American Rebels

by Nina Sankovitch

  If not for the reoccurrence of symptoms related to his consumption, Josiah might have called 1771 his best year ever. He was happily married and Abigail was pregnant with their first child. After the success of the Boston Massacre trials, there was ongoing demand for his legal work and, at the same time, the local papers clamored for more of his political tracts. But his health failed him again and again. Fevers and sweats plagued his nights, and violent coughing broke up the peace of his days.

  He moved his office to Queen Street, which brought him closer to the offices of the Boston Gazette, but more important, brought him closer to home. Abigail was the chief draw, her care and her company the best boon to his health, along with the creature comforts of their house on Marlborough Street. With Abigail’s help and the calm surroundings of his library (and the inspiration provided by the many tomes he had collected over the years), Josiah resolved to take better care of his health while also pursuing the legal work that grounded him and the political work that so invigorated him.

  * * *

  Edmund Quincy IV, father of Dolly, played his own role of resistance against what he called the “British occupation of Boston.”14 As a justice of the peace for the town, he always let colonists go free when they were brought before him on disorderly charges (and worse). The lawyer Benjamin Gridley, a Loyalist, claimed he had to resort to threats against Edmund to get him to finally put “one of the damned Sons of Liberty in Gaol!”15

  * * *

  After three years of living in Boston, John Adams had become increasingly disenchanted with town life. Although his political work continued, new legal cases were slow in coming and did little to inspire him. He’d lost a case against Jonathan Sewall, where Adams had represented the owners of a slave for whom Sewall was seeking freedom through an action called “replevin and trespass.” These types of cases were called “freedom suits” and had been brought in increasing numbers in Massachusetts ever since the High Court in England, in a case called Somerset v. Stewart, declared slavery to be “odious” and held that no English law or statute allowed for it.16

  Adams’ loss in the case was expected; he wrote in a letter to a friend, “I never knew a Jury by a Verdict, to determine a Negro to be a slave. They always found them free.”17 Nevertheless, Adams would continue to take such cases when offered. Fighting for the continued enslavement of a fellow human didn’t appear to bother him; a paying client was a paying client. In any event, he reasoned, slavery would die out as a “Measure of Economy” when slaves turned “lazy, idle, proud, vicious,” thereby becoming “wholly useless to their Masters.”18

  Adams couldn’t see the hypocrisy of arguing for the liberties of white colonists while defending the enslavement of black ones—but his wife could. Abigail would call John to task on it—but not yet.

  With Josiah Jr. having moved away from the offices on King Street, Adams no longer enjoyed long afternoons spent debating with the younger man over how a case might be brought or complaining together over the demanding circuit court schedules. John missed the daily contact; his two law clerks were bright and ambitious, but neither could match Josiah for his understanding of the law or his pure love of it.

  Abigail was always a good companion, and an honest sounding board for her husband’s dreams and frustrations. But she too was feeling tired out by life in Boston. Raising four children, managing the household on Cold Lane, keeping up with farm matters in Braintree, and keeping the family budget was all taking its toll on her. She and John adored their children but the costs of raising them seemed to go higher and higher, as John’s aspirations for the family grew and Abigail’s own expectations for the children increased.

  As John wrote to his friend and brother-in-law Richard Cranch, “In a little while Johnny must go to Colledge, and Nabby must have fine Cloaths, aye.… And very cleverly you and I shall feel when we recollect that we are hard at Work, over Watches and Lawsuits, and [our children] at the same Time Raking and fluttering away our Profits. Aye, and there must be dancing Schools and Boarding Schools and all that, or else, you know, we shall not give them polite Educations.”19

  The Cranches were themselves considering moving to Braintree. Richard’s watchmaking business in Salem was failing miserably and Mary was eager to move back closer to her family. Braintree was just one town over from Weymouth, where Abigail and Mary’s parents lived, and if Abigail and John were considering returning to Braintree, even better. Mary had a plan to run a boardinghouse and build the family wealth through her own labors.

