Adams Family Correspondence, volume 3
I have this Moment heard of an Oportunity of writing a line to you by Coll. Tyler of this Town who sets out this Day from hence and is going in a Vessel bound to France from New London.1 I would in the first Place (to fore-close Anxiety) inform you that your Wife and Children, your Mother, Brother &c. are well.
Mr. Partridge is return'd from Congress last Week—brings no News of importance. Genl. Hancock and Genl. Ward are not yet set out for Congress. Mr. Adams, it is said, will soon set out for Philadelphia.2 We have no News from Charlestown, South Carolina, later than the 22d of March, when the Inhabitants were in good Spirits, had got the Works in the Town in good order, and their out-works, for preventing the Enemy's approach, so strong that they were in no great apprehen-326sion of their succeeding in their Attempt on that Place. The storm that overtook the Enemy's Fleet after they left N: York, was very Providential. The Loss of their Cavalry and Warlike Stores was very great, but the Delay of their Attack upon Charlestown by that means for so long a Time, was of unspeakable Advantage to the State of S. Carolina and to the Town of Charlestown in particular, as by that means they had time to compleat their Works and collect Forces from distant Parts to defend them.
We have a strong Rumour in Town, via Plymouth, that a very formidable French Fleet is arrived at Martinico consisting of 17 Sail of the Line, 20 Frigats and 100 Transports with a large Body of Troops. Should this News prove true I fancy Britain may soon bid farewell to the West Indies as well as to North America.
You will see by the Papers the Congress has recommended a total Revolution in the Paper Currency. The Genl. Court is now sitting here. We have adopted the Spirit of the Recommendation, and a Bill for that purpose has pass'd both Houses but is not yet enacted. By this Act a Tax of £72,000 per Annum for seven Years including the present Year, is to be raised in hard Money, or Produce at a certain Rate; which Sum is supposed sufficient to redeem our Quota of the Continental Currency at its present depreciated value, estimated at forty Paper Dollars for one hard one. This Tax is to be paid in Silver at 6/8 per Oz. or Gold in proportion: or else in Wheat, Rye, Corn, Merchantable Fish, Barrell'd Pork and Beef, &c. &c. which are to be deliver'd into the State-Stores free of Charge at a certain stipulated Price, such as the Merchants would be willing to pay for them in Silver and Gold.3
This is the Fund on which the New Bills proposed by Congress for this State are to be founded, and will at the end of seven Years be sufficient to redeem them with Gold and Silver, and pay the intervening Interest. The Form of Constitution has received various alterations since you left it in less able Hands, that as I conceive are not for the better. It is now printed and sending out to the People. I let sister Adams have one of them to send to you in her Pacquet by Mr. Guile (one of the Tutors) who is going in a Vessel from Beverly, bound to Holland. I will endeavour to send you another by this Conveyance per favor of Coll. Tyler, if I can get it soon enough.4 Sister Adams has received from Mr. Tracey of Newbury Port the Goods that you directed Messrs: Gardoqui and Sons to send to her, consisting of several Pieces of family Linnen, some silk Handkerchiefs, a sett of Knives and Forks, some Glass-Ware &c. I suppose such Articles, if to be sold here, would 327fetch four Dollars in hard Money, for what cost one Dollar in Europe; so that I think a few Remittances of that kind from time to time to Mrs. Adams would be very proper. And upon this occasion I would beg leave to mention to you that if any of your Mercantile Friends should be willing to become Adventurers to America in that way, I should be very glad to serve them in disposing of any Merchandize that might be consign'd to me. I am oblig'd to keep in my Hands part of a very good Warehouse built with Brick and cover'd with Tile, on the Town Dock in Boston where I could store the Goods without Expence of Truckage, and would transact the Business on the most reasonable Terms. And should any of them be inclined to purchase Lands now when so many Confiscated Estates will soon be to be sold (as I wrote you more at large in my Letter of the 18th. of Jany. last, which I hope you have received) my Connection with Public Affairs would enable me to transact such Business with some Advantages that a Person in a more private Station of Life would not have: and my knowledge of the French Language may also facilitate such a Correspondence.
