101From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 8 March 1811 (Adams Papers)
I thank you My Dear, & revered Brother & Sister, for your repeated attentions to me, & mine. The Cold, & the Snow yet remaining upon the Earth, renders it I fear, very painful & unpleasant Weather for my Son. I hoped to receive a Letter from him before this time, Silence in any one else I should construe as inability, or an increase of Disease. Few Children I believe are half attentive enough...
102From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 14 March 1811 (Adams Papers)
I will without delay thank you for the ind letter of the 5th, which was not received till yesterday. It has been my intention to ask after your health for some time, & that of your dear Sisters; My heart feels much for her sore bereavement, as her day is so may her strength be. To that great being in whom she confides I commend her, with her afflicted Husband. May he be more to them than sons...
103From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 19 March 1811 (Adams Papers)
In proportion as the time lengthens since the receipt of your last Letter, which is also the last that I have received from any of my friends at Quincy, I find not only my anxiety to hear directly from you increasing with it, but also my desire and determination if possible to relieve you and my other friends with you from a similar anxiety respecting us, which you would feel in the case of so...
104From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 22 March 1811 (Adams Papers)
I dined yesterday at the French Ambassadors, at a diplomatic dinner of about sixty persons in the highest and most formal style.—I give you a description of this entertainment, which may amuse you as a specimen of the usages of the time and place, and give you an idea of what is understood to be the suitable style of entertainment by an Ambassador—The invitation was by printed Card, sent five...
105From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 6 April 1811 (Adams Papers)
I have but just received your very Sisterly Letter, by Mrs Adams, handed me this morning. I immediately sat down & wrote to my Son, urged him to adjust his affairs with his Landlady, pay if possible, & thank her for any extra—kindness he has received—& quit her House as soon as convenient—I certainly know he may obtain respectable Boarding, at good Houses, for a less price—A little unconcern,...
106From William Eustis to Abigail Smith Adams, 22 April 1811 (Adams Papers)
It is among the instances of good fortune which are now & then permitted to accompany the discharge of a public duty, that franking a Letter from the State Department in the absence of the Secretary has brought me to your recallection and attention. Judge Adams as I am informed has been requested to return to the United States as soon as circumstances will admit: and as no public vessel has...
107From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 24 April 1811 (Adams Papers)
The Russian People pass their lives in a continual and alternate succession of feasting and fasting. Every individual whether of high or low degree celebrates two days in every year; one for his birth and the other for his baptism, which is called his name day, and is kept on the day marked in the Calendar, as devoted to the Saint of the same name; for it is a religious principle that every...
108From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 2 May 1811 (Adams Papers)
The religious ceremony of which in my last Letter I gave you an account, began at Midnight and terminated between three and four in the morning.—It was accompanied by a Salute of 21. Guns fired from the Fortress, two or three times, at particular stages of the performance—This was conformable to the customary practice; which always ushers in Easter day at St: Petersburg with an expence of...
109From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 16 May 1811 (Adams Papers)
Not one word have I heard from you my dear Friend since your kind letter, saying that you was but just leaving the chamber, after a long confinement. I hope & pray that you soon regained your usual health though that at best is delicate. Various circumstances have prevented my being with you ere this. Three weeks since I was called to Plymouth, to sympathize with my beloved Mrs Hammatt for the...
110From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 18 May 1811 (Adams Papers)
The late french Ambassador at this Court, the Duke de Vicence, has taken leave, and his succesor Count Lauriston has been received—He takes his departure this Evening or to-morrow for Paris, and I avail myself of the opportunity to enclose a line for you, under cover to Mr Russell our Chargé d’Affaires at that place—I have already sent several letters for you and for my brother to him to be...
111From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 10 June 1811 (Adams Papers)
With a mind sorely depressed by the late afflicting intelligence from America and the many additional circumstances which are hourly occurring to encrease the difficulties of my present situation and I feel almost incapacitated from writing even a few lines to thank you & my dear Sister Adams for the very tender and affectionate manner in which you broke to us the melancholy Tidings of our...
112From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 11 June 1811 (Adams Papers)
Your letter of 15. Feby: which was brought by Captain Brown, of the Washington, and which I received on the 23d: of last Month, gave me the first intelligence of those afflicting Events the Death of Mrs: Hellen and Mrs: Norton—I received it early in the morning, and was thereby enabled to communicate it to my wife and her Sister, with as much preparation as the nature of the case would...
113From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 20 June 1811 (Adams Papers)
I have not been unmindful of you my Dear Friend, nor of each member of your worthy family since leaving your hospitable Mansion, where christian graces adorn the possessors. My delay in writing in hopes of sending the promised Receipt has been in vain, for it has been to no purpose that I have repeatedly searched for it. However I do not regret it so much as I otherwise should do as the Root...