  Richard finally acquiesced with Mary’s plans, and in the spring of 1771, they rented a large house in Braintree just a half mile away from the Adams family farmhouse. They began advertising for boarders and travelers; with no inn available in Braintree, there was sure to be business for their rooming house. Mary also vowed to try her hand at dairy work, and Richard bought up (with the financial assistance of Norton Quincy) some rocky acres of barely tillable land to try out farming.

  John Adams reasoned that the time was right to move his own family back to the farmhouse in Braintree. Neither public committee work nor lawsuits seemed to bring him pleasure anymore; nor did they bring needed funds to the family treasury. Worst of all, neither his legal work nor his political work fed his ambitions to become a great man in the community; to the contrary, John felt that his community standing was suffering, even when he was acting on its behalf: “I have acted my sentiments [for my colony], with the Utmost Frankness, at Hazard of all, and the certain Loss of ten times more than it is in the Power of the People to give me, for the sake of the People, and now I reap nothing but Insult, Ridicule and Contempt for it, even from many of the People themselves.”20

  John was determined to “shake off a little of that Load of public and private Care which has for some Time oppressed me.” He feared that if he did not leave Boston, he would soon “have shaken off this mortal Body.”21

  Within weeks of returning to the farm in Braintree, John felt better. He wrote in his diary, “Still, calm, happy Braintree. No journeys to make to Cambridge, no General Court to attend. I divide my time between law and husbandry. Farewell politics!”22

  A few days later, again he wrote of his “Joy” and his “Pleasure, in revisiting my old Haunts, and recollecting my old Meditations among the Rocks and Trees, which was very intense indeed. The rushing Torrent, the purling Stream, the gurgling Rivulet, the dark Thickett, the rugged Ledges and Precipices, are all old Acquaintances of mine.”23 John Adams was glad to be home.

  Abigail was also happy to be back in Braintree. She too welcomed the familiar sights, sounds, and smells of the village and their farm; no longer suffering the “Noisy Buisy Town,” she settled happily into “my humble Cottage in Braintree.… Where Contemplation p[l]umes her rufled Wings / And the free Soul look’s down to pitty Kings.”24 To have her sister Mary less than a mile away was an added benefit and the fulfillment of a long-held wish. Now their children could all play together, boys and girls scampering on the rocks along the beach or playing in the gardens behind the homes of the two sisters.

  Mary was just as busy as Abigail, keeping both the boardinghouse and the dairy going and caring for the children, but nevertheless, Abigail and Mary could, after a separation of almost five years, once again see each other frequently—and they did. Abigail was also able to see her family in Weymouth more frequently now that she was back in Braintree; her mother often came to visit her elder daughters and their children, accompanied by Abigail’s younger sister, Betsy. Betsy was a favorite aunt of young John Quincy Adams and a welcome presence to his father, John, who called Betsy “amiable” and “ingenious.”25

  It took no time at all for Abigail to reestablish herself as matriarch of the village. She encouraged other mothers in Braintree not only in their cottage industries of weaving and apothecary work but also in educating their children. She firmly believed that “much depends … upon the early Education of youth and the first principals which are instilled take the deepest roo
t.”26

  Nevertheless, she often felt ill-equipped to meet the task: “With regard to the Education of my own children, I find myself soon out of my depth, and destitute and deficient in every part of Education.”27 She did what she could, and encouraged others to do the same, not only for their children but for themselves and for their country: “If we mean to have Heroes, Statesmen and Philosophers, we should have learned women”—and men.28

  Josiah Quincy Sr. welcomed the Adams family back to Braintree. The village was growing by leaps and bounds, he told John, and business in local manufacturing was strong. Immigrants, mostly from Germany, worked in factories, such as Josiah’s glassmaking and chocolate businesses on Shed’s Neck (called Germantown for the number of Germans who lived and worked there). Immigrants also supplied needed labor as local farms prospered through a series of good harvests. Josiah assured John that in the new economy, he would find plenty of clients needing a lawyer.

  The year before, in early 1770, the rented home of Josiah Quincy Sr. had burned to the ground (the second time this occurred; again, no one was hurt but furnishings and books were lost in the fire). Buoyed by his various business projects, including the purchase of properties throughout Massachusetts and beyond, Josiah Sr. decided the time had come to finally build a house of his own. The house would be built on property his father had left to him, acres of fields and pasture on a hill, with sloping meadows that led down to the water.

