Diary of John Adams, volume 4
Quincy December 1. 1806.
When I asked Leave of Congress to make a Visit to my Constituents and my Family in November 1777, it was my intention to decline the next Election, and return to my practice at the Bar.2I had been four Years in Congress, left my Accounts in a very loose condition, my Debtors were failing, the paper Money was depreciating, I was daily loosing the fruits of seventeen Years industry, my family was living on my past Acquisitions which were very moderate, for no Man ever did so much Business for so little profit. My Children were growing up without my care in their Education: and all my pay imoluments as a Member of Congress for four Years, had not been sufficient to pay a labouring Man upon my farm. Some of my Friends, who had more compassion for me and my family than others, suggested to me what I knew very well before, that I was loosing a fortune every Year by my Absence. Young Gentlemen who had been Clerks in my Office and others whom I had left in that Character in other Offices were growing rich, for the Prize Causes, and other Controversies had made the profession of a Barrister more lucrative than it ever had been before. I thought therefore that four Years drudgery, and Sacrifice of every thing, were sufficient for my Share of Absence from home and that another might take my place. Upon my Arrival at my home in 2Braintree I soon found that my old Clients had not forgotten me and that new ones had heard enough of me to be ambitious of engaging me in Suits which were depending. I had applications from all quarters in the most important disputes. Among others Coll. Elisha Doane applied to me to go to Portsmouth in New Hampshire, upon the Case of a large Ship and Cargo which had been seized and was to be tried in the Court of Admiralty before Judge Brackett.3At the Tryal of the 3Cause at Portsmouth and while I was speaking in it, Mr. Langdon came in from Phyladelphia and leaning over the Bar whispered to me, that Mr. Deane was recalled, and I was appointed to go to France. As I could scarcely believe the News to be true, and suspected Langdon
When the Dispatches from Congress were read, the first question was whether I should accept the Commission or return it to Congress. The dangers of the Seas and the Sufferings of a Winter passage, although I had no experience of either, had little Weight with me. The British Men of War, were a more serious Consideration. The News of my Appointment, I had no doubt were known in Rhode Island, where a part of the British Navy and Army then lay, as soon as they were to me, and transmitted to England as soon as possible. I had every reason to expect, that Ships would be ordered to intercept the Boston from Rhode Island and from Hallifax, and that Intelligence would be secretly sent them, as accurately as possible of the time when she was to sail. For there always have been and still are Spies in America as well as in France, England and other Countries. The Consequence of a Capture would be a Lodging in New Gate. For the Spirit of Contempt as well as indignation and vindictive rage, with which the British Government had to that time conducted both the Controversy and the War forbade me to hope for the honor of an Appartment in the Tower as a State Prisoner. As their Act of Parliament would authorise them to try me in England for Treason, and proceed to execution too, I had no doubt they would go to the extent of their power, and practice upon me all the Cruelties of their punishment of Treason. My Family consisting of a dearly beloved Wife and four young Children, excited Sentiments of tenderness, which a Father and a Lover only can conceive, and which no language can express. And my Want of qualifications for the Office was by no means forgotten.
On the other hand my Country was in deep distress and in great danger. Her dearest Interest would be involved in the relations she might form with foreign nations. My own plan of these relations had 5been deliberately formed and fully communicated to Congress, nearly two Years before. The Confidence of my Country was committed to me, without my Solicitation. My Wife who had always encouraged and animated me, in all antecedent dangers and perplexities, did not fail me on this Occasion: But she discovered an inclination to bear me Company with all our Children. This proposal however, she was soon convinced, was too hazardous and imprudent.
It was an Opinion generally prevailing in Boston that the Fisheries were lost forever. Mr. Isaac Smith, who had been more largely concerned in the Cod Fishery than any Man excepting Mr. Hooper and Mr. Lee of Marblehead, had spoken to me on the Subject, and said that whatever should be the termination of the War he knew We should never be allowed to fish again upon the Banks. My Practice as a Barrister in the Counties of Essex, Plymouth and Barnstable had introduced me to more Knowledge both of the Cod and whale fisheries and of their importance both to the commerce and Naval Power of this Country than any other Man possessed, who would be sent abroad if I refused, and this consideration had no small Weight in producing my determination. After much Agitation of mind and a thousand reveries unnecessary to be detailed, I resolved to devote my family and my Life to the Cause, accepted the Appointment and made preparation for the Voyage. A longer time than I expected was required to fit and man the Frigate. The News of my Appointment was whispered about, and General Knox came up to dine with me, at Braintree. The design of his Visit was As I soon perceived to sound me in relation to General Washington. He asked me what my Opinion of him was. I answered with the Utmost Frankness, that I thought him a perfectly honest Man, with an amiable and excellent heart, and the most important Character at that time among Us, for he was the Center of our Union. He asked the question, he said, because, as I was going to Europe it was of importance that the Generals Character should be supported in other Countries. I replied that he might be perfectly at his ease on the Subject for he might depend upon it, that both from principle and Affection, public and private I should do my Utmost to support his Character at all times and in all places, unless something should happen very greatly to alter my Opinion of him, and this I have done from that time to this. I mention this incident, because that insolent Blasphemer of things sacred and transcendent Libeller of all that is good Tom Paine has more than once asserted in Print, the scandalous Lye, that I was one of a Faction in the fall of the Year 1777, against General Washington. It is indeed a disgrace to the moral Character and 6the Understanding of this Age, that this worthless fellow should be believed in any thing. But Impudence and Malice will always find Admirers.4
JA inserted this title at some point after he had filled up the first page of the MS with the opening passage of his autobiographical narrative as newly resumed. The next dozen sheets of the MS of Part Two have the title “Travels &c.” or “Travels,” with a date, at the head of each new four-page sheet; thereafter only dates, without captions, appear. In the present text dates are given only at the head of entries.