114From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 28 June 1811 (Adams Papers)
The very sudden change of the weather last Sabbath, when I was in a high state of persperation; caused so great opression & hoarseness upon my Lungs, as made me feel quite sick, & detained me in Town a day longer than I intended—As I had not sent to Mr Peabody, I thought best to send to Mr Parker, & go on Bag, & baggage, to our own Door in Atkinson by Wednesday Stage, which was much more...
115From William Stephens Smith to Abigail Smith Adams, 29 June 1811 (Adams Papers)
I was much gratified by the receipt of a few lines from you under date of Feby. 11th. enclosing a Letter from my Son William whose improvement I notice with pleasure— my Son John attends his dear mother and Sister on a visit to you, I proposed to attend Mrs: S. the last fall, and again pressed her to visit you in the Winter being confident both you and herself would feel more at ease than...
116From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 30 June 1811 (Adams Papers)
I have now to acknowledge the receipt of your number 6. dated 22. February, brought by the Henry Captain Harris; a vessel of which we had heard nearly a Month since, and which has at length arrived after a passage from Boston of 100 days.—The arrivals from America now crowd upon one another in multitudes which I am afraid will prove not very profitable to many of the adventurers.—From Quincy...
117From William Cranch to Abigail Smith Adams, 7 July 1811 (Adams Papers)
Upon receipt of your kind letter of the 17th. ulto. I was too deeply afflicted by the information it contained even to thank you for it, as I aught to have done. I inferr’d from it that my dear mother had gone to join the departed spirits of her mother, her father and those other friends from whom she had been so long separated by death. It was A day or two pass’d before I was undeceived; so...
118From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 13 July 1811 (Adams Papers)
I hope my Dear Sister’s Fibres are not so relaxed by the late intense heat of the weather, as not to be able to hold a Pen, & by her communications inform, comfort, & eddify her anxious Sister, & Friends—I was agreeably supprized by receiving two very kind letters from our good Brother Cranch, since my return to Atkinson—They gave me a very gratifying account of our dear Sister’s gradual...
119From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 29 July 1811 (Adams Papers)
My last letter, of which a press-copy is enclosed, was sent by the Palafox, Captain William Welsh, since which I have received four letters from you, N. 9—dated 8. April—one of 24. April not numbered—one of 15. May, and one of 28 May—both numbered 11.—So that I have now nine of your letters since you began to number them The numbers missing are 3 and 4. between 26 Jany. and 15. Feby. and N. 8....
120From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 3 August 1811 (Adams Papers)
Your Letter my Dear Sister, received a week since, flattered me with the pleasing Prospect of our beloved Sisters recovery— though slowly, & feeble, I trusted she might yet be of great service to her family, by her Presence, & Instruction; but your Intelligence by to Days Mail; has damped my fond Expectations—deeply shaded, & almost erased the pleasures of Hope—The sudden & voilent attack made...
121From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 12 August 1811 (Adams Papers)
On the 10th: of August 1811. we received your favour of 22. September 1810 to my wife; not quite eleven months after it was written; and the next day we received that of 8 June 1811. which has performed its voyage in a little more than two. Whether the Passage has been short or long the letter always gives pleasure, and always contains some intelligence that is new. You have repeatedly...
122From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 12 August 1811 (Adams Papers)
Although I have not written since receiving your favors of July 12th., & August 2nd., yet my heart has been with you daily, knowing too well by woful experience what your anxieties must be for a beloved Sister struggling between life & death, whose society must be precious to all who have the pleasure of knowing her virtues, & how much more so must it be to her near & dear Relatives. I have a...
123From William Stephens Smith to Abigail Smith Adams, 12 August 1811 (Adams Papers)
I have received your affectionate and interesting Letter of the 23d. of July you have conversed with the Doctor, but omit to mention his name, you say it is his opinion “that no outward application should be made, and that mrs: Smith’s general state of health is so good as not to threaten any present danger , he does not pronounce it to be a cancer, tho he cannot say, but that it may terminate...
124From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 20 August 1811 (Adams Papers)
Last Tuesday the Horn blew to announce the Departure of the Mail an Hour sooner than the usual Time, which obliged me to break of abrubtly, even without any Signature—Though I suppose you would know from whom it came, by the badness of the writing, & local Circumstances—I find since my last Fall sickness that my hands tremble more than they used— Not received a Letter from you, nor my Cousin,...
125From William Cranch to Abigail Smith Adams, 1 September 1811 (Adams Papers)
I thank you most sincerely for your excellent letter of 5th. ulto. which I should have answer’d before, but for the sickness & removal of my family. The precarious state of my dear mother’s health, for some time past, has, I trust, in some measure prepared me for an event, which is certainly inevitable and which we know can not be long procrastinated. Indeed our term of existence here is so...
