Adams Family Correspondence, volume 6

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Chronology

The Adams Family, 1782–1785

1782	Oct. 8	After lengthy negotiations, JA signs the first Treaty of Amity and Commerce between the Netherlands and the United States, at The Hague.
1782	Oct. 17	JA leaves The Hague for Amsterdam and then Paris, where he arrives on 26 October.
1782	Oct. 30–Nov. 30	JA participates in negotiating and, with his fellow commissioners, signs at Paris, on 30 Nov., the Preliminary Treaty of Peace between the United States and Great Britain.
1782	Oct. 30	JQA leaves St. Petersburg for The Hague by way of the northern route, through Finland and across the Åland Islands to Sweden.
1782	Nov. 8	JA tells AA to put CA and TBA in a school and come to Europe with AA2 if she can get assurances that Congress will keep him in Europe another year.
1782	Nov. 22	JQA arrives in Stockholm.
1782	Dec.	JA writes to Congress, asking to resign his position. He informs AA of his decision, telling her to stay in America. Royall Tyler is a serious suitor of AA2; AA informs JA.
1782	Dec. 31	JQA leaves Stockholm to travel across Sweden to Göteborg.
1783	Jan.	AA2 visits the family of James and Mercy Otis Warren at Milton, and later in the month, the family of Samuel Allyne Otis in Boston.
1783	Jan. 25	JQA arrives at Göteborg.
1783	Feb. 11	JQA leaves Göteborg for Copenhagen, where he arrives on the 15th.
1783	Feb. 23	The Shelburne ministry falls in Great Britain; shortly to be replaced by the Fox-North ministry.
1783	March 5	JQA leaves Copenhagen for Hamburg, where he arrives on the 10th.
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1783	April	AA sends CA and TBA to live in Haverhill with their aunt, Elizabeth Smith Shaw, where they prepare for college with their uncle, Rev. John Shaw. CA remains in Haverhill until he enters Harvard in 1785. TBA lives there until he matriculates in 1786.
1783	April 5	JQA leaves Hamburg and travels through Bremen to Holland.
1783	April 21	JQA arrives at The Hague, where he continues his study of Latin and Greek with C. W. F. Dumas until JA's arrival in July.
1783	April 27	JA, Benjamin Franklin, and John Jay begin conferring with David Hartley on the definitive treaty with Great Britain.
1783	May	AA buys land in Braintree for JA from the heirs of Micajah Adams.
1783	June	CA ill with measles. AA and AA2 go to Haverhill to visit, and to bring CA home to Braintree to recover. He returns to Haverhill in August.
1783	July 17	AA and AA2 attend Harvard commencement.
1783	July 19	JA leaves Paris for The Hague, where he arrives on 22 July and is reunited with JQA after two years' separation. They travel to Amsterdam on 26 July, returning to The Hague on 30 July. JQA begins serving as his father's secretary and continues in this role until his departure for America in May 1785.
1783	July—Aug.	John Thaxter and Charles Storer travel to London. Thaxter returns to Paris on 25 Aug., but Storer remains in England, and then moves to northeastern France.
1783	Aug. 6	JA and JQA leave The Hague for Paris, arriving on 9 August.
1783	Sept. 3	JA, Benjamin Franklin, and John Jay sign the Definitive Treaty of Peace with Great Britain in Paris. On 7 Sept. they learn that Congress has resolved to appoint them to a joint commission to negotiate a commercial treaty with Great Britain. JA immediately asks AA, with AA2, to join him in Europe.
1783	Sept. 14	John Thaxter, JA's private secretary since Nov. 1779, leaves Paris for America. Carrying the definitive treaty to Congress, he sails from France on 26 September. Landing at New York, he reaches Philadelphia with the treaty on 22 Nov., and Braintree on 14 December.
1783	Sept. 17	Death of AA's father, Rev. William Smith of Weymouth, Mass.
1783	Sept. 22	JA and JQA move to Thomas Barclay's house in Auteuil, near Paris, where JA recovers from a serious illness; they remain 527there until 20 October. This is the house that the Adamses will occupy in Aug. 1784.
1783	Oct. 20	JA and JQA travel to England, where they visit London, Oxford and Bath, remaining until 2 January.
1783	Oct.–Nov.	AA visits Haverhill to nurse TBA, who suffers from “a severe fit of the Rheumatism”; she returns on 10 November.
1783	Dec.	AA buys land in Braintree for JA from William Adams. AA meets Francis Dana in Boston upon his arrival from St. Petersburg, over four years after his departure from Boston for Europe with JA.
1783	Dec. 19	William Pitt the younger forms his ministry in Great Britain.
1783	Dec.–Jan.	AA2 visits relatives and friends in Boston for over a month.
1784	Jan. 2	JA and JQA leave England and travel across the North Sea to the Netherlands, where JA seeks and secures a second Dutch loan to save America's credit. JA and JQA remain at The Hague, with brief visits to Amsterdam bankers for JA, and JQA's long trip to London, until July-August.
1784	March	AA2 visits the Warrens in Milton.
1784	April	AA delays arranging her departure for Europe, hoping to hear again from JA, and from Elbridge Gerry, who keeps her informed about Congress' decisions concerning America's diplomatic missions.
