John and Abigail Adams: A Story of Politics, History, and Romance

John Adams and Abigail Smith Adams exchanged over 1,100 letters during their lifetimes together, beginning during their courtship in 1762 and continuing throughout John’s political career until 1801. After that they were mainly together and wrote just a smattering of letters. Over 700 of the letters were from John to Abigail, and they were warm letters often beginning with the touching and evocative phrase “My Dearest Friend.” But they were more than that, as Mrs. Adams was a knowledgible and wise woman, and her husband treated her with that respect. He wrote her informative letters that included his descriptions of the Continental Congress, his impressions of Europe while he served in diplomatic roles, and his experiences as President. While separated, Abigail was in Quincy at the family home and provided John with updates about their family, farm, plus political matters and news of the Revolution’s and Presidential Administration’s impact in the Boston area. Their correspondence is famous for its quality and range, and a book about it has been published – “My Dearest Friend – Letters of Abigail and John Adams.”

The Massachusetts Historical Society has the Adams Papers, including almost all of the known letters John and Abigail exchanged. The Adams Family Papers Project there believes there are a small number of John’s letters remaining with descendants, but they were unable to identify any in third party private hands. Our search of auction records for John Adams over the past 35 years reveals nothing to Abigail at all. Any remnant of his correspondence to her on the private market would be of the utmost rarity, if not unique.

Here is that remnant. A well-known, documented and remarkable Free Frank “J. Adams,” with the very bold handwriting Adams used as President, on the front of a folded address sheet addressed to Mrs. Adams at Quincy, Massachusetts, and with a reddish brown “PHI / 25 FE” stamp at upper left for Philadelphia, 25 February. Philadelphia first used this style postmark in August 1798 and it ceased being the U. S. capital in May 1800; John’s letters to Abigail essentially stopped the next year. Using this information, the correspondence list of the Massachusetts Historical Society, and its information on when John was in Philadelphia and Abigail in Quincy, it is possible to date this frank to John’s letter to Abigail of February 25, 1799. This was a time when the United States almost ended up in a war with France.

That letter was as salty and extraordinary as can be, starting out (of course)?“My Dearest Friend,” and going on to blast Benjamin Franklin and France:?“…Frederic, Franklin and other Soidisant [self-characterized] Phylosophers, insist that Nature contrives these Things with others to reconcile Men to the thought of quitting the World. If my Phylosophy was theirs I should believe that Nature cared nothing for Men, nor their follies nor their Miseries, nor for herself. She is a mighty Stupid Woman, sometimes beautiful and clever but very often diabolical. A kind of French Republic, cunning and terrible: but cruel as the Grave and unjust as the Tempter and Tormentor.”

On the verso of this frank is a fascinating docket in Adams’ hand at the very end of his life, meaning he himself chose to retain it. It states simply “Scraps,” which back then had the meaning we would give to “odds and ends.” Thus it contains examples of his handwriting written a quarter century apart.

This famous frank is illustrated in Edward Stern’s “History of the Free Franking of Mail in the United States” and mentioned in David G. Phillips’s “The American Stampless Cover Catalogue.” It is ex Edward Stern and Arthur Richter collections. It goes without saying that it is our first autograph from John to Abigail. This is particularly touching, since Adams kept this as a memento of his wife into his very old age. Sold with both engravings pictured here.