Feb 3 1812: Adams to Jefferson

On February 3, 1812, John Adams writes in response to the letter received from Thomas Jefferson dated January 21, 1812. Jefferson's letter had completed the reconciliation of the two patriarchs of the revolution who had been bitter enemies as a result of the election of 1800. Jefferson's earlier letter can be found here.  Adams letter of February 3, 1812 follows (I have added broken up the letter with my own paragraphs): 

Quincy February 3. 1812

Dear Sir 

Sitting at My Fireside with my Daughter Smith, on the first of February My Servant brought me a Bundle of Letters and Newspapers from the Post Office of this Town: one of the first Letters that struck my Eye has the Post Mark of Milton 23. Jany. 1812. Milton is the next Town to Quincy and the Post Office in it is but three Miles from my House. How could the Letter be so long in coming three miles? Reading the Superscription, I instantly handed the Letter to Mrs. Smith. Is that not Mr. Jeffersons hand? Looking attentively at it, she answered it is very like it. How is it possible a Letter from Mr. Jefferson, could get into the Milton Post office?

Opening the Letter I found it, indeed from Monticello in the hand and with the Signature of Mr. Jefferson: but this did not much diminish my Surprize. How it is possible a Letter can come from Mr. Jefferson to me in seven or Eight days?

I had no Expectation of an Answer, thinking the Distance so great and the Roads so embarrassed under two or three Months. This History would not be worth recording but for the Discovery it made of a Fact, very pleasing to me, vizt. that the Communication between Us is much easier, surer and may be more frequent than I had ever believed or suspected to be possible.

The Material of the Samples of American Manufacture which I sent you was not Wool or Cotton, nor Silk nor Flax nor Hemp nor Iron nor Wood. They were spun from the brain of John Quincy Adams and consist in two Volumes of his Lectures on Rhetorick and oratory, delivered when he was Professor of that Science in our University of Cambridge.

As Relation of mine, a first Cousin of my ever honoured, beloved and revered Mother, Nicholas Boylston, a rich Merchant of Boston, bequeathed by his Will a Donation for establishing a Professorship, and John Quincy Adams, having in his veins so much of the Blood of the Founder, was most earnestly solicited to become the first Professor. The Volumes I sent you are the Fruit of his Labour during the short time he held that office. But it ought to be remembered that he attended his Duty as a Senator of the United States during the same Period. It is with some Anxiety submitted to your Judgment.

Your Account of the flourishing State of Manufactures in Families in your Part of the Country is highly delightful to me. I wish the Spirit may spread and prevail through the Union. Within my Memory We were much in the same Way in New England: but in later Times We have run a gadding abroad too much to seek for Eatables, Drinkables, and Wearables.

Your Life and mine for almost half a Century have been nearly all of a Piece, resembling in the whole, mine in the Gulph Stream, chaced by three British Frigates, in a Hurricane from the North East and a hideous Tempest of Thunder and Lightning, which cracked our Mainmast, struck three and twenty Men on Deck, wounded four and killed one. I do not remember that my Feelings, during those three days were very different from what they have been for fifty Years.

What an Exchange have you made? Of Newspapers for Newton! Rising from the lower deep of the lowest deep of Dulness and Bathos to the Contemplation of the Heavens and the heavens of Heavens. Oh that I had devoted to Newton and his Fellows that time which I fear has been wasted on Plato and Aristotle, Bacon (Nat) Acherly, Bolin[g]broke, De Lolme, Harrington, Sidney, Hobbes, Plato Redivivus, Marchmont, Nedham, with twenty others upon Subjects which Mankind is determined never to Understand, and those who do Understand them are resolved never to practice, or countenance.

Your Memoranda of the past, your Sense of the present and Prospect for the Future seem to be well founded, as far as I can see. But the Latter i.e. the Prospect for the Future, will depend on the Union: and how is that Union to be preserved? Concordia Res parvae crescunt, Discordia Maximae dilabuntur [from Sallust, Jugurtha, “Small communities grow great through harmony, great ones fall to pieces through discord.”].

