Adams Family Correspondence, volume 13
th:September 1798
Your favour of the 14th: inst. came to
hand last night a little time after my letter to you had gone to the post; its contents
however may serve to regulate you as to engaging my passage, but I will add further,
that as the season is so far advanced it would be imprudent to defer my passage for the
sake of having accommodations quite to my liking—if therefore a clever Captain &
good vessel should soon offer, I will thank you to engage a birth for me, whether armed
or unarmed.1 I see in the Hamburg “intelligence Comptoir” a number of American & Danish
vessels advertized to be ready by the middle of this
month—probably some of these may sail about the 1st: proxo:—2
In reply to your enquiry respecting arms, I can only say that our
War Department may have already given orders to our Minister in
London for the purchase of a supply, as I know such a measure was contemplated,
but whether they have actually been given I am unable to say— If you wrote to Mr: King the same intelligence as you 241 have given me upon this subject, it might be useful, specifying the size—calibre
&ca: &ca: of the Arms
and the price at which they may be contracted for; deliverable at Hamburg or in the U.S.
The Prussian fusee’s cost complete at the manufactory upon
an average Rx 7. a piece; this is about half the sum
allotted by the law of Congress— the expence & risque of transportation might amount
to 3 Rx more which would afford a considerable profit as a
speculation even from hence. But if the Govt: has already
given orders for the purchase of any quantity, you will probably be informed of it from
the source, though it would be well to advertize Mr: K— of your prospects.3
I wear a black cockade myself, with my uniform, but otherwise not; though I approve the idea of wearing one at home,
and agree with you that it is rather apish to wear it
abroad, unless as an officer— It can do no harm however unless it should produce a
spirit of persecution towards such as do not assume it. I
think a Consul should officially wear the cockade
prescribed to the Naval Officers, & if his emoluments
would permit—the uniform. You see my opinion would lead you at once into expence. You will do best
to follow your own.4
The Autumnal reviews are just commencing— I wish you could spare a
few days to come & see them—5 You
could come on with Mr: Welsh & return / with your humble
Servt
RC (OCHP:Joseph Pitcairn Letters); addressed: “A Monsieur / Monsieur J. Pitcairn
/ Consul Americain / à Hambourg”; internal address: “Mr:
Pitcairn.”; endorsed: “T B Adams 17 Sep 1798 / Ansd 22d.”
Pitcairn’s letter has not been found. TBA’s 16 Sept.
letter repeated his request that Pitcairn arrange passage to the United States and
introduced Thomas Welsh Jr. (“Letters of Thomas Boylston Adams,” Quarterly Publication of the Historical and Philosophical
Society of Ohio, 12:21–22 [Jan.–March 1917]).
The Hamburgische Address Comtoir
Nachrichten, 13 Sept., listed several ships preparing for departures to ports
in the United States, including the ship Juno, Capt.
Hermann Hinrich Wolters, for Philadelphia; the barque Maria
Elizabeth, Capt. J. D. Bradman, and the brig Three
Friends, Capt. John Haleron, for New York; and the schooner Isabella, Capt. Jacob Jones, for Boston.
On 4 May Congress approved the expenditure of $800,000 for the
purchase of arms and on 6 July appropriated an additional $400,000 to buy weapons to
be sold to state militias. Secretary of the Treasury Oliver Wolcott Jr. wrote Rufus
King in July seeking foreign sources for arms purchases. King approached the British
and was refused, though he was promised that regular shipments to the United States
would begin immediately if tensions with France resulted in war; he then wrote to
Pitcairn and asked him to purchase German muskets in Hamburg. Pitcairn did so and
shipped 500 from Hamburg on 13 December. Despite complaints that the guns were of
inferior quality, the shipments continued because, as King informed John Jay on 7
Dec., “we can obtain Arms from no other part of Europe.” By 9 July 1800 Pitcairn had
overseen the purchase and shipment of 7,000 muskets and 63,500 gun flints on behalf of
the U.S. government (
U.S. Statutes at Large
, 1:555–556, 576–577; King,
Life and (Corr., 2:391, 416, 441–442 457–458, 474–475;
Samuel Hodgdon to Ebenezer Stevens, 29 Jan. 1799, DLC:Samuel Hodgdon Letterbook, 1798–1799; Stevens to
Hodgdon, 30 Sept., DNA:RG
217, 4th Auditor Misc. Rec’d; 242 Pitcairn to
Wolcott Jr., 9 July 1800, DNA:RG 94, Post Revolutionary War Papers).
For TBA’s uniform, see vol. 12:395–396, 397,
TBA attended Prussian military reviews on the
outskirts of Berlin on 17 and 18 Sept, 1798. On the first day he saw exercises that
were “clever enough,” but those of the next day he found by “far the prettiest of
any,” JQA and LCA joined him on the second day, with
JQA reporting that a mock battle outside the Oranienburg Gate was “a
very good one” (TBA, Journal, 1798
, p. 31;
D/JQA/24, 18 Sept., APM Reel 27).