You will see by the enclosed Paper that I have lost a very worthy Relative Mr. Natl. Cranch by an unlucky Fall: What makes this Event truly melancholy is the Connection between him and Betsy Palmer—they were soon to be Married.5
I want to write a thousand things to you but have not time, as I must Seal this directly. Give my kindest Love to the dear Boys Johnney and Charley, and to Mr. Thaxter. I intend writing to Mr. Thaxter by the next Oportunity that offers. His Friends at Hingham, Father Smith, Uncle Quincy &c. are all well. Sister Adams has drawn a Bill on you for one Hundred Dollars or £22–10–0 Sterling in favour of Mr. Thos. Bumstead who is making a genteel Chaise for her, she pays the rest here. The lowest Price I could get it for was three hundred hard Dollars. I suppose Mr. Bumstead has sent the Bill by Coll. Tyler.6 We were very happy in hearing from you soon after your dangerous Passage. Your Letters from Spain I suppose all arriv'd safe to hand, but we have not receiv'd a Line from you since your Arrival in France. I hope we shall soon have that Pleasure, which will add greatly to the Happyness of our friendly Circle, and particularly to that of your affectionate Brother,
P.S. I mentioned in my last that it was probable that Borland's Estate in Braintree would be to be sold before long by Order of Government; should that be the case I should be glad to buy it if I could 328without selling my own Farm that joins upon it and makes it so very convenient for me. I should therefore be glad to know from you, by the first Oportunity, whether if I should be able to purchase that Place
This was The Earliest Diary of John Adams
. John Steele had served in the Continental Army, resigning as major in 1779, and thereafter in the ill-fated Massachusetts expedition against Penobscot, in which he held a commission as lieutenant colonel. A fellow passenger on his voyage from New London to Nantes in 1780 was the aspiring artist John Trumbull, and the two young men made their way, apparently without difficulty even though they were both former Continental officers, to London via Paris, where Tyler called on JA late in June; see note 6 below.
On Tyler and his career see
Grandmother Tyler's Book
, p. 257 and passim;
Mass. Soldiers and Sailors
; John Trumbull, Autobiography, ed. Theodore Sizer, New Haven, 1953, p. 58–59, 64–66; G. Thomas Tanselle, Royall Tyler, Cambridge, 1967, passim. In the early 1930's, while investigating Trumbull's sojourn in London during the Revolution, Lewis Einstein brought to light in the Public Record Office a letter written by Tyler to Lord George Germain from Bordeaux, 6 Aug. 1781, in which the writer offered to serve in the British forces, asking only £1,000 in compensation for the property he would thus forfeit in America (Einstein, Divided Loyalties . . ., Boston and New York, 1933, p. 365–366, 447). The offer was not taken up, and Tyler later returned to Boston without known damage to his reputation.
George Partridge had been elected to the Continental Congress in June 1779 and had attended from the following August until early April 1780. John Hancock, although a delegate, did not attend at all in 1779 or 1780. Artemas Ward, elected in Nov. 1779, did not attend until mid-June 1780. Samuel Adams extended his leave from Congress, begun in June 1779, for a whole year. See Burnett, ed., Letters of Members
, 4: liii; 5: lvii–lviii.
This was An Act making Provision for Calling in, to be destroyed, this State's Quota, according to the present Apportionment, of all the Public Bills of Credit which have been emitted by Congress, &c., through a title of fifteen lines, passed 5 May 1780 and printed in Province Laws, 5:1178–1183. See, further, note 8 below.
The third session of the Convention had adjourned on 2 March until 7 June after having empowered a committee to print and distribute the text of the Constitution as agreed on for the consideration of the towns, together with an Address of the Convention . . . to Their Constituents (Mass. Constitutional Convention, 1779–1780, Journal
, p. 163–164, 168–169, 216–221). For the background see above, JA to AA, 13 Nov. 1779, note 3.
