Pierpont Potter (1794–1886), attorney, was a native of Connecticut. An 1829 newspaper advertisement indicated that he had been “for several years … head of the English and Elementary department” of the Union Hall Academy in Jamaica, Queens County, New York. Potter was admitted to the New York Supreme Court as an attorney in 1834 and practiced law until at least 1870. He was also appointed cashier of the Bank of Jamaica at its creation in 1861, and he served as clerk of the Queens County Board of Supervisors from 1835 until 1876, after which he became assistant clerk until his death. Potter owned real estate worth $2,500 in 1850, with none listed in 1860 and 1870 but personal property both years valued at $1,000. He died in Jamaica (New York Commercial Advertiser, 14 Oct. 1829; New-York Spectator, 6 Nov. 1834; DNA: RG 29, CS, N.Y., Queens Co., Jamaica, 1830–80; New York Herald, 6 Jan. 1861; Benjamin F. Thompson, History of Long Island [3d ed., 1918], 2:42; Robert Seabury and Pierpont Potter, comps., Proceedings of the Board of Supervisors, of the County of Queens, for the year 1885 [1886], 38, 252–3; Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper 61 [1886]: 359; gravestone inscription in Josephine C. Frost, “Inscriptions from Prospect Cemetery at Jamaica, Long Island, N. Y.” [1910 typescript]).

The letters that passed between TJ and John Adams and had been printed late the previous year were dated 1 and 11 June 1822. vulgus: “the common people; the ordinary ruck” (OED description begins James A. H. Murray, J. A. Simpson, E. S. C. Weiner, and others, eds., The Oxford English Dictionary, 2d ed., 1989, 20 vols. description ends ).