Thomas Boylston Adams

Thomas Boylston Adams (September 15, 1772 - March 12, 1832) was the third and youngest son of second United States president John Adams and Abigail (Smith) Adams. He worked as a lawyer, a secretary to his brother John Quincy Adams while the latter served as United States ambassador to the Netherlands and Prussia, the business manager of and a contributor to the political and literary journal Port Folio, and a Massachusetts chief justice. Early life Adams was born on September 15, 1772, to John and Abigail Adams, in Braintree, Massachusetts. His parents’ youngest surviving child, he joined three older siblings: Abigail (Nabby), John Quincy, and Charles. Thomas was named for his paternal great-great-grandfather, physician Thomas Boylston. Thomas’s early childhood, spent primarily on the family farm in Braintree, was marked by the uncertainty and upheaval of the American Revolution. John Adams’s frequent absence, while he participated in the Continental Congress, caused his youngest child great emotional distress. Abigail reported to her husband that Thomas often stood beside her while she wrote letters to John, asking his mother to “send duty” and expressing how he “longs to see Pappa.” At three years old, Thomas told his mother and siblings that he believed his father would not “come home till the Battle is over.” On one occasion, John sent letters to his three eldest children but, since the boy could not yet read, neglected to write Thomas. His mother revealed that the four-year-old “stood in silent grief with the Tears running down his face,” insisting that “Pappa does not Love him he says so well as he does Brothers.” In the summer of 1776, Abigail Adams decided that three-year-old Thomas, along with his siblings, should be inoculated for smallpox. At age four, he wanted to be a soldier, prompting his father to write him and suggest he, like his great-great-grandfather and namesake, become a physician instead.