1784	April—June	CA and TBA visit AA and AA2 in Braintree, before the latter depart for England.
1784	May 7	John Jay elected secretary for foreign affairs by Congress. Thomas Jefferson elected by Congress to join JA and Benjamin Franklin to negotiate treaties of amity and commerce with over twenty European and African powers.
1784	May 14	JQA leaves The Hague for England, reaching London on 18 May. There his purpose of meeting AA and AA2 is frustrated by their decision to delay leaving Boston. He stays in London until about 26 June and makes several visits to Parliament and to the Court of Chancery.
1784	June 1	John Jay sails from England for America.
1784	June 18	Thomas Jefferson arrives in Boston, too late to arrange a passage on the ship taking AA to England. He sails on 5 July, reaching England on 26 July, and Paris on 6 August.
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1784	June 20	AA and AA2 sail from Boston for England on the Active, landing at Deal, England on 20 July. They proceed to London, arriving on 21 July, and remain until 8 August.
1784	July 26	JA, upon hearing from AA, and learning that Jefferson has been named a commissioner and is headed for Paris, decides to join Jefferson and Franklin there. He still plans, however, to have AA and AA2 come to The Hague first, and sends JQA to London. JQA arrives on 30 July and joins AA and AA2 after a separation of nearly five years.
1784	Aug.	JA, having heard that Jefferson has already arrived in France, changes his plan and on 7 Aug. arrives unexpectedly in London, where he is reunited with AA after nearly five years apart. The Adamses travel from London to Paris, arriving on 13 Aug.; on the 17th they move to Auteuil, where they live until May 1785. JA, with his colleagues Franklin and Jefferson, immediately begins corresponding with several European powers to arrange commercial treaties with America.
1784	Dec. 21	John Jay accepts Congress' appointment as secretary for foreign affairs; he is the first secretary to be in sympathy with JA's views on foreign policy.
1785	Feb. 24	Congress names JA to be the first U.S. minister to Great Britain.
1785	March 10	Congress names Thomas Jefferson U.S. minister to France, in place of the retiring Benjamin Franklin.
1785	May 12	JQA leaves Paris for America to attend Harvard College. On 21 May he sails from Lorient on the Courier de l'Amérique.
1785	May 20	JA, AA, and AA2 leave Auteuil for England, arriving in London on 26 May. They reside in London until 1788.
1785	June 1	JA has his first audience with King George III; he is presented to Queen Charlotte at Court on 9 June.
1785	June 23	AA and AA2 are presented to King George and Queen Charlotte at a Court Day at St. James's Palace.
1785	July 2	JA, AA, and AA2 move into the first American legation in London, a rented house on Grosvenor Square.
1785	July 12	Benjamin Franklin leaves Passy, where he had lived for over eight years, to return to America. He sails from England on 28 July.
1785	July 17	JQA arrives in New York City, where he stays with Richard 529Henry Lee, president of Congress, and visits extensively with congressmen and with leaders of New York society.
1785	mid-July	CA is admitted to Harvard College; he begins his studies in mid-August.
1785	Aug. 4	Col. William Stephens Smith, the secretary of the American legation in London, asks JA for leave to attend Frederick the Great's review of the Prussian army at Potsdam. He departs for Prussia on 9 Aug., and extends his stay in Europe into December, visiting Vienna and Paris.
1785	Aug. 5	JA signs the first Treaty of Amity and Commerce between Prussia and the United States. (Franklin and Jefferson sign in France in July; the Prussian envoy Baron von Thulemeyer signs at The Hague in September.)
1785	Aug. 13	JQA leaves New York for Boston, taking the overland route through central Connecticut and Massachusetts.
1785	mid-Aug.	AA2 breaks off her engagement with Royall Tyler; AA writes to Mary Cranch to explain this decision.
1785	Aug. 25	JQA arrives in Boston, after an absence of nearly six years. He visits Cambridge on 26 Aug., where he is reunited with his brother, CA, and his cousin, William Cranch, both students at Harvard. On 27 Aug. he visits his Adams and Cranch relatives in Braintree.
1785	Aug. 31	Harvard's President Joseph Willard advises JQA to seek further preparation to enter the college as a “junior sophister” in the spring.
1785	Sept. 7	JQA, with his aunt, Mary Cranch, visits Haverhill for a week to arrange for his intensive study of Latin and Greek under the guidance of his uncle, Rev. John Shaw. There he is reunited with his brother TBA. On their return from Haverhill, JQA and Mary Cranch visit his aunt Catharine Salmon Smith.
1785	Sept. 19	Charles Storer sails for America.
1785	Sept. 30	After further visits to Boston and Braintree, JQA returns to Haverhill.
1785	Oct.	JQA pays a short visit to the Daltons in Newbury with his cousin, Elizabeth Cranch, who lives with the John Whites of Haverhill for the entire fall. On 25 Oct., CA and William and Lucy Cranch arrive for a one-week visit.
1785	Dec. 5	William Stephens Smith returns to London with Col. David Humphreys.