Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-03-19
FiDe Minutes A Day
With Our Presidents
BY JAMES MORGAN.

A schoolgirl complained thai
American history was so Uttered w
with Adamses" that she couldn't tel
n from the other. Yet this most
distinguished family in our national
biography lived in America one hun
bred and fifty years before it broke
into fame.
When the engagement was an
nounced of John Adams Of Braintree,
Mass, to the daughter of Parson
Smith of the adjoining town Of Wey-
mouth, people were shocked that
Abby should marry so beneath her
station. Was she not a Quincy n a
Norton? And John, the son of a
small farmer, was put down to four
tenth place among his twenty-four
classmates. when Harvard catalogues
were made up according to social
rank. After hat he taught school in
Worcester to get enough money 10
study law, n the strictest of the
Puritans looked on lawyers as ungod-
lY.
Father-in-law Smith was game and
tradition says that he preached down
his goSsiping p~arishioners from this
well-chosen text: John came neither
eating bread nor drinking wine, and
ye say he hath q DEVIL"
Although she never went to school,
this parsons daughter was by long
odds the cleverest In the entire n
of our Presidents wives, her publish
ed letters forming a delightfully."- hu-
man document in our too often I'M
human history. When John Joined
the fathers of the republic in the
yrnaf uunrlr ~ CnffinU ID tho most
masculine government the world ever
saw. this mother of the republic a
to stay home to rock the cradle, cook
and patch for four little Adamses and
to tend the farm. Milking and churn-
Ing, knitting and darning, teaching
and praying, toiling n saving, she
supported the family, inspired her
dency and reared a son to follow in
the fathers footsteps. To Abigail
Adams alone belongs the glory of
having been the wife of one PreSi-
dent and the mother Of another.
Although lawyer Adams defended
the British soldiers on trial for
shooting down the citizens in what
Is called the Boston Massacre, the
patriots sent him to congress-, where
he sprang the first proposal Of Wash
ington's appointment as commander
in-chief. Not that he eve cared much
for George, but he wanted the Vir-
ginians n the others in the yet
conservative congress to adopt the
rebellious troops gathered about
colonies to the war. which until Their
had been only a local conflict In New
England.
In the war It fell to Adams to do
picket duty in Europe. Congress sent
him to France with a thoughtful
warming to put in the bottom of his
dispatch bag plenty of lead or stone
or other weighty substance to sink
his papers. For his W neck no pro-
lection was proposed In event of the
British capturing a signer of the rebel
manifesto of July 4, 1916. Neverthe-
less he took with him on the perilous
trip his t~en-year-old son, John
Quincy.
On the next voyage he carried not
only John Quincy, but also his second
son, and they were shipwrecked off
the coast of Spain. Having to. ride
muleback over the mountains, they
were three months pa the road to
Paris. Never mind; the boys picked
up Spanish along the way!
After five long. anxious years of
separation from husband and chill
dren, The mother herself sailed TO
Europe, and the pioneer American
OtAAhNAA ~ oPE'SA W tAiS Soal VI W.
James was Abigail, the farmerette OF
B~raintree. Her presentation costume,
according to her own description, was
,hite lute-string covered with white
crepe, festooned with lilac ribbon and
mock point lace, over a hoop of enor-
nous extent, and with q narrow train
three yards long; also ruffle cuffs,
treble lace ruffles and dress cap,
with long lace lappets andtwo white
plumes."
You will be stared at q great
DEAL" the Duke of Dorset kindly
warned the Adamses. On the con-
trary, every back in the court circle
vas turned upon the Yankee rebels
and Queen Charlotte received Abigail
with contempt and corn.
A man can defend himself always,
as Abigail's husband did right man
fully when it fell to him to be the
first Independent American to stand
before the throne Of England. George
III. ~venturing to infer from his sup
posed dislike of France, a preference
for England, his one-time subject
frankly corrected the King: II mus
dvow to Your Majesty hat 1 have nc
attachment but to my own country
That was not an die boast. 1t was
he simple truth-the very corner
stone of the life of John Adams.
(CopyGght, 1920. by James Morgan
published by special arrangement
with The Mcclure Newspaper Syn
dicate).