2011From Hannah Phillips Cushing to Abigail Smith Adams, 8 September 1812 (Adams Papers)
My thanks are due to you My Dear Friend for a letter of the 1st. & it would afford me much enjoyment to visit Quincy this week, agreeable to your kind invitation; But my Sister Johnston is now passing a little time with us, a favor that we seldom enjoy so that I cannot leave home at present. By the last of Octr. it is my intention to be with you once more my Dear Madam, in whose society it is...
2012From William Stephens Smith to Abigail Smith Adams, 31 December 1814 (Adams Papers)
I received your letter enclosing one addressed to Mr. Adams, and presented it to the Secretary of State it will be forwarded with the public dispatches to Gent. I do not admire Williams return at this moment, having recieved his Commission as Secretary of the Legation, I think he had better hold it, and remain abroad for the present—least he should be on his Way I stated to Mr. Monroe, as he...
2013From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 17 July 1815 (Adams Papers)
Your kind Letters of 20 May and 4 June have been received together with others to my wife and the children which they have answered and will answer for themselves. Hitherto since our arrival in London, I have been obliged to rely upon their punctuality in answering your Letters, as an apology for the temporary deficiency of mine. Besides the multitude of trifling but indispensable avocations...
2014From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 9 March 1807 (Adams Papers)
It is a long time my Dear Sister, since I have written to you; but I consider it a priviledge that we can think of our Friends, animate our Souls by a view of their useful lives, & refresh ourselves by a retrospect of past scenes, when we cannot find one leisure moment to visit them, or impress our Ideas upon paper.— Ever since Thansgiving we have had one, or other of our Family sick in bed,...
2015From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 10 February 1814 (Adams Papers)
I was in hopes of receiving a Letter by yesterdays Mail from you—I was glad to see by the News Papers that Col. Smith, who formerly girded on the Sword for his country’s defence, was now opening his mouth, I trust in wisdom, advocating the same noble cause—What will be the issue of the present agitation of your State, & ours, I cannot predict, but I fear, unless great pains is taken to...
2016From 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...
2017From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 2 May 1818 (Adams Papers)
My health has been so indifferent and the City is so flat since the adjourment of Congress that I cannot find materials for a Letter—It is difficult for me to say what the nature of my indisposition as the Doctor cannot ascertain it no more than myself but I believe general weakness and a slight attack of what they here call chills and fevers has been my chief complaint and the latentness and...
2018From William Stephens Smith to Abigail Smith Adams, 7 July 1813 (Adams Papers)
I have the pleasure of acknowledging the receipt of your Letter of the 30th. of June, and enclose you a letter from Mrs Smith, which I received yesterday, two from Caroline and one from my Son John, whose affectionate attentions have no doubt contributed much to the restoration of their dear Mother’s health, who I am extreamly happy to find is able to travel and that she is now on her way to...
2019From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 13 June 1812 (Adams Papers)
I received your letter yesterday, which informed me of yours, & Mrs Smith’s intended visit, & am glad if you were able to go, & were disposed “to bury the Hatchet ,” it is certainly best, when we are all so far advanced in age, & hope to meet in those blest abodes where Peace, & Love reign forever—where raging Party Spirit, Injustice, ambition, & mavolence cease— you had a fine day for your...
2020From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 6 December 1805 (Adams Papers)
After a pleasant although extremely fatiguing journey we have safely arrived at Mrs. Hellens were we found all the family in good health and spirits Mr. Adams’s health is much improved and he has gain’d flesh on the journey but I much fear that the exercise he takes will prove too much and again reduce him to his former state of debility- My spirits and health have both been very indifferent...
2021From 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...
2022From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 19 May 1809 (Adams Papers)
It would be impossible for me to tell you how disappointed, grieved, vexed, & everything, I was, when Mr Peabody returned from Andover a Friday Eve, & told me Mrs Adams was to return the next day home—If I had been the least apt to shed tears, I am sure they would fallen in plenty—For to have conversed with her, would have been next to having seen you my dear Sister,—I had many questions to...
2023From Mary Smith Gray Otis to Abigail Smith Adams, 11 April 1815 (Adams Papers)
I could not my dear Mrs Adams hear of the sudden death of your beloved Sister, without sympathizing in your sorrows; you like myself, have recently been call’d to part with many dear friends. The tender cords, of consanguinity friendship & affection are breaking fast from us, & we are every day call’d to mourn, for our own, or the publick loss. Your sister’s has been a useful & an active life,...
2024From Julia Stockton Rush to Abigail Smith Adams, 13 May 1813 (Adams Papers)
I want words to express the grateful feelings of my heart for your kind sympathy on our late heavy affliction, we have indeed suffered a bereavement that can never be repaired to us as individuals or as a family.—A husband, a father, a protector, snatched from us with but little time to prepare our minds for such a stroke, twenty hours before his pure spirit fled from us forever, we had no...
2025From William Stephens Smith to Abigail Smith Adams, 2 April 1814 (Adams Papers)
I have your letter of the 22d. of march, and am much gratified that my enquiries and communications relative to Mr. De Wint meet wit your approbation—you will no doubt observe by my last letter to my dear Caroline, that ultimately my Ideas fully correspond with your own, and thinking that I was hard with the young man, I softened my letter, and withdrew from that stern position that I had...