Nathaniel Cranch was a nephew of Richard Cranch, who probably wrote 329the following obituary, printed in the Boston Independent Ledger, 24 April 1780, p. 3, col. 2:
“On Wednesday evening last “Mr. Cranch was the Son of a very worthy Clergyman in England: He came into America some years before the commencement of the present contest; when that interesting event had taken place, he did not stand an inattentive spectator, but throwing aside his local prejudices, carefully weighed the merits of the cause, and seeing clearly on which side truth and justice lay,—that honesty of mind, that invincible attachment to truth and justice, that were the characteristic qualities of his Soul, determined him to risk every thing in defence of the American cause. In this glorious struggle, he was engaged from the first forming of the army at Cambridge, untill a few weeks past—when the flattering prospect of a settlement in life, that would have crown'd his tenderest wishes, brought him back.—The feeling heart alone can tell the sequel!”
At the time of this “melancholy event” young Cranch was engaged to his cousin Grandmother Tyler's Book
, p. 55–56, and Adams Genealogy. See also Thaxter to AA, 12 May, below.
JA's record of personal expenditures contains an entry showing that on 28 June he paid Tyler 535 livres to redeem AA's bill of exchange in the amount of 100 dollars (JA, Diary and Autobiography
, 2:440). Cranch, as he states here, had made the arrangements with Thomas Bumstead, a carriage-maker, dealer, and auctioneer of “Long Acre,” Boston, who advertised frequently in the papers in 1780. It is clear that AA had JA's approval for this personal indulgence, but when he heard its cost he pronounced it “horribly dear” (JA to AA, 17 June, below).
Here and below, MS is torn by seal.
JA received Cranch's letter on 16 June and immediately sent on to Vergennes the enclosed newspaper (presumably the Independent Ledger, 24 April; see note 5 above), together with an extract from the letter itself, namely the third paragraph, on the measures of Congress and of Massachusetts to check further depreciation of the currency. See JA to Vergennes, 16 June (RC in Archives Aff. Etr., Paris, Corr. Pol., Etats-Unis, vol. 12; LbC in Adams Papers, printed, with the enclosed extract, in JA, Works
, 7:187). Since many of Congress' creditors were French, Vergennes deeply disapproved of the Gordian method adopted to redeem the old currency, and JA's defense of it was one of the chief causes of the breach between him and Vergennes that took place in June–July 1780. The fullest account of this historic quarrel is in John E. Little, John Adams and American Foreign Affairs, 1755–1780, Princeton Univ. doctoral dissertation, 1966, ch. 8.
That a Nation once distinguished in the Annals of Mankind, should by the Pride, Avarice, Ambition, Injustice and Oppression of its Governors, loose its distant Dependencies, is not an uncommon Event in 330the History of the World; but that the same Nation, from the Operation of the same Causes, together with Folly and Madness, should league one half the World against her, is not only a Phenomenon in Modern Times (reserved to be exhibited by a neighbouring Nation) but a melancholy Monument of divine Vengeance. That this is the present State of England is but too true. Behold her a public Enemy, hostile to the Rights of Mankind, but too impotent to sport much longer. Such extremes of Wickedness and their Consequences, unhappily for human Nature and the Peace of Nations, are not local—other States and Kingdoms become infected by them, their Virtues and Morals become shaken and debauched. Britain then is to be considered not only as attempting to subvert the Civil and political Institutions of Men but indirectly their religions also. To You, Madam, who are so well versed in History, another observation is unnecessary.
