Papers of John Adams, volume 20

TRANSLATION

From Richard Peters

To John Adams from Eliphalet Pearson, 15 June 1789 Pearson, Eliphalet Adams, John
From Eliphalet Pearson
Sir, Cambridge 15 June 1789.

President Willard having resigned the office of corresponding secretary to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences, your goodness will pardon his successor, in diverting your attention, for a moment, from more important objects, while I request a favor, with which the honor of the society may be connected.1

At our last meeting, & upon the recommendation of Mr. Gardoqui, through General Knox, the Duke de Almodavar, & the Marquis de Santa Cruz, two Spanish noblemen, were elected fellows.2 Not knowing the place of their Lordships’ residence, & being totally unacquainted with the forms of addressing Spanish nobility, I have taken the liberty of troubling your Excellency with the certificates of their election, accompanied with official letters undirected. Permit me, therefore, to request the favor of your adding, or of your asking the Spanish minister to add, the proper superscriptions; directing each of the letters to the nobleman, named in the certificate inclosed under the same cover. The certificates, & letters thus directed, Mr. Gardoqui, I trust, will be so obliging, as to address under cover, & forward to the respective noblemen.

Be pleased, sir, to accept my thanks for Mr. Croft’s letter to Mr. Pitt, which you were so good, as to send me some time since;3 and, praying that your health, happiness, and extensive usefulness, may be long continued, indulge me the honor of subscribing myself, with sentiments of profound respect & sincerest esteem, / Sir, / Your Excellency’s / much obliged & very humble servant

E. Pearson.

RC (Adams Papers).

1.

Joseph Willard acted as corresponding secretary of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences from 1780 to 1789. He was succeeded by Pearson, who held the post until 1802 (Mark G. Spencer, ed., The Bloomsbury Encyclopedia of the American Enlightenment, 2 vols., London, 2015, 2:1103; Sibley’s Harvard Graduates , 18:292).

2.

The academy elected Spanish chargé d’affaires Don Diego de Gardoqui; Pedro de Luxan y Silva, the Marquis de Almodóvar, former Spanish minister to Great Britain; and José Joaquin de Bazán Silva y Sarmiento, Marqués de Santa Cruz (1734–1802), director of the Spanish Royal Academy since 1776. The 62 founding members of the academy were all Americans, but between 1785 and 1804, they selected 48 Europeans to join the ranks 27 (vols. 6:232, 17:19; Elogio del Excelentísimo Señor Marques de Santa Cruz, Madrid, 1802, p. 4; Memoirs of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, 1:v, xx–xxii [1783]; 2:165–166 [1804]).

3.

Sir Herbert Croft, An Unfinished Letter to the Right Honourable William Pitt Concerning the New Dictionary of English, London, 1788.