Papers of John Adams, volume 20
th, 90
Your favor of the 31st of January I
received in its season. I have at two or three several times had conversation with
General Knox upon the subject of Mr Martin Brimmer Sohier;
and have the General’s promise to give particular attention to Mr Sohier’s merit and pretensions. As the Secretary at War appeared to be well
acquainted with the candidate, and to have the best disposition to serve him I doubt not
you will be satisfied with his decission.1 How is commerce and business in general at this time in Boston? Is it more or less
brisk than it was a year ago? Is any benign influence felt from the new government or
not? Are the Shipwrights employed? What is the price of bills?2 Here exchange is altered twenty per Cent as some
say and fifteen as others state it, in favour of the Country in twelve months.
LbC in CA’s hand (Adams Papers); internal address: “Thomas Crafts
Esqr Boston.”; APM Reel 115.
On 31 Jan. longtime family friend Col. Thomas Crafts Jr. wrote to
JA (Adams Papers),
soliciting a military post for Martin Brimmer Sohier (1760–1792), who had served in
the Continental Army. George Washington nominated Sohier as an ensign on 3 March 1791
(Richard M. Lytle, The Soldiers of America’s First Army,
1791, Lanham, Md., 2004, p. 236, 237).
Crafts replied to JA’s queries on 17 May 1790, below. According to the 1790 port
returns from Boston, a total of 1,655 ships entered, yielding $21,027 in tonnage
duties between 1 Oct. 1790 and 30 Sept. 1791, in addition to a net sum of $320,430
collected on goods and merchandise. The Columbia
Rediviva’s successful circumnavigation of the globe, completed in 1790,
reinforced Boston’s status in maritime trade, for which see vol. 19:xiii. Between 1 Oct. and 30
Sept. 1791, Massachusetts ports had collected $420,707 in duties, comprising
one-seventh of the nation’s entire collection revenue (Hamilton Andrews Hill, The Trade and Commerce of Boston, 1630 to 1890, Boston,
1895, p. 87–88, 90).