letters from Governor Fenner, Messrs. Bourne, Foster, &c. after perusal of which you observed that my credentials were amply...
203From John Adams to Henry Colman, 9 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
I thank you for giving me an Opportunity to read a Discourse which I greatly regretted that the feeble State of my health would not allow me to hear. Your Text is the Sublimest Expression of Patriotism, that ever was penned as far as I know.—Your Simple Scrutiny into the physical and moral Motives to Patriotism, proves that a Man who does not love his Country Native Country is a Monster, an...
204From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 9 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
In the Search for Something, in the History and Statutes of England, in any degree resembling this Monstrum horrondum ingens the Writt of Assistance, the following Examples were found. In the Statute of the first Year of King James the Second Chapter third “An Act for granting to his Majesty an imposition upon all Wines and Vinegar &c ” ; Section 8, it is enacted “That the Officers of his...
205To John Adams from Joseph Wheaton, 11 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
I can no longer restrain an inclination which has for Some month urged me to write to you, and to give you a Short narritive of myself and the part I have taken in the late contest with our ancient enemy the English Nation—rather government—After the war was declared in June 1812, a peice was published in the National intelligencer dated 5.th. June—respecting the affair at Machias in taking...
206To John Adams from Rufus King, 12 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
As none of the Eminent Statesmen of the Country was more Early, or deeply impressed by the great importance of our national Fisheries, and navigation; and as no one has made more constant Exertions, than you have done, to Establish these Rights; I have taken the Liberty to send you a copy of a Speech that I delivered in the Senate during the last session of Congress, upon an occasion, in...
207To John Adams from John F. Watson, 12 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
I frankly confess I am a Stranger & have need to bespeak your indulgence for my freedom—But men of your eminent character, become a kind of Public property & are necessarily more liable to have their time encroached upon than other men. Without further apology, I will acknowledge to you, that I entertain the hope, that if I could but influence you to believe as I do, that your memoirs would be...
208To John Adams from LeRay de Chaumont, 13 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
Your most esteemed favor of the 2nd: April travelled a good deal before to reach me, as I was absent from home when it arrived. It was sent to me to Philadelphia & from there it followed me to New York & from there here. At last I got it & I hasten to present you my best thanks for the strongly felt pleasure it gave me & the kind enquiry you make me to know who was my wife You have known I...
209From John Adams to William Tudor, Sr., 14 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
Mr. Otis, to Show the Spirit of the Acts of Trade, those I have already quoted as well as those I Shall hereafter quote And as the best Commentaries upon them; produced a Number of Authors upon Trade, and read Passages from them, which I Shall recite, without pretending to remember the Order in which he read them. Sir Josiah Child “A new discourse of Trade” Let me recommend this Old Book to...
210To John Adams from William Lambert, 15 July 1818 (Adams Papers)
I have the honor to inclose herewith, two printed copies of abstracts of calculations relative to the longitude of the Capitol, in this City from Greenwich Observatory, in England.—These calculations were entered into, and completed, to lay a foundation for the establishment of a first meridian for the United States of America at the Seat of their government, according to the original plan of...