126From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 10 September 1811 (Adams Papers)
The first page of the enclosed Press-Copy of my last Letter is so faint that unless you should have received the original, before it comes to hand, I know not whether you will be able to read it—The second however is more plain, and contains the material information of the whole; the birth of my daughter—This information has since been repeated in letters to my father and my brother,...
127From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 11 September 1811 (Adams Papers)
Not one ray of information has reached us respecting your Family, or my Dear Mrs Cranch’s ill health, since your letter written the day after leaving here. I cannot but hope that she is convalesent, & that you my Friend with her Family & others, may yet be blessed with her society on earth a while longer. But if it should be otherwise directed by an allwise Providence, I doubt not but that you...
128From William Stephens Smith to Abigail Smith Adams, 15 September 1811 (Adams Papers)
I received your very affectionate Letter (dated the 20th. of August, post mark 2d inst.) on Wednesday; in my Letter of August 12th. I may have expressed myself with too much Solicitude and given my opinion too decidedly in Opposition to that of professional men—they will have liberallity , enough, to excuse me—I fully agree with you that it would be best, having advised with Surgeon’s and...
129From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 2 October 1811 (Adams Papers)
Your favour of 21. June, without a number, was forwarded to me from Copenhagen by Mr. Erving, who recovered it from the Radius, which on her passage to this place, was taken by a french privateer, and is still detained in Denmark—Like almost all the letters which we have received this year it brought tidings of sickness and affliction among our friends—In the sorrow which they have so often...
I received your kind Letters yesterday by mail, & though I ought soon to have expected such an Event, yet I find it has shocked my nerves more than I should have thought—For he had so lately written to me, & his strength of mind appeared so brilliant, & so composed respecting my Sister, that I could not but please myself with the hope that his, life & usefulness might been continued, but it...
My dearly beloved, & only Sister, for the “threefold silken Cord is broken ” To what an unusual Striking, affecting Providence have you been called to witness,—such as my Eyes never beheld—Very pleasant, & lovely through a long series of years, & in Death we may say, they were not divided—Together freed, their Gentle Spirits flew, to Scenes of immortal Bliss, we humbly trust—Thought can pursue...
132From William Cranch to Abigail Smith Adams, 22 October 1811 (Adams Papers)
I received yesterday your kind letter of 17th. instant, informing me of the death of my dear and venerable father, and of the hopeless state of health of my dear Mother. I rejoice and am thankful that my father was not left to linger out a painful and solitary existence deprived of the dear partner of all his comforts. which It seems like a special interposition of the all–merciful hand. My...
133From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 24 October 1811 (Adams Papers)
By every vessel that has arrived for several months from America, and which we should have expected to bring letters for us, we receive, instead of letters, apologies for not writing, because we were thought to be on our passage home—You only have foreseen the contingency which has actually happened, that we might be detained over the present Winter, and you only continue to give us some...
134From Archibald Young to Abigail Smith Adams, 7 November 1811 (Adams Papers)
Cloathing purchased for George and John Adams 3 peices Blew Nankeen at 2 dollars pr piece 6 1 peice yellow 1 25 2 yd Gingham .63 1 yd vesting 1 42 4 yds check 1 69 5 doz pearl Buttons 1 50 3 yd cotton Cloth 75
The excellent Sermon you sent, me was indeed “a cordial to my Heart—” I thank Mr Whitney for the justice he has done to departed excellence, & for his sympathetick remembrace of me, & the absent Relatives—It was my ardent wish to have been present at the mournful Obsequies, but it was not to be—Mr Peabody’s Indisposition, & a number of contingencies prevented—I have been laying plans in my own...
136From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 14 November 1811 (Adams Papers)
I did not need your last token of love to remind me of my duty to one who is unwearied in exertions of friendship towards me. My mind dwells much on my dear absent Friends & it is with truth I can say that you & yours have a large share of my contemplations. By my own woful experience I can & do most sensibly feel for you under your bereavments. The society of a good Brother & Sister is...
137From William Cranch to Abigail Smith Adams, 16 November 1811 (Adams Papers)
I have not words, my dear Aunt, to express my gratitude for your kind and consoling letter of the 25th. ulto.—It was, as I wished, minute and particular respecting the last moments of my dear and venerable parents. Mr. Norton’s letters having been directed to George town remain’d there some days, so that your letter was contain’d the first information I received of the death of my mother,...
138From Mary Smith Gray Otis to Abigail Smith Adams, 29 November 1811 (Adams Papers)
I was much gratified my dear Mrs Adams the last week; by a line from you: especially as it announced your own health & that of your family with Mrs Smith’s restoration. I have thought of her with much anxiety & sympathised with you both , on the various events, which have call’d forth all the feelings of the human Heart. Whilst you feel the loss of your excellent Brother & Sister, you cannot...