  By the end of the year, Josiah’s new house was finished. A magnificent Georgian mansion, it sat high above the surrounding fields and meadows, commanding a view of the sea and land all around. At the top of the house, a monitor had been built; Josiah loved nothing better than to sit in his warren and look out. He could see all the way to Boston Harbor and count the masts of the many ships passing through its waters. He could see the spire of the Old South Meeting House on Milk Street and, on a clear day, the treetops of Beacon Hill.

  The rooms of the house were high-ceilinged, spacious, and airy and fitted out with finely sculpted moldings, European-patterned wallpaper, and multicolored fireplace tiles, all exhibiting the latest in fashion and elegance. Josiah installed magnificent pieces of furniture into the house, including the large Japanned chest he had saved from two fires. The specter of fire haunted him, and he demanded extra vigilance on the part of all the servants to keep this home safe. He hoped it would be a lasting refuge for himself and his family for years to come.

  John and Abigail were invited to visit the new home, along with Josiah’s brother Edmund and his daughters Dolly and Katy. Josiah Jr. and Abigail came often, and even Samuel Quincy and his wife, Hannah, made the trip in a fine gilt carriage pulled by a pair of black horses. John Hancock and his aunt Lydia were also invited to Josiah’s new home. Having known Reverend Hancock, and then lived in John’s childhood home for a period of time, Josiah Sr. felt a bond with Hancock; and he was happy to see his niece Dolly involved with a leader of the colony who was known for his generosity and sense of duty.

  In the late spring of 1771, Josiah’s daughter Hannah Lincoln came on her own to see her father’s new mansion. She had accompanied her husband, Bela Lincoln, to the hospital on George’s Island in Boston Harbor, where she left him to take one of its famous rest cures. Lincoln was suffering from a disease of his digestive system and had grown gaunt, weak, and even more angry. Yet Hannah stood by him; her visit to her father was short, as she had promised Bela she would soon return to the island to oversee his recovery. But Lincoln’s health continued to deteriorate, and Edmund Quincy wrote to his daughter Katy in July that “Poor Dr. Lincoln … is said to be in a very dangerous state.”29

  John Adams particularly enjoyed these evenings spent with old friends at the home of Josiah Sr. As had happened in the years when they had been in college together, their talks centered on politics: administration of the colony, the rights of colonists under the Massachusetts Charter, and the future of Massachusetts. John Hancock, John Adams, Josiah Quincy Jr.—each of the men had been developing his own ideas about how the colony should be governed. Now they found that their individual aspirations were shared, and the sharing only strengthened their resolve to relieve Massachusetts from what they all agreed was unwarranted parliamentary oppression.

  The camaraderie of old friends was a much-needed balm to John Adams’ soul. He had been feeling “quite left alone, in the World.”30 Now he found men who shared his distrust—and dislike—of Thomas Hutchinson. In Adams’ opinion, Hutchinson was the man whose “Character and Conduct have been the Cause of laying a Foundation for perpetual Discontent and Uneasiness between Britain and the Colonies, of perpetual Struggles of one Party for Wealth and Power at the Expence of the Liberties of this Country.”31 Encouraged by his old Braintree friends, he felt renewed resolve to fight against Hutchinson: “Our sons, if they deserve it, will enjoy the happy fruits of their Fathers’ Struggles.”32

  Josiah Jr. was just a boy when his brothers Sam and Ned, along with John Adams and John Hancock, gathered as college friends. But now he, like each of them, was a man working in the world, with direct knowledge of Parliament’s efforts to control and guide the colonies in America—and like them, willing to fight to protect the liberty of the colonists from the overreach of England. For Josiah, it was the legal institutions that would “rescue one right from the jaws of power, and restore one liberty to oppressed mankind,” and he predicted, “how would grateful millions bless the institution!”33

  For John Adams, it was hard work on the part of public servants that provided the only bulwark against administrative corruption and parliamentary oppression, no matter how thankless such work might be: “I have very cheerfully sacrificed my Interest, and my Health and Ease and Pleasure in the service of the People. I have stood by their friends longer than they would stand by them. I have stood by the People much longer than they would stand by themselves.”34