2026From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 13 June 1809 (Adams Papers)
By last Friday mail, I received your very excellent Letter, wherein you observe, it was thought a journey might be of service to your health, I have not time now to make any remarks, only upon this part of your Letter, & warmly would second the motion, & would wish you to set off immediately, without stoping to adjust every preliminary —For if you do, you will see, I fear so many Lions, in the...
2027From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 18 November 1817 (Adams Papers)
I began to be quite uneasy at your long silence my and was much pleased to find by your Letter of the 12th that pleasure and not sickness was the cause of your delay in answering my last. I am very sorry to hear that Mrs de Wint health is weak and I agree with you in the opinion that she left home too early I hope however that when she returns and resumes her quiet mode of life that she will...
2028From Elizabeth Smith Shaw Peabody to Abigail Smith Adams, 21 October 1811 (Adams Papers)
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...
2029From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 4 July 1816 (Adams Papers)
We have been some time now without receiving Letters from you, although we have heard of you from other branches of the family. In your last Letters to the Children you mention the approaching marriage of Susan which ere this has probably taken place should it be so I must beg you will make my congratulations acceptable with every good wish for her future happiness. We are here plunged into...
2030From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 19 November 1813 (Adams Papers)
If my last Letter should reach you before this, my ever dear and affectionate mother, you will see by the Postscript, that before it was dispatched we had been informed through an indirect channel of the decease of my beloved Sister—This event, so distressing in itself, but for which your kind letters of 2 and 14 July, had in some measure prepared my Mind, has excited a new and additional...
2031From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 12 January 1811 (Adams Papers)
The year eighteen hundred and ten according to Russian reckoning still exists—But as its last hours are upon the wing; and as the New-Year has already made the progress of almost half a month with you, I can no longer delay the opportunity of wishing you, and my dear father, and my George and John, and all the family around you, not the compliments of the Season, but a truly joyful year to be...
2032From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 2 September 1813 (Adams Papers)
The arrival of Mr Bayard, & Galatin, my dear Madam, has made so little alteration in our situation, that I have little or nothing to write you, but complaints, of the prospect I have of a much lengthen’d stay in this Country: and the additional grief of losing the society of my Sister, which was almost the only thing left me to render life supportable. Mr A is even more buried in study than...
2033From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 24 January 1808 (Adams Papers)
I have delay’d answering your very kind letter owing to my Baby’s having been very seriously sick and requiring all my attention during a fortnight. He is now entirely recover’d and has two teeth— I much fear it will be a long time before I shall be permitted to see you as every thing appears to be in such a state of confusion and hostility that it is impossible to form any idea of the time...
2034From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 21 September 1812 (Adams Papers)
During the last two years, the unwelcome task has too often been allotted to you, to communicate to my dear wife and me tidings of affliction by the death and sorrows of those whom we loved—The turn has now come to me to ask your sympathy for our own peculiar distress—We have lost our dear and only daughter...as lovely and promising a child, as ever was taken from the hopes of the fondest...
2035From Richard Rush to Abigail Smith Adams, 23 July 1815 (Adams Papers)
It would have been a greatr gratification to me if I could have announced to you before this time the actual appointment of Mr John Adams Smith, as secretary to the Legation at London. I have, however, great pleasure in saying that I believe but one thing is wanting to it. Mr Monroe, who yesterday favored me with a conversation upon the subject, did not hesitate to say, that he feels “a...
2036From John Quincy Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 14 March 1806 (Adams Papers)
It is so long since I have had one hour of leisure that I could appropriate to correspondence with my friends at Quincy and Boston, that I am fearful you will impute to some other cause the length of the interval between my letters—My health however has been gradually improving ever since I left you, and on the whole has been better through the Winter, than for two years before.—A variety of...
2037From Catherine Elizabeth Murray Rush to Abigail Smith Adams, 30 March 1817 (Adams Papers)
For some time past I have been wishing to have the pleasure of writing to you, to express my thanks for the very kind and flattering letter you addressed to me by Miss Sumner; also to repeat to you the gratification I felt at an introduction to Col Sumner and herself. All agreed that they were ornaments to the society of Washington this winter. It was not however in my power, and truly did I...
2038From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 10 February 1818 (Adams Papers)
10 Mr Adams attended the funeral of Mr Astor’s grandson on arriving at Mr Astors the old Gentleman told him he had received a most urgent Letter from Mrs Bentzon begging that the body might be sent to her at New York and asked his advice what he should do on the melancholy occasion Mr Adams told him that considering all the circumstances he thought it would be best for him to indulge his...
2039From Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams to Abigail Smith Adams, 21 January 1816 (Adams Papers)
Your last Letter was indeed flattering to me. eminently as you are gifted with the talent of writing your approbation must afford the greatest pleasure and exite encouragement. It has often been to me a source of wonder how you can write to so many in one family, and yet never appear at a loss for subjects; but you possess the talent of giving interest even to trifles and the easy course of...
2040From Richard Rush to Abigail Smith Adams, 11 November 1816 (Adams Papers)
I find, from a conversation with Mr Monroe, that it is not the intention of government to send dispatches to Spain by the Chippewa, or to employ her, in any other way, as a dispatch vessel. Hence the rumour adverted to in your favor of the 28th ulto. must, it would seem, have originated in some mistake. I ought to have transmitted this information some days earlier, and beg leave to apologize...