From Jeremy Belknap to John Adams, 2 March 1795

From Jeremy Belknap

Boston March 2d 1795

Dear Sir

Your favours of Jany 23 & Feb 4 enclosing a Certificate from the Secretary’s office & Mr Madison’s answer, with the History of Geneva have been duly recd & I thank you for them; I am now waiting for Mr Thomson’s answer which must be decisive, tho’ enough may be said without it to satisfy every person not excepting Dr Kippis himself. When I shall have recd this I will draw up something & send it to you for your revisal, before it goes any further.

Inclosed is a set of queries sent to me by a Mr Tucker, Professor of Law in the College at Williamsburg— I had a few Copies struck off & have distributed them among such Gentn. as I think can give me the requisite Information.1 Is it in your power to assist me? Was you as a Lawyer concerned in any Causes where Negroes sued for freedom before the Revolution? What arguments were used on either side? & how did the matter terminate? Do you remember a Petition in 1773 for the liberation of all the blacks? How was it supported & treated in the Genl Court?2

The two Proclamations which we had for the late Thanksgiving have made some noise among us. Some of my Brethn read the President’s only, others read it with the Govr’s endorsement I was among the former & have had the honor of being pointed at in the Chronicle for it; but I have not tho’t it worthy of an answer. A Mr Bradford of Rowley has printed a democratic Sermon as a Contrast to Osgoods. I am told he is Brother to David Bradford the Pittsburg Shays.3

I suppose the placing of the State’s arms & those of the U.S. was a fancy of the Printer’s—but I cannot say which is so placed as to have the superiority.

The Castle flag was not hoisted nor the Guns fired on the President’s birth day!4

What I said of the Zodiac was intended for no one’s inspection but your own.

I am sir with great Respect your / most obed Servt

Jeremy Belknap

PS. Any little pamphlet that you may have to spare will be acceptable—

I send you one of J Winthrop’s which is more popular than his first5

RC and enclosure (Adams Papers).

1. The enclosure listed questions about the history and practice of slavery in Massachusetts. Belknap sent it on behalf of the Bermuda-born St. George Tucker (1752–1827), a College of William and Mary law professor who was at work on A Dissertation on Slavery: With a Proposal for the Gradual Abolition of It, in the State of Virginia, Phila., 1796, Evans, description begins Charles Evans and others, American Bibliography: A Chronological Dictionary of All Books, Pamphlets and Periodical Publications Printed in the United States of America [1639–1800], Chicago and Worcester, Mass., 1903–1959; 14 vols., rev. edn., www.readex.com. description ends No. 31319 (DAB description begins Allen Johnson, Dumas Malone, and others, eds., Dictionary of American Biography, New York, 1928–1936; repr. New York, 1955–1980; 10 vols. plus index and supplements. description ends ; Washington, Papers, Presidential Series description begins The Papers of George Washington: Presidential Series, ed. W. W. Abbot, Dorothy Twohig, Jack D. Warren, Mark A. Mastromarino, Robert F. Haggard, Christine S. Patrick, John C. Pinheiro, David R. Hoth, Jennifer Stertzer and others, Charlottesville, Va., 1987– . description ends , 13:140).

2. Black citizens presented a signed petition to colonial governor Thomas Hutchinson and the Mass. General Court in Jan. 1773, seeking emancipation and formal recognition of their adherence to Christianity (Mia Bay and others, eds., Toward an Intellectual History of Black Women, Chapel Hill, N.C., 2015, p. 43). For JA’s views on the institution of American slavery during the Revolutionary War, see vol. 3:xvi-xvii.

3. These two works were Rev. David Osgood’s The Wonderful Works of God Are to Be Remembered: A Sermon, Delivered on the Day of Annual Thanksgiving, November 20, 1794, Boston, 1794, Evans, description begins Charles Evans and others, American Bibliography: A Chronological Dictionary of All Books, Pamphlets and Periodical Publications Printed in the United States of America [1639–1800], Chicago and Worcester, Mass., 1903–1959; 14 vols., rev. edn., www.readex.com. description ends No. 27456; and Rev. Ebenezer Bradford’s The Nature and Manner of Giving Thanks to God, Illustrated: A Sermon, Delivered on the Day of the National Thanksgiving February 19, 1795, Boston, 1795, Evans, description begins Charles Evans and others, American Bibliography: A Chronological Dictionary of All Books, Pamphlets and Periodical Publications Printed in the United States of America [1639–1800], Chicago and Worcester, Mass., 1903–1959; 14 vols., rev. edn., www.readex.com. description ends No. 28339. David Bradford (b. ca. 1760), a lawyer and deputy attorney general for Washington County, Penn., eluded arrest for his leadership of the Whiskey Rebellion (AFC description begins Adams Family Correspondence, ed. L. H. Butterfield, Marc Friedlaender, Richard Alan Ryerson, Margaret A. Hogan, Sara Martin, Hobson Woodward, and others, Cambridge, 1963– . description ends , 10:320). The details of Belknap’s sermon have not been found.

4. Boston residents did not organize a formal event, but Philadelphia society celebrated George Washington’s birthday with a “splended ball.” JA was careful to note that the French minister, Jean Antoine Joseph Fauchet, was placed “on the right hand of the President, which gave great Offence to the Spanish Commissioners” (AFC description begins Adams Family Correspondence, ed. L. H. Butterfield, Marc Friedlaender, Richard Alan Ryerson, Margaret A. Hogan, Sara Martin, Hobson Woodward, and others, Cambridge, 1963– . description ends , 10:87, 89, 95).

5. Belknap likely sent A Journal of the Transactions and Occurrences in the Settlement of Massachusetts and the Other New-England Colonies, from the Year 1630 to 1644 by John Winthrop, Hartford, Conn., 1790, a copy of which is in JA’s library at MB (Catalogue of JA’s Library description begins Catalogue of the John Adams Library in the Public Library of the City of Boston, Boston, 1917. description ends ).

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Source Project: Adams Papers
Title: From Jeremy Belknap to John Adams, 2 March 1795
Author: Belknap, Jeremy
Recipient: Adams, John
Date: 2 March 1795

Reference

Cite as: “From Jeremy Belknap to John Adams, 2 March 1795,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/06-21-02-0278. [Original source: The Adams Papers, Papers of John Adams, vol. 21, March 1791–January 1797, ed. Sara Georgini, Sara Martin, R. M. Barlow, Gwen Fries, Amanda M. Norton, and Hobson Woodward. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2022, pp. 381–382.]

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