  And for John Hancock, it was the joined resolve of a community of dedicated citizens that held out the most hope for liberty from oppression; “I have always, from my earliest youth, rejoiced in the felicity of my fellow-men; and have ever considered it as the indispensable able duty of every member of society to promote, as far as in him lies, the prosperity of every individual, but more especially of the community to which he belongs.”35

  Only Samuel Quincy held back from the discussions shared by old friends. His silence was due to his roles as solicitor general and as justice of the peace in Boston, a new appointment; but he also kept quiet because of the secret source of his newly bolstered salary, which came from revenues gathered through the hated tea tax, the one tax still exacted from the colonists. While his brothers and friends devised new plans for getting rid of this final tax, Sam was profiting from it.

  Thomas Hutchinson hoped to guarantee Sam’s continued loyalty by masterminding his rising career, similar to what he had accomplished with Jonathan Sewall. To bring a Quincy into the Loyalist camp was a coup, and Hutchinson knew it. In 1771, Hutchinson had paid a handsome price for the Quincys’ home on South Street; perhaps this was another clever ploy to draw Sam further into his debt. With the money from the purchase, Sam and Hannah were able to build a grand new home on Hanover Street, surpassing Josiah Sr.’s Braintree home in size, opulence, and luxury.

  * * *

  Samuel Quincy wasn’t the only Braintree native courted by Thomas Hutchinson. Under express orders from Lord Hillsborough in England, Hutchinson sought at every turn to promote John Hancock and bring him into the Loyalist fold. With memories of the repealed Townshend Acts fading and trade once again picking up in Massachusetts, Hancock was looking to his businesses, stocking his warehouses, employing men to keep the House of Hancock humming. The politics of protest, Hutchinson believed, would be discarded by Hancock as he pursued his economic ambitions.

  In December 1771, Hutchinson reported to General Gage in New York, without revealing the source of his knowledge, that Hancock had vowed to “never again” ally himself with the likes of
Sam or John Adams.36 In early 1772, he wrote to the former governor, Francis Bernard, now in London, that Hancock had completely broken with the Sons of Liberty: “Hancock has not been with their club for two months past.… His [defection] will be a great loss to them, as they support themselves with his money.”37

  Hutchinson perceived Hancock to now be an easy conquest, an ambitious merchant tired of the antics of the colonial troublemakers. All that was needed to bring Hancock firmly to the side of the Crown and Parliament was an appointment (or two) to high office. Once Hancock was offered and then accepted his new roles, the deal would be sealed and Hancock would be theirs. Hutchinson predicted that without Hancock’s fortune and his magic touch with the citizens of Boston, Sam Adams and the Sons of Liberty would lose their footing in the colony. Then once again peace—as defined and imposed by Governor Hutchinson—would reign in Massachusetts.

  16

  Patriots Assemble

  If to appear for my country is treason,

  and to aim for her defiance is rebellion,

  like my fathers, I will glory in the name of rebel and traitor,

  as they did that of puritan and enthusiast.

  —JOSIAH QUINCY JR.

  On April 1, 1772, Hutchinson made the official announcement that John Hancock had been offered the commission of captain of the Cadet Corps (with the official rank of colonel) for the town of Boston, and that he had accepted the position. It was a position that would not only allow Hancock to achieve a military rank overnight, but it also played to his affinity for fine clothing and visual display. Within a week of receiving the commission, Hancock put an advertisement in the local paper offering employment to “Two fifers that understand playing. Those that are masters of music … are desired to apply to Col. John Hancock.”1 Although uniforms for the Cadets and their leader were supplied by the British authorities, Hancock took over their consignment. Hancock had always loved clothes and now he could satisfy his appetite for color and style while also flaunting his newfound role as commander. The uniforms he ordered were magnificent: tricorne hats trimmed in beaver fur and cocked just right, with a rosette to hold the fold; scarlet red jackets embellished with buff lapels and cuffs; and brilliant white gaiters that fastened over boots with black buttons.