See JA's Diary entry of 15 Nov. 1777 and note 1 there. The thirteen-month gap (Oct. 1776–Nov. 1777) between Parts One and Two of the Autobiography is very meagerly filled in by occasional Diary entries, but see especially the entry of 15 Sept. 1777 and note 1 there.
This was the initial stage of a case that became famous, not merely because it was in and out of the courts for almost eighteen years but because it raised complex and important issues respecting state, confederation, and federal jurisdiction in admiralty law and touched directly on the sensitive issue of state sovereignty—or so the aroused citizens and officials of the State of New Hampshire thought. As JA knew it, the case was that of Penhallow and Treadwell v. Brig Lusanna and Cargo. (By an understandable confusion the vessel's name was sometimes later written as Susanna or Susannah, and it is so found in modern references to the case. But the published notices of the original trial upon libel give it as “Lusannar,” adding only a touch of New England dialect to its correct form; see Portsmouth Freeman's Journal, 15, 29 Nov. 1777.) The Lusanna was owned by the wealthy Cape Cod merchant Elisha Doane and had been recently captured in highly compromising circumstances, after voyages in 1775–1777 from Plymouth to London, from there to Gibraltar, and back to Halifax, by the New Hampshire privateer McClary. Lusanna was brought into Portsmouth, libeled by its captors, and its trial fixed for December in the New Hampshire Maritime Court (established under certain resolves of the Continental Congress, 25 Nov. 1775, in which JA had probably had a part; see entries in his Autobiography, 23, 25 Nov. 1775 vol. 3:346–349, above). This court was presided over by Joshua Brackett, who was both a physician and a judge. JA was engaged to defend Lusanna's owner by Shearjashub Bourne, son-in-law of Doane and the man who, as supercargo, had conducted the vessel's complicated operations during the past two years (Bourne to JA, 6 Dec. 1777, Adams Papers; this letter originally enclosed “a Brief of facts” which has not been found). It was Bourne's contention that the vessel's British papers merely enabled him to masquerade as British, whereas he was really loyal to the American cause while vending whale oil in England and carrying supplies to British garrisons. The parties to the case were persons of some eminence, and the trial attracted a great deal of attention; see JA to AA, 15 Dec. 1777 (Adams Papers; JA-AA, Familiar Letters
, p. 325–326); Stiles, Literary Diary
, 2:236–239, which contains a vivid record of JA's conversation during this visit to Portsmouth, together with references to the trial. JA presented his argument on 16 Dec., but the jury (for Congress' resolves recommending the establishment of local prize courts recommended jury trials therein) found for their neighbors the libelants. Thus ended JA's part in the Lusanna case, because he soon afterward left for Europe. But the Doane party appealed to the New Hampshire Superior Court, which sustained the lower court, and from there to the Court of Appeals established by the Continental Congress in 1780, which in 1783 upset the previous verdicts and found for the Doanes. Through John Sullivan the captors of the Lusanna now appealed directly to Congress, and Thomas Jefferson wrote a report for a special committee that upheld the New Hampshire captors and courts, on the ground that “neither Congress nor any persons deriving authority from them had jurisdiction in the said case.” This report was long and fiercely contested in Congress and in the end not adopted. To skip several stages, the case finally came before the United States Supreme Court, which in 1795 found for representatives of JA's original client Doane, on the broad ground that when the states yield exclusive powers to the United States the federal power becomes supreme.