Our Union is an immense Structure. In Russia, I doubt not, a Temple or Pallace might be erected of Wood, Brick, or Marble, which should be cemented only with Ice. A sublime and beautiful Building it might be; surpassing St. Sophia, St. Peters, St. Pauls, Notre Dame or St. Genevieve. But the first Week, if not the first day of the Debacle would melt all the Cement and Tumble The Glass and Marble, the Gold and Silver, the Timber and the Iron into one promiscuous chaotic or anarchic heap.

I will not at present point out the precise Years Days and Months when; nor the Names of the Men by whom this Union has been put in Jeopardy. Your Recollection can be at no more loss than mine. Cobbets, Callenders, Peter Markoes, Burrs and Hamiltons may and have passed away. But Conquerors do not so easily disappear. Battles and Victories are irresis[t]able by Human Nature. When a Man is once acknowledged by the People in the Army and the Country to be the Author of a Victory, there is no longer any Question. He is undoubtedly a great and good Man. Had Hamilton, Burr obtained a recent Victory, neither You, nor Jay nor I should have stood any Chance against them or either of them more than a Swallow or a Sparrow.

The Union to me is still an Object of as much Anxiety as ever Independence was. To this I have sacrificed my Popularity in New England and yet what Treatment do I still receive from the Randolphs and Sheffeys of Virginia. By the Way are not these Eastern Shore Men?

My Senectutal Loquacity has more than retaliated your “Senile Garrulity.”

I have read Thucydides and Tacitus, so often, and at such distant Periods of my Life, that elegant, profound, and enchanting as is their Style, I am weary of them. When I read them I seem to be only reading the History of my own Times and my own Life. I am heartily weary of both, i.e. of recollecting the History of both: for I am not weary of Living. Whatever a peevish Patriarch might say, I have never yet seen the day in which I could say I have had no Pleasure; or that I have had more Pain than Pleasure.

Gerry, Paine, and J. Adams, R. R. Livingston, B. Rush, and George Clymer and yourself, are all that I can recollect, of the Subscribers to Independence who remain. Gerry is acting a decided and a splendid Part. So daring and so hazardous a Part; but at the same time so able and upright, that I say: “God save the Governor” and “prosper long our noble Governor.” I walk every fair day, sometimes 3 or 4 miles.

Ride now and then but very rarely more than ten or fifteen Miles. But I have a Complaint that nothing but the Ground can cure, that is the Palsy; a kind of Paralytic Affection of the Nerves, which makes my hands tremble, and renders it difficult to write at all and impossible to write well.

I have the Start of you in Age by at least ten Years: but you are advanced to the Rank of a Great Grandfather before me. Of 13 Grand Children I have two, William and John Smith, and three girls, Caroline Smith, Susanna and Abigail Adams, who might have made me Great Grand Children enough. But they are not likely to employ their Talents very soon. They are all good Boys and Girls however, and are the solace of my Age.

I cordially reciprocate your Professions of Esteem and Respect. Madam joins and sends her kind Regards to your Daughter and your Grand Children as well as to yourself.

JOHN ADAMS 

P. S. I forgot to remark your Preference for Savage over civilized life. I have Something to say upon that Subject. If I am in Error, you can set me Right, but by all I know of one or the other I would rather be the poorest Man in France or England, with sound health of Body and Mind, than the proudest King, Sachem, or Warriour of any Tribe of Savages in America.

Feb 1, 1812: Byron to Hodgson

On February 1, 1812, Byron writes to his friend Francis Hodgson about his attendance in the House of Lords the night before. Byron has not yet made a speech in the House of Lords. He appears both to be waiting for an appropriate issue and somewhat nervous at the prospect. The letter ends with him suggesting that perhaps he will speak on Catholic Emancipation. In fact, his first speech will be in the debate concerning the 1812 Frame Breaking Act which was to deal with Luddite disturbances. The letter of February 1, 1812 reads:

8, St. James’s Street, Feb. 1, 1812.

My Dear Hodgson,

 —I am rather unwell with a vile cold, caught in the House of Lords last night. Lord Sligo and myself, being tired, paired off, being of opposite sides, so that nothing was gained or lost by our votes. I did not speak: but I might as well, for nothing could have been inferior to the Duke of Devonshire, Marquis of Downshire, and the Earl of Fitzwilliam. The Catholic Question comes on this  month, and perhaps I may then commence. I must “screw my courage to the sticking-place,” and we’ll not fail. 

