Adams Papers

To John Adams from John Boylston, 5 January 1779

From John Boylston

January 5th. 1779

Dear Sir

When I wrote you Per G. Tailer1 requesting the favour of your Advice and Assistance in procuring him a speedy return to America I did not thereby mean your assistance in any pecuniary Advance but only your recommendation to him of the first good oppertunity for his return to his Native home, as I suspect many Such Juvenile, Volatile, and capricious Subjects, have been and may be to you and your Worthy Colleague2 very troublesome. Let the said G. T. for this reason know that no Bill on me will be paid of his draft.

Adieu; my sincerest and best wishes attend you,

J. B.3

RC (Adams Papers).

1. No previous letter from Boylston has been found, but William, or Guillaume, Taylor had served as John Hancock’s secretary while he was president of the congress. He had sailed from Boston for France on 26 July 1778, bearing packets from the congress for the Commissioners and possibly also letters to JA from AA (PCC, No. 79, I, f. 236–237; No. 37, f. 119; Adams Family Correspondence description begins Adams Family Correspondence, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1963– description ends , 3:59–62). That Boylston wrote regarding him seems to indicate that the vessel on which he sailed was captured. Except for a letter of reference by the Commissioners dated 18 Dec. 1778 (LbC, Adams Papers), no previous reference to Taylor has been found in the Commissioners’ correspondence.

2. Undoubtedly Benjamin Franklin; see Boylston’s letter of 6 Feb. (below).

3. John Boylston was a first cousin of JA’s mother. He had gone to England in 1771 and, despite indications that in 1778 he considered returning to America, remained there until his death in 1795. For additional information on Boylston, particularly his sympathy for the American cause, see Adams Family Correspondence description begins Adams Family Correspondence, ed. L. H. Butterfield and others, Cambridge, 1963– description ends , 4:201.

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    Source Project
    Adams Papers
    Title
    To John Adams from John Boylston, 5 January 1779
    Author
    Boylston, John
    Recipient
    Adams, John
    Date
    5 January 1779

    Reference

    Cite as
    “To John Adams from John Boylston, 5 January 1779,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/06-07-02-0216. [Original source: The Adams Papers, Papers of John Adams, vol. 7, September 1778 – February 1779, ed. Gregg L. Lint, Robert J. Taylor, Richard Alan Ryerson, Celeste Walker, and Joanna M. Revelas. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1989, pp. 340–341.]

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