An American ‘farmeress’

Abigail Adams is one of two women in U.S. history to be both wife to a president and mother of a president. In her 2,100-plus letters that remain, she is also revealed to be a businesswoman, a political adviser, and a farm manager, including the family’s dairy enterprises.

“I hope in time to have the Reputation of being as good a Farmeress as my partner has of being a good Statesmen,” writes Abigail Adams to her husband, John, in a letter dated April 11, 1776.

Abigail was in charge of the family farm and land, much of which was outside Boston, Massachusetts, at Braintree. Abigail served as a farm and household manager while John was away, including his decade-long residency in Europe. Even when she joined him away from the farm, she continued to manage the farm via letter. Abigail was also assisted in her endeavors by her uncle, Cotton Tufts, who served as her agent of sorts.

“I must intreat you, my dear Partner in all the joys and Sorrows, Prosperity and Adversity of my Life, to take a Part with me in the Struggle,” John writes to Abigail in a letter dated July 1, 1774. “I pray God for your Health — intreat you to rouse your whole Attention to the Family, the stock, the Farm, the Dairy. Let every Article of Expence which can possibly be spared be retrench’d. Keep the Hands attentive to their Business, and [let] the most prudent Measures of every kind be adopted and pursued with Alacrity and Spirit.”

John’s estimation of Abigail’s management can be seen in another letter to her dated May 27, 1776.

“I begin to be jealous, that our Neighbours will think Affairs more discreetly conducted in my Absence than at any other Time,” John writes.

Abigail was born Nov. 11, 1744, to a Congregational pastor and his wife. Abigail was predominantly educated at home, although a tutor, Richard Cranch, who later married her older sister, also assisted in her education.

“(She was) a very hard-working person, a very loving person, caring person, but also in many respects, a very demanding person that people live up to her stance,” said historian and director for the Center for the Study of the American Constitution, John Kaminski. “(She was a) very loyal person. … She had a voracious appetite to read and learn, and she did that regularly. … She was compassionate, and so she was quite concerned about people.”

John and Abigail married in 1764. As a lawyer, John was often away from home. From 1774-1777, he was part of the Continental Congress and was one of the authors and a signer of the Declaration of Independence.

The farm enterprises Abigail was managing included horses, dairy cows and sheep. Because they were only a few miles from the ocean, they could buy fish. They were raising crops, had a garden for home use, and had an orchard including apples for cider — which Kaminski said was a favorite drink for the couple.

“She’d … hire farm hands who would … do the actual farm duties,” Kaminski said. “She was paying the taxes. … She was investing money, whether that be in other land or whether that be in government bonds and paper. … She didn’t particularly like to acquire too much land, because that presented further problems. Once they got the land, they had to pay taxes on the land, and they had to farm the land, so she’d have to hire somebody.”

As manager, Abigail was not involved in the daily, physical work.

“She’s not the quintessential farm woman who’s out planting the crops and harvesting the crops,” Kaminski said. “(She is not) doing all that kind of work in milking the cows and the sheep and that kind of thing, making the butter and the milk, etc. … Abigail, never lived a day of her life without slaves or servants.”

Kaminski said Abigail’s father owned slaves, but freed them in his will. John and Abigail never owned slaves themselves.

Some of the letters between her and John reveal the practical issues she faced, such as those in a letter from John dated July 30, 1777.

“I am sorry to find by your late Letter what indeed I expected to hear, that my Farm wants manure,” John writes. “I fear by your Expressions that your Crop of Hay falls short. … The true Maxim of profitable Husbandry is to contrive every Means for the Maintenance of Stock. — Increase your Cattle and inrich your Farm. — We bestow too much manure upon Corn — too little upon Grass. Make Manure, make food for Cattle, increase your stock.”

When John went abroad to Europe from 1778-1788, serving ambassador positions in France, the Netherlands and Great Britain, Abigail also became a merchant, selling items John shipped to her —such as pins, needles, ribbons and fabric.

Money was not as important at that time because it readily depreciated Kaminski said. He also said this merchant endeavor of Abigail’s life was atypical for women of her time.

Living apart from her husband for years at a time seems to have left Abigail lonely. Her letter to John dated Dec. 27, 1783, shares her desire for John to return.

“If my dear Friend you will promise to come home, take the Farm into your own hands and improve it, let me turn dairy woman,” Abigail writes. “And assist you in getting our living this way; instead of running away to foreign courts and leaving me half my Life to mourn in widowhood.”

Abigail and their daughter, Nabby, joined John in Europe in 1784, living there until their return to the U.S. in 1788. John was then elected vice president, serving from 1789 to 1797 before serving as president until 1801.

While her husband was holding one of the highest positions in the U.S., Abigail continued to manage the farm. In a letter dated Feb. 8, 1794, Abigail writes to John about potential dairy employees.

“I have seen the Son, and daughters of the Richards Family, and told them my Terms,” Abigail writes. “They are an able Family and have been used to a dairy upon a large scale. If we keep a dairy only upon Thayers place, It will be best to place the Family there, who are the most accustomed to a large dairy and will not think much of the work.”

A month later, in March 1794, she wrote to John about needing six dozen milk pans, six cream pots, eight milk pails, two cheese tubs and other dairy-related items.

Abigail also helped her husband in politics.

“She becomes the most trusted adviser to her husband,” Kaminski said. “John Adams is an important figure in American history, and much of that importance that he achieved was assisted by Abigail Adams.”

Two of the policies Abigail encouraged John to do included the signing of the Alien and Sedition Acts in 1798 and the appointment of what are called “midnight judges” and other judicial officers under the Judiciary Act of 1801.

“Everybody agrees that the most detrimental aspect of John Adams’s career was when he signed the Alien and Sedition laws,” Kaminski said. “I think he was not so much in favor of them himself, but Abigail was. … It’s partly because she felt protective of John and the slander that was expressed toward him, but also when … her son, John Quincy Adams, was slandered as well.”

In 1801, after John lost his next bid at the presidency to Thomas Jefferson, the Adamses went back to Braintree and lived at their Peace field home the rest of their lives. Abigail died of typhoid in 1818 a few years before her son, John Quincy Adams, became president in 1825.

Sources:

— Interview with John Kaminski, director for the Center for the Study of the American Constitution.

—archive.firstladies.org/curriculum/educational-biography.aspx?biography=2

— www.encyclopedia.com/women/encyclopedias-almanacs-transcripts-and-maps/adams-abigail-1744-1818

— www.masshist.org/digitaladams/archive/

— founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/