139From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 30 November 1811 (Adams Papers)
Although since I last wrote to my brother, on the 6th: instt: we have neither received a line from America, nor had an opportunity of transmitting a letter to any place from which it could be dispatched to you; yet remembering my engagement never to suffer a month to pass without writing at least once to you, and once to him, and perceiving that as it applies to you, I am within one day of a...
140From James Monroe to Abigail Smith Adams, 3 December 1811 (Adams Papers)
I have had the Honor to receive your Letter of the 28th ult. covering one to your Son the American Minister at St Petersburg. I fear it will be too late for the “Hornet” sloop of war: but I have had it put under cover to Mr Barlow and sent to the Collector of the Customs at Newyork, requesting him to forward it by the first safe conveyance With great Respect / I have the Honor to be / Madam /...
141From Mercy Otis Warren to Abigail Smith Adams, 8 December 1811 (Adams Papers)
Though I have felt the complicated affliction that has recently assailed my friends at Quincy, I have been silent;—nor should I now interrupt you from this unexpected Quarter, but from the interest I feel in her happiness, and the desire I have to know the situation of your amiable daughter.— I have never heard a word from her since her Brother was here,—the day after she passed through a...
At the arrival of the last Mail, I thought I could hear my dear Sister say, “Is there no Letters from Atkinson? I fear some of her Family are sick.”— It has been really so—I have had one of my silent Colds —& my dear Abby, was confined a week after her return from Boston—But we are now both of us much better—I believe, I have what may be called the Rheumatism, or the Creek at the pit of my...
143From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 22 December 1811 (Adams Papers)
After I had written the letter of which I now enclose a copy, intending to have it ready for Mr: Smith, an opportunity was presented me of sending it by another conveyance—and Mr Smith not being ready to go, I dispatched it; so that as he is now upon his departure I shall send by him two letters instead of one, for you—And as the Winter opportunities are so unfrequent, I write by him also to...
144From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 1 January 1812 (Adams Papers)
I will not suffer the first day of this new year to pass over, without renewing to my dear Mother the expression of my fervent prayers to God, that it may be a year of health enjoyment, and every blessing to her and to my father, as well as to my beloved children who are with you, and to all the family around you—And with the hope of auspicating it to us all, I join that of having once more...
I hope my Dear Sister, will excuse all my bad writing, & every inaccuracy which weekly presents itself to her view—My letters I know must appear in a very shabby ordinary Habit, for I have so little time to afford them even the Ornament of a real dress , that I am almost ashamed to send them.—And if I did not think, that as soon as they reached my beloved Sister, she would throw over them the...
146From Mary Smith Gray Otis to Abigail Smith Adams, 7 February 1812 (Adams Papers)
I presume dear Mrs Adams, you know ‘ere this, that the “Star in the East,” who is to make the Palace tremble, is the Vice P— Why he is thus designated, I dont know. I should think his star was allmost sett & that he would be willing to have it go down in peace; rather than in the turmoil of politics: but I believe, the last spark, that is extinguished in the heart of Man, is ambition. Govenear...
147From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 8 February 1812 (Adams Papers)
A long interval without the receipt of letters from you, I have always found too sure an indication that when they come they would bring sorrows with them—I had been upwards of three months without receiving a line from Quincy when, on the 29th: of last Month I received together with several other letters and dispatches from Washington, but no others from Quincy your afflicting, but most kind...
148From Carolina Virginia Marylanda Johnson Buchanan Frye to Abigail Smith Adams, 12 February 1812 (Adams Papers)
I avail myself of the opportunity that now offers of writing to my dear and absent Sisters whose affection for me will receive a severe pang, from the melancholy events that have lately occured. My mind has become in some degree resigned to the Will of Heaven. Your sympathizing and Maturnal Friendship has soothed and comforted my afflicted heart whose sorrows can only find alleviation in the...
I presume, it is not abusing your kindness, in addressing you with a few lines, to assure you of mÿ Sincerest thanks for the unexpected gift of Quincÿ Adam’s Lectures—which you have bestowed on me. What enhances the value of this present, is that Seems to have been a mark of filial affection of a beloved Son, now endorsed to me bÿ your own hand. It is mÿ misfortune—Madam! that I can onlÿ...
150From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, March 1812 (Adams Papers)
I have been for several Days waiting, & hoping I should find leisure to write to my Dear Sister, but as each hour brings it indispensible Duties, I hope you will accept of a moment devoted to you, & wish you to excuse the many Imperfections you will necessarily observe, of everything done in a hurry—Last Wednesday Cousin Thomas arrived, walked from Haverhill, & got here about four PM—we were...