Yours ever,

B

Jan 19 1812 Percy Bysshe Shelley

In the Biographical Sketch, at the beginning of The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley (New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1901), George Edward Woodberry notes a curious incident involving the poet: 

At Keswick, too, occurred the first of the personal assaults on Shelley, which tried the belief of his friends. He had begun the use of laudanum, as a relief from pain, but he had recovered from the illness which discloses this fact, before the incident occurred. On January 19, at seven o'clock at night, Shelley, hearing an unusual noise, went to the door and was struck to the ground and stunned by a blow. His landlord, alarmed by the noise, came to the scene, and the assailant fled. The affair was published in the local paper, and is spoken of by Harriet [his wife] as well as Shelley. Some of the neighbors disbelieved in it, but his simple chemical experiments had excited their minds and made him an object of suspicion, and it is to be said that the country was in a disturbed state.

Laudanum was a form of opium. It could be a potent narcotic. In the nineteenth century it was used in many patent medicines. It was prescribed for a variety of ailments. Samuel Taylor Coleridge was one of the famous laudanum addicts.

Jan 15 1812: Ludditism Arrives in Yorkshire

In Leeds, there is the first indication that Luddite disturbances have spread to Yorkshire. Magistrates dispersed a crowd gathered in Leeds. 

The events are described in more detail in Luddite Bicentenary 1811-1813 as follows: 

At 9 o'clock on the evening of Wednesday the 15th of January, Magistrates in Leeds received news they must have been dreading. An informant gave them information under oath about a conspiracy to destroy machinery in the area.

Croppers were to gather en masse that night and then make their way at 11 o'clock to a new Mill at Sheepscar to "proceed to the work of destruction".

The Magistrates assembled at the office of the Town Clerk to decide what to do. They proceeded with mounted troops towards the proposed location of the attack, the meeting point being a bridge close to the Mill. Once there, they observed a number of people, who were passing the meeting place, and then returning to pass it by again, as if they were unsure of what to do. They seemed reluctant to gather, and when they finally dispersed at 1.00 a.m., the Magistrates and troops apprehended one of their number. The man had his face blacked, and carried a hammer and chisel. He also carried a large piece of burnt cork in his pocket.

For more information about the Luddites see my earlier post here.

An interesting timeline of the spread of Ludditism in Yorkshire can be found here.

Luddite Bicentenary 1811-1813 remains one of the best sources for information on the Luddite movement on the web. The site has a particularly useful examination of the historical context for the spread of the Luddite disturbances in Yorkshire here.

January 11 1812: Luddites

1812 is also the bicentennial of the Luddites.

Luddite disturbances did begin in Nottinghamshire, England in November 1811 but increased in scope as they spread to the  West Riding of Yorkshire in early 1812. Many of the disturbances took the form of machine-breaking in the wool and cotton industries.  The  Luddites were named after the mythical leader of the movement, a certain ‘General Ned Ludd’ or ‘King Ludd’, who lived in Sherwood Forest. 

There were a number of grievances that gave rise to the Luddites. Many wanted to get rid of the new machinery that supposedly was the cause unemployment. Artisan hand weavers did not want power looms or weaving frames introduced.  There were also protests against wage reductions. In general, artisans and workers were experiencing changing economic conditions that we broadly call the industrial revolution.  In addition, there were various economic difficulties caused by the disruption in economic activity as a result of the Napoleonic wars.

The tweets for January 12, 2012 come from a letter  sent on January 11, 1811 from the Magistrates of the Nottingham County.  The letter can be found here in the very interesting website, Luddite Bicentenary 1811-1813.

The Magistrates are writing to the Home Office seeking protection for John Braithwaite and Elizabeth Braithwaite. The Braithwaites were going to give evidence at trial against Wm. Carnell and Joseph Maples. The latter having been charged with having broken into the Braithwaite's home and  breaking "several Frames therein and ...[taking] away certain parts of these Frames." The Braithwaits had received various threats after the arrests were made. The Magistrates sensibly thought the Braithwaites might be safer in London.

To celebrate, the 200 years the Luddites have a website,The Luddite Link.

