7831Abigail Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 25 January 1801 (Adams Papers)
I received Yours of the 20th Instant. You will see how matters have gone in senate respecting the Convention. Dean Swift in verses upon his own death, Says of those who had predicted his death So the party had rather the whole convention should be negatived and every thing put again at the mercy of France, than assent to an accommodation with them; Yet pretend that they are fearfull of Mr...
7832William Smith Shaw to Thomas Boylston Adams, 25 January 1801 (Adams Papers)
Yourss of the 20 th & 21 st are received. I also received this morning a compleat sett of the Port folio without any letter or direction respecting them. Presuming they were sent to be at my disposal, I shall send them by tomorrow’s mail, to Anapolis where I expect to get many subscribers. I some time since sent a sett to Boston and another to young Chace at Baltimore, and if I had a number...
7833John Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 27 January 1801 (Adams Papers)
You have it right in yours of 22 d. — A Rivalry between George Cabbot and Elbridge Gerry, for the Tittle of Excellency in Massachusetts, produced all the opposition of Federalists in that State to my Administration and has now thrown the whole Party in the back ground. I am afraid that is not the worst. Their unbridled rage and violent opposition to Peace with France, will exasperate the...
7834Abigail Adams to John Quincy Adams, 29 January 1801 (Adams Papers)
Your Brother Thomas has performed the painfull office of announcing to You the Death of Your Brother Charles, with what a weight of Sorrow is my bosom opprest. when I reflect, that he was cutt down in the bloom of Life, in the midst of his days, he is numberd with the Dead; it becomes me in Silence to mourn; Mourn over him living, I have for a long time, and now he is gone.— the tender...
7835Thomas Boylston Adams to William Smith Shaw, 29 January 1801 (Adams Papers)
I received the letter you enclosed me from my father on the 25 th: inst t: with a few names of members & others, for Dennie— I have sent you three or four setts already of the P— F— to be distributed and now enclose you another— The opinion, here is pretty general, that the journal of the Silesian tour is, by far, the most interesting of all the Contents— Indeed, whatever comes from the pen of...
7836John Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 30 January 1801 (Adams Papers)
On a lu, Tabius, avec beaucoup de plaisir. Il est tres Sage tres Scavant et tres elegant.— The Article he vindicates is now well understood here and is I believe universally allowed to be no Violation of our Engagements with any other power.— Even higher and Stronger ground is taken by Some of the ablest Lawyers and it is even contended that We had a right to go back to the Statu quo, and...
7837Thomas Boylston Adams to John Adams, 2 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
Your favors of the 24 th: & 27 th: ult o: are duly received. It seems not to be understood here, whether the proceedings, in Senate, relative to the Convention, are conclusive, as to the fate of that instrument, or whether, under any pretext, the discussion can be revived upon it. I am, myself, unable to solve the question, though I have some idea, that the rejection of the particular,...
7838Abigail Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 3 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
The Roads and Weather prevent my leaving this place this day as I had designd; mrs cushing and otis advise me to take lodgings at mr Staell’s in 3 d street, Your former lodgings— I shall want a chamber with two Beds and one Bed for a Man servant; I always chuse to have my Maid and susan sleep in the Room with me. She has got the hooping cough. I hope the worst part of it is over. when I get to...
7839William Smith Shaw to Thomas Boylston Adams, 3 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
Agreeable to my promise in my last, I now inclose to you Mr Jeffersons letter, which I consider to be the counterpart of the letter to Mazzei and which, you must have more philosophy, than I think you possess, to read without bitter indignation—without execrating the author, in the most unqualified terms. The whole letter is in the canting style of the vilest demagogue of our Country.—...
7840Abigail Adams to Mary Smith Cranch, 7 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I Suppose the reason why I have not had a Letter from You for a long time, arrises from Your expectation that I am upon my Journey; the Roads have been represented to me as so intolerable bad, and I know them to be So, that I have been prevaild upon to remain longer than I designd. I now think I shall stay untill after the 13 th of Feb ry , the great important Day which may in its concequences...