JA's own brief notes on the case in 1777 are among his legal papers (M/JA/6, Adams Papers, Microfilms, Reel No. 185). A bulky MS record of the case through 1783 is in DNA:RG 267, Revolutionary War Prize Cases (Microcopy No. 162, Case No. 30, designated in the pamphlet accompanying this microcopy as “Doane et al., Appellants, v. Treadwell and Penhallow, Libellants, and the Brig Susannah"). The captors' appeal to Congress and Jefferson's Report thereon, Jan. 1784, are printed in Jefferson, Papers
, 6:447–455. The arguments of counsel and opinions of the justices in the U.S. Supreme Court are in Reports of Cases ..., Phila., 1790–1807Lusanna and the long course of litigation over it that are not elsewhere in print, put the case of the aggrieved New Hampshire men, and denounced the high court's decision as a miscarriage of justice and an “indignity” to the independence of the State: Statement of the Cause of the McClary Owners, and Doane & Doane's Administrators ..., Portsmouth, 1795The Supreme Court in United States History, Boston, 1922
Preceding two sentences omitted by CFA in his text. (Attention is called in Part Two of the Autobiography only to the more significant textual omissions and alterations made by CFA in the only text of JA's Autobiography hitherto published.) The particular attacks by Paine that JA alludes to have not been identified, though Paine had often enough abused JA in print, most recently and perhaps most bitterly in a series of letters “To the Citizens of the United States” published in Washington and Philadelphia newspapers, 1802–1805; see Complete Works, ed. Philip S. Foner, N.Y., 1945
I was almost out of Patience, in Waiting for the Frigate till the Thirteenth day of February 1778, when Captain Samuel Tucker, Commander of the Frigate Boston, met me at the House of Norton Quincy Esquire, in Braintree, where We dined.1
After dinner I bid Adieu to my Friend and Unkle Quincy, sent my Baggage, and walked myself with Captain Tucker, Mr. Griffin a Midshipman, and my eldest Son, John Quincy Adams between ten and eleven years of Age, down to the Moon Head where lay the Bostons Barge.2 In our Way We made an halt of a few minutes at the House of Mr. Seth Spear on Hoffs neck, where some Sailors belonging to our barge had been waiting for Us. The good Lady, who was an Adams, came out very civilly to invite Us in. We had no time to spare and excused ourselves. She was an amiable Woman, with very delicate health, much afflicted with hysterical complaints, often a little disarranged in her imagination. At this time she was somewhat flighty and accosted me in an alarming manner. “Mr. Adams you are going to embark under 7very threatening Signs. The Heavens frown, the Clouds roll, the hollow Winds howl, The Waves of the Sea roar upon the Beech,” and on she went in such a Strain that I seemed to be reading Ossian. I thought this prophecy of the Sybill, was not very cheering to one whose Acquaintance with the Sea, had been confined to a few Trips to Half Moon a guning and one to Cohasset rocks a fishing when he was a Boy3 and a few Parties to Rainsfords Island and the Light House in Company with the Select Men of Boston after he was grown up: but I was not enough of a Roman to believe it an ill Omen. It was only a prelude to a Commedy, which I feared all my Voyages and Negotiations would prove to be. It amused me enough to be remembered and that was all.4
The Wind was high and the Sea, very rough, but by means of a quantity of Hay in the bottom of the boat, and good Watch Coats with which We were covered, We arrived on board the Boston, about five O Clock, tolerably warm and dry. I found in the Frigate Mr. Vernon a Son of Mr. Vernon of the Navy board, who had that year graduated at Colledge; a little Son of Mr. Deane of Weathersfield between Eleven and twelve years of Age; and a Mr. Nicholas Noel, a french Gentleman, Surgeon of the Ship, who seemed to be a well bred man. He shewed me a Book which I was very glad to see as the French Language was then one of my first Objects. The Title is “The Elements of the English Tongue, develloped in a new, easy and concise manner, in which the pronunciation is taught by an Assemblage of Letters, which form similar Sounds in french, by V. J. Peyton. I mention this because Peytons Grammar is little known, and I think will be very Usefull to any American who wishes to acquire that Language.
Here for the first time in composing the three fragmentary parts of his Autobiography JA consulted his Diary in order to refresh his memory. Having done so, he began to incorporate large portions of it into his narrative, sometimes copying his Diary entries fully and faithfully, sometimes paraphrasing or summarizing them, sometimes greatly expanding them. The Autobiography thus becomes from this point on a text with commentary, so that in order to distinguish what is new in it from what JA took from his Diary one must read the two texts in tandem. Any attempt by the editors to point out systematically the additional matter, not to mention all the variations in language between the contemporary Diary record and the later narrative distilled through JA's memory, would result in a veritable forest of footnotes. The editors have therefore limited themselves to pointing out only representative instances of altered language. For the same purpose of economy in annotation, cross-references to identifying and explanatory notes in the Diary have also been furnished very selectively in the Autobiography.
On the topographical details see JA's Diary entry of 13 Feb. 1778 and note 2 there.
“Cohasset rocks,” a few miles east of Braintree but beyond the Nantasket peninsula in Massachusetts Bay, remained a favorite fishing and shooting area throughout the 19th century. As an example of the continuity of family habits it is worth remarking that in 1880 two of JA's great-grandchildren, JQA2 and CFA2, who had as boys gone on fishing jaunts there with their father, bought shares in a private summer colony, the Glades Club, whose property helps form Cohasset harbor, and that in the 1960's their great-grandchildren still swim, fish, and sail off “Cohasset rocks.” See The Glades, Boston, privately printed, 1914.
The incident of the pause at the house on Hough's Neck was written by JA on a separate sheet of the MS and keyed to its proper place in the text by a dagger mark.