The above post is also based, in part, on information found in the UK national Archives website found here. 

UPDATE

The tweets for January 13, 2012 again come from the website Luddite Bicentenary 1811-1813 based on the following post. 

January 6 1812 Catherine Glynne

Catherine Glynne was born on 6 January 1812 at Hawarden Castle, Flintshire, Wales to Sir Stephen Richard Glynne, 8th Baronet, and to Mary Griffin, who was the daughter of Catherine Grenville and Richard Griffin, SecondLord Braybrooke, Baron of Braybrooke. 

Her future husband,William Ewart Gladstone, was 2 years old at the time.

William Gladstone was born on 29 December 1809 to Anne MacKenzie Robertson and Sir John Gladstone, 1st Baronet. He was educated at Eton College, Windsor, Berkshire, England; graduating from  Christ Church, Oxford University, Oxford,Oxfordshire, England, in 1831 with a Master of Arts (M.A.) and he held the office of Member of Parliament (M.P.) (Tory) for Newark commencing on 1832.

Catherine Glynne married William Ewart Gladstone on 25 July 1839 at Liverpool, Lancashire,England in a double wedding with Catherine's sister, Mary Glynne, who married George Lyttelton, of HagleyHall, Worcestershire, fourth Lord Lyttelton aged 21, four year younger than his wife (1).

Mr. Gladsone continued his distinguished and illustrious political career continuing to hold the office of Member of Parliament (M.P.) (Tory) for Newark to 1845, the office of Secretary of State for the Colonies in 1845, office of Member of Parliament (M.P.) (Liberal)for Oxford University between 1847 and 1865, the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1852, the office of Lord High Commissioner of the Ionian Islands in1858, the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer between 1859 and 1866; was invested as a Privy Counsellor (P.C.); then held the office of Member of Parliament (M.P.) (Liberal) for South Lancashire between 1865 and 1868, the office of Member of Parliament (M.P.) (Liberal) for Greenwich between 1868 and 1880, the office of Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury between December 1868 and February 1874; was awarded the honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Laws (D.C.L.); held the office of Chancellor of the Exchequer between 1880 and 1882; the office of Member of Parliament (M.P.)(Liberal) for Midlothian between 1880 and 1895, the office of Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury between April 1880 and June 1885, the office of Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury from February 1886 to August1886, and the office of Prime Minister and First Lord of the Treasury when he was 82 years of age serving between August 1892 and February 1894 (2).

Catherine Glynne and William Gladstone were married for 59 years. 

Roy Jenkins, William Gladstone's biographer, noted "…[she] was passionately engaged with the success and well being of her husband, but not very interested in either politics or the intricacies of religious doctrine and observance, the two subjects which most interested him." (3)

Roy Jenkins, who was also Baron Jenkins of Hillhead OM, PC, summed up their relationship this way:

It could be argued that their marriage was not particularly close.They were often and sometimes unnecessarily in different houses conjoined only by regular but not notably intimate letters. Gladstone nearly always singed himself to her"Ever yours affty., W.E. Gladstone". Later in life he occasionally alternated this with 'From your old WEG'. For decades, however, he never varied in writing  'Mrs W.E. Gladstone', as though it were a business communication, across the bottom of the letter. But when the last of the wives of his three elder brothers had died, he suddenly shifted, with an extraordinary sense of precedential precision, to writing' Mrs. Gladstone.' (4)

Catherine Glynne had eight children.

Her husband died on May 19, 1898 at the age of 88.

She survived him by about two years to 14 June 1900 dying at the age 88 at Hawarden Castle, Flintshire, Wales. 

Footnotes 

1. Roy Jenkins, Gladstone: A Biography (London, 1995), p. 55
2. thepeerage.com
3. Gladstone: A Biography, p. 55
4. Gladstone: A Biography, p. 55

January 6 1812: Martha Ballard

On January 6, 1812, a Monday, Martha Ballard wrote in her Diary:

Clear morn, Cloudy aftn. I have done a larg wash for me to have put my Linning out to drie, knit at Evng. Linda filld Sausages. at home. 

The transcription above is again taken form the website dohistory. The transcription of the diary is the work of Robert R. McCausland and Cynthia MacAlman McCausland.