The present Picture of England is truly melancholy. Her Tyranny has dismembered the best Part of her Empire—America is independent—Ireland is perfecting her Strength in her (England's) Weakness, and gliding on very calmly and smoothly to Independence. Behold her interrupting the Commerce of the United States, of Holland, seizing and condemning Articles not contraband by Treaty nor the Law of Nations, and insulting their Flag to crown their Injustice. The King by Proclamation has declared all Stipulations of the Treaties between England and the Republic are to be suspended, and the Republic to be considered as a Neutral Power no Ways priviledged by Treaties, because the Dutch have refused the Succours demanded in Virtue of a Treaty. Russia, from whence England expected a considerable Assistance in Men and Ships to promote her System of Rapine and Depredation, has determined upon a rigorous Neutrality between the belligerent Powers, declared her Resolution to maintain her Flag in Honor, invited Holland to make Common Cause, and sent Copies of her Resolutions and Declarations, to the Courts of the Powers at War. This Neutrality is against England—hard fate indeed that even a Neutrality is against her.1 She has insulted the Flag of Sweeden, by one of her Cruisers, attacking a Sweedish Frigate innocently and peaceably pursuing her Course. Behold her engaged in a War against America, France and Spain, singly and alone, without an ally or a Prospect of obtaining one in Europe. It is said that there is a Quintuple Alliance forming or formed between Russia, Prussia, Sweeden, Denmark and the Republic of the United States of Holland. I affirm it not for a Fact. If You recollect the System of Europe pointed out in an Judicious and ingenious Letter now in Manuscript in your Cus-331tody,2 You will probably think this Event not unlikely. The Object of it is, the protection of their Commerce and respective Flags. I cannot say that it is entered into—I can only affirm that such an Alliance is not improbable; for those Powers and no others in Europe love England with much Cordiality, but on the contrary see without Regret the decay of her Power. Add to all this, Intestine Broils and Divisions rending the Kingdom asunder. Such is the State of England internally and externally. A Tear of Pity an American is magnanimous enough to shed upon this Spectacle. Britain should shed Tears of Blood.
I had the pleasure of seeing Masters Johnny and Charley, my two dear little Friends, this day—they are well. With equal Satisfaction and equal Justice, can I send this acceptable Tribute, which is due to them, to a tender and fond Mamma, that they behave well.
I had the Honor of dining to day with his Excellency at Mr. Grand's, where were beaucoup de monde and amongst the rest Madamoiselle Labhar is not to be forgotten. Think me not smitten, Madam. If I have any Partiality for any one in particular (which I will neither affirm nor deny) it is not on this Side the Water.
Remember me affectionately to your dear Nabby and Tommy, and respectfully and dutifully where due.
The latest scholarly study of the Armed Neutrality of 1780 is by Isabel de Madariaga, Britain, Russia, and the Armed Neutrality of 1780, New Haven, 1962. Since it concentrates on the mission of Sir James Harris (later 1st Earl of Malmesbury) to the Court of Catherine the Great at St. Petersburg, it does virtually nothing to indicate American interest in this significant episode of northern European diplomacy. See, however, Bemis, Diplomacy of the Amer. Revolution
, chs. 11–12; Morris, Peacemakers
, ch. 8.
Undoubtedly Thaxter is alluding to the long and remarkable letter JA addressed, or at least began, to John Jay, president of Congress, within a day or two of his return to Braintree from France, 4 Aug. 1779. When composing it, JA regarded it as his last diplomatic dispatch and therefore a kind of testament, embodying his “Reflections . . . on the general State of Affairs in Europe, so far as they relate to the Interests of the united States” (RC in PCC, No. 84, I, printed in Wharton, Dipl. Corr. Amer. Rev.
, 3:278–286; LbC in Adams Papers, printed in JA, Works
, 7:99–110). The influence of this testament on Thaxter's present letter is manifest. In the Adams Papers is a twelve-page contemporary copy in an unidentified hand which may possibly have been the version Thaxter saw and studied, although it is more likely that he read the letterbook copy. Numerous other contemporary copies were made, of which a number survive (four besides those already mentioned are recorded in the Adams Papers Editorial Files as in various repositories and private collections). The explanation is in a letter from James Lovell to JA, 14 Sept. 1779 (Adams Papers): “The dull letter you mention has been received JCC
, 14:981, under date 332of 20 Aug. 1779