7841John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 7 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I received only three days ago your N: 22. dated the 6 th: of December, and containing the melancholy tidings of the death of our unhappy brother at New-York. I had been informed of it two days earlier by a letter from my excellent friend M r: Murray at the Hague, who had seen an account of it in a New-York Gazette.— Of the situation in which he has left his wife and children you say nothing,...
7842Thomas Boylston Adams to William Smith Shaw, 8 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I have your letters of 30 th: ult o & 3 d curr t: for which I thank you— The letter, which has so copiously extracted your indignation, not without good cause, did not provoke me, however, in the same degree. I do not see for my part, what other notions of Government, M r: Jefferson could be expected to entertain— It was because he was known to think in the style of this letter, that the...
7843Abigail Adams to John Adams, 13 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I arrived here about half after Six, without any accident, but beat and bang’d enough I do not wish for the present, a severer punishment to the Jacobins & half feds who have sent me home at this Season, than to travel the Roads in the san culot stile just now; the Roads were hard frozen points up, all the way. we were 4 hours making our first stage, and then commenced a voilent snow storm....
7844Abigail Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 14 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I wrote to you last Evening requesting You to meet me at the susquahanah; but I did not reflect that it was two days Journey. this Evening Leiut Parker has arrived and has tenderd me his services; Mr Evans furnishes me with a carriage to Philadelphia provided we can cross the River if I cannot get over, I must depend upon the chapter of chances— if I can get over I expect to be in on twesday....
7845Abigail Adams to William Smith Shaw, 14 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
Altho I was much fatigued last Evening, I wrote a few lines to the President to let him know we were safely housed. the Roads were so bad, that the Mail tho two hours before us in the morning did not get in, untill half an hour after us, and there was not any mail from Philadelphia. we took colds all of us; I have a very Soar throat & Louissa a stiff neck— Susan this Morning complaind her...
7846John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 14 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I last week informed you that I had withdrawn from Amsterdam all the stocks I held there, and had remitted to M r: King, in London fourteen hundred pounds sterling, for which I authorised you to draw, and requested you to place the proceeds in the most advantageous manner; but not in any institution or fund depending upon our national Union; for the generality of our Countrymen are so far from...
7847Thomas Boylston Adams to William Smith Shaw, 15 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
Your favors of the 10 th: & 11 th: inst t: are received. We have heard of the proceedings in the Representative chamber as far as the 22 d: ballot, and we have admired that firmness, which puts the issue of the choice upon strength of nerves, rather than numbers. I have but little expectation, that the thing will go through, as it began— Some body will go over to the majority, but it is not...
7848John Adams to Abigail Adams, 16 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
Saturday night 9 O Clock and not before I rec d yours of 13 th. and the Letter to Thomas with it, brought here no doubt by mistake. I regret very much that you have not a Gentleman with you. The Skittish young Colt with you, is always timorous, but no harm will befall you or her I trust. The Weather and roads here, on Saturday Sunday and to day are the finest We have seen this year. The...
7849Abigail Adams to John Adams, 19 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I reachd this city on twesday Evening. at Baltimore Leiut Parker came in to see Me, and offerd his service to me; I had engaged a carriage of Evans to take Me here with good horses and a carefull driver, for which I was to give him 80 dollors—or in proportion if I could not get across the Susquahannah I offerd Mr Parker a seat with me. he was very usefull to me and exerted himself very much or...
7850Thomas Boylston Adams to William Smith Shaw, 19 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
We have been rejoycing with exceeding joy at the news of the result at Washington— Now we hope the Gentlemen will do something. I got your letter of Monday & at the same time was informed that the choice was finally made. Our former suspence was so uncomfortable, that any thing would have been considered a relief— It comforts me that New-England would not yield, but the rest have done better...
