Читать книгу First Ladies For Dummies - Marcus A. Stadelmann, Marcus A. Stadelmann PhD - Страница 56

Abigail and John Adams had five children, with four surviving into adulthood. Her oldest son and future President John Quincy Adams was born in 1767. John Adams became active in politics, was an advocate for independence from England, and became a delegate to the Continental Congress after the Boston Tea Party in 1773 (see later in this section). He was gone for long periods of time, and during that time, Abigail managed their property and business affairs. Both she and her husband were raised in a culture of civic virtue where the public good takes precedence over self and thus were willing to sacrifice being together. However, the two stayed in touch by literally writing thousands of letters to each other during their lifetimes. Overall, 1,160 letters have survived to this day, and the most famous one is the one Abigail wrote to John while he was serving in the Second Continental Congress and was working on the Declaration of Independence.

More than 2,000 of Abigail’s letters to family and friends in which she discussed the major events of the Revolutionary War have been preserved. The revolution changed her from a naïve traditional woman to a worldly opinionated woman on par with her husband. Her letters also show that she was opposed to slavery and a very religious women, because in her letters she consistently references the Bible.

The British Parliament passed the Tea Act in 1773. This act allowed the British East India Company to take over the American tea business. Disgusted, the colonists responded with the Boston Tea Party, where people disguised as Indians boarded three British ships and dumped 342 crates of tea into the Boston harbor. Parliament responded with the so-called Intolerable Acts, closing Boston harbor and repealing many basic Colonial rights, including the right to local self-government.

Abigail became a revolutionary herself. She melted pewter spoons to make bullets for the minutemen, American patriots fighting the British military.