For more on Martha Ballard see here and here.

January 5 1812 Siege of Tarifa

The Siege of Tarifa ended on January 5, 1812. 

The French forces were unsuccessful in their attempt to capture this small coastal town in Andalusia, Spain. The town had been occupied by a small British garrison since 1811. There about 4,000 British and Spanish soldiers in the town.

In November, 1811, the British garrison had attacked the French lines around Cadiz which was also under siege by the French. Marshal Soult, the French commander, then decided to attack Tarifa. He dispatched Marshal Victor with about 15,000 men taken from the troops around Cadiz.

The siege began on 20 December 1811. The French made quick progress and breached the walls of the town on the first day. The French continued to attack through to December 30 1811. They were able to establish a sixty feet wide breach in the defensive wall. At this point the weather intervened. Severe rainstorms and flash floods caused havoc for both sides but more so for the French forces. French trenches and camps were overrun by the flash floods. The French plan to attack on dawn on December 31, 1811 had to be delayed allowing the British and Spanish defenders to carry out some crucial preparations. 

The French attack began at 9 a.m. but rain again slowed the advance until the French were forced to retreat suffering between 210 to 400 casualties. In contrast, the British lost 36 men and the Spanish 20 men.

The weather continued to play a major part in the siege. Rain meant that the besieging forces was cut off from the main French armies in Cadiz. Later, the French forces in Tarifa were cut off from each other. Supplies began to run short. 

Marshall Victor tried on 1 January to reopen the attack but a heavy rainstorm hit the area on the night of 3 and 4 January. Victor had to admit that the French cause was hopeless. On the night of 4-5 January, 1812, after spiking nine of their twelve heavy guns, the French abandoned the siege.

The above is based on the information found here and in the interesting Journal of Colonel Skerrett, the British commander at Tarifa, which can be found here here .

January 2 1812: Jefferson Letter

January 2, 1812

  

Thomas Jefferson, former president,  currently residing in Monticello, Virginia,  wrote a letter to Dr. John Crawford: 

“The fate of England, I think with you, is nearly decided, and the present form of her existence is drawing to a close.  The ground, the houses, the men will remain;  but in what new form they will revive and stand among nations, is beyond the reach of human foresight. We hope it may be one of which the predatory principle may not be the essential characteristic. If her transformation shall replace her under the laws of moral order, it is for the general interest that she should still be a sensible and independent weight in the scale of nations, and be able to contribute, when a favorable moment presents itself, to reduce under the same order, her great rival in flagitiousness. We especially ought to pray that the powers of Europe may be so poised and counterpoised among themselves, that their own safety may require the presence of all their force at home, leaving the other quarters of the globe in undisturbed tranquillity. When our strength will permit us to give the law of our hemisphere, it should be that the meridian of the mid-Atlantic should be the line of demarkation between war and peace, on this side of which no act of hostility should be committed, and the lion and the lamb lie down in peace together.”

January 1 1812: Martha Ballard

January 1, 1812

On January 1, 1812, a wednesday, Martha Ballard wrote in her diary:

Cloudy and some rain. Epm Conducted his grand pah & I to Capt Pitss, we found his famely allmost Sick with Colds. Charls Coxes wife there. we went from there to Judg Norths to an Evng Lecture. Revd mr Tappin performd. the Text Romans XIII C vers 11th. we returnd home before 9h Evn.

at Judg Norths to Lecture. a mr Deans here from New Sharon.

Martha Moore Ballard (1734/1735-1812) was born in Oxford, Massachusetts to Dorothy and Elijah Moore. In 1754, she married Ephraim Ballard, a miller and surveyor, who appears to have had some Tory sympathies that caused him trouble after the American Revolution. Martha Ballard is now remembered because of her diary where she recorded her life as a midwife and healer from the age of fifty to her death. She had nine children, three of whom died in 1769 from the diphtheria epidemic.

The tweets about her are taken from her diary which can be found in the DoHistory website. This website contains a copy of Martha’s diary and a useful transcription.

Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, her biographer, notes in her A Midwife's Tale that Martha’s diary records that Martha, as midwife, was involved in 816 deliveries performed between 1785 and 1812, the last year of her life.