7851William Smith Shaw to Thomas Boylston Adams, 19 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I gave you the earliest information of Mr. Jeffersons election. Last night a mob of about fifty collected about the houses near to the capitol and compelled the inhabitants to illuminate them in honor to Mr. J. This passive submission of the federalists to the will of a rascally mob is in my opinion degrading in the lowest degree. I never would have submitted I would have died first. No...
7852William Cranch to Abigail Adams, 20 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I have a thousand times wish’d to express to you my gratitude for the attentions I received from you during your residence here; and most particularly, for your kindness to my dear mother and family during her late severe illness; but a consciousness of the inadequacy insufficiency of language to give a faithful representation of my feelings, has hitherto imposed upon me a silence which I fear...
7853Abigail Adams to John Adams, 21 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I write You once More from this city. the Trenton River is impassable, and has prevented my Sitting out. we hope however that the Rain may clear it. I sent Townsend of to day; I have heard Some of the Democratic rejoicing Such as Ringing Bells & fireing cannon; what an inconsistancy Said a Lady to me to day, the Bells of Christ Church ringing peals of rejoicing for an Infidel President! the...
7854William Smith Shaw to Abigail Adams, 25 February 1801 (Adams Papers)
I have had the pleasure to receive your very kind letter of the 14 th of Feb. at Baltimore, for which I pray you to receive the grateful offerings of an honest heart. I should not have neglected answering it, till this late date, had I not been uncommonly occupied in business, and had nothing to tell you, but what I wrote to Mr. Adams, whose letters I presume you have seen Soon after you left...
7855William Smith Shaw to Abigail Adams, 2 March 1801 (Adams Papers)
For a few days past, every moment of my time has been so compleatly occupied in official duties, that I have had hardly a moments time to write or even to think for myself— We have not heard from or […], since your last letter to the President from Philadelphia The President has nominated all the officers for this district Mr T. Johnson of Frederick—Mr Marshall of Alexandria, brother to ex Sec...
7856John Quincy Adams to Abigail Adams, 10 March 1801 (Adams Papers)
I am almost asham’d to acknowledge how long it has been since I wrote you last, and can only hope you will consider my numerous letters to my brother, most of which I intended as much for you as for him, to be a sufficient apology— I have not received a line from you or from my father since last June, though I think it impossible but that you should have written more than once— My last letter...
7857Hannah Quincy Lincoln Storer to Abigail Adams, 14 March 1801 (Adams Papers)
Permit Me, dear Madam, to offer My thanks for Your care of letters, from Our dear Children— And to congratulate You on your return to peace feild. I feel assured that You and Yours, will injoy a tranquility, that is Not in the power of the World to give , Or take away — I reflect with triumph that M r Adams can adopt those pleaseing lines of Our favourite Poet— May I confess? that I feel My...
7858Editorial Note (Adams Papers)
Soon after Thomas Jefferson declared in his 4 March 1801 inaugural address that “We are all republicans: we are all federalists,” Abigail Adams wrote an essay charging the president’s party with hypocrisy and calling on Federalists to treat Jefferson as Democratic-Republican critics had treated George Washington and John Adams during their administrations. Abigail quoted Jefferson’s request...
7859Abigail Adams’ Essay on American Politics, post 18 March 1801 (Adams Papers)
Mr Jefferson in his Speech; makes observes, that, He may [“]I Shall often go Wrong through defect of Judgment, when right, I shall often be thought wrong by those Whose positions will not command a view of the Whole ground, I also ask support against the Errors of others, who May condemn what they Would not if Seen in all its parts;” If the Same measure was to be meeted to the new...
7860John Quincy Adams to Thomas Boylston Adams, 21 March 1801 (Adams Papers)
While I was sealing up on the last post day; the cover to M r: Pitcairn, of my number 29. I received two packets from you, containing three copies of the translation, and the three first numbers of the Port-Folio, with a couple of newspapers besides— Your few lines of January 23 d: were in one of the packets; and the next day came to hand your N: 23. of January 15 th: The packets are marked as...