Diary of Charles Francis Adams, volume 2
1827-08-25
Morning at the Exchange to see my father. Saw Richardson afterwards at my room with whom I had a pleasant conversation of an hour. Received a letter from my Mother, of admonition concerning a certain difficulty supposed to have arisen between Abby and I and closing with a paragraph concerning George of a melancholy description.1 This arrived just as I was starting to go to Medford with my Father. After we arrived Abby read the letter at my request as I thought it might be a slight hint to her, and she took it very well.
The persons who dined with us were Mr. Everett, Mr. Gorham, Chardon and Gorham Brooks and Mr. Stetson, the parson of the parish to which Mr. B. belongs.2 We remained here tonight according to Invitation.
Hearing that Abigail and Mrs. Frothingham felt that “there was much severity” in one of CFA’s letters, LCA thought it her duty to warn her future daughter-in-law “that the Adams’s had a manner of speaking and writing that appeared harsh tho in fact it meant nothing more than the common style of other people.” In their treatment of women, she added, “the Adams family are one and all peculiarly harsh and severe. . . . There seems to exist no sympathy, no tenderness for the weakness of the sex or for that incapacity of occasional exertion which is a part of their nature arising from the peculiarities of their constitutions.” LCA’s concluding paragraph, concerning GWA, has been cut off (LCA to CFA, 19 Aug. 1827, Adams Papers).
Caleb Stetson, the Congregational minister at Medford (
Mass. Register, 1828, p. 114).
1827-08-26
I attended Meeting, as it is called, both morning and afternoon. Mr. Burnap, a gentleman well remembered as in the class preceding ours at Cambridge, favoured us and made me sleepy. In the evening there was a round of Medford people to see my father, notwithstanding the violent rain, to all of whom I was introduced, and among others to two Miss Grays and one Miss Hall, cousins of Abby.1 The process was very fatiguing.
Charlotte and Henrietta Gray, daughters of the late Samuel Gray, of Salem, and Mary (Brooks) Gray, a sister of P. C. Brooks; and Mary Brooks Hall, daughter of Nathaniel Hall and Joanna Cotton (Brooks) Hall, another sister of P. C. Brooks (JQA, Diary, 26 Aug. 1827; Brooks, Medford
, p. 527).
1827-08-27
Morning very rainy, but did not deter my father from going to Boston, but we went in Mr. B.’s Carriage instead of the Chaise. I stopped at the Office and sat there all the morning. Finding there was no probability of fair weather, I purchased an Umbrella and sallied 156forth; notwithstanding the precaution, I was wet through. In the afternoon I went to see the Fosters, expecting to find my Father there, but he had gone to Quincy. At any rate a very troublesome visit was got over for the family are exceeding disagreeable. Evening quietly at home.