Dearest Friend: A life of Abigail Adams

Dearest Friend: A Life of Abigail Adams

Summary of the Book

Dearest Friend, written by Lynne Withey, entails the story of the most influential lady in the Revolutionary America. The book is a great piece of work from Lynne Withey; she has chronologically described the life of Abigail Adams with detail oriented approach starting from her childhood, early life, background information through all the chain of events in her life. The book astutely highlights the public as well as private sides on this fascinating woman. She was a wife of patriot John Adams; Withey describes her as maddeningly contradictory person who confronted conventional norms during her time (Withey, 50-350).

Abigail Adams was born on 11th November, 1744 in north of the Parish Congregational Church in Weymouth, Massachusetts. She was considered as one of the most extraordinary woman evident in the revolutionary period. Unlike foreordination, original sin, or the knowledge about the divine nature of Christ, she was accentuated upon the prominence of morality and rationality. She was a delicate and nervous woman; she often used to get sick often and her parents decided not to send it to study at prestigious schools of the time. Yet, she was taught by her mother and was not deprived of education (Withey, 50-350). The education at that time did not go beyond the writing or arithmetic for daughters, and in rare cases some were studying music. However, her life was devoted to study English literature, thus becoming a kind of writer with a concise, vigorous and elegant writings which was evident in her lyrics. Initial years of her life were not spent in isolation, but rather amongst people of erudition and political sagaciousness. Her mother trained her and her siblings to read, write, and cryptograph (Withey, 50-350). She also knew English and French because of a large library maintained by her uncle and father. As a woman, she was intellectual and open-minded; Abigail's thoughts on women's rights and the government played important roles that are discussed in the book.

On 25th October, 1764, she was married to John Adams; a young lawyer in Boston, characterized by having a quiet life during his ten years of married life. She shared strong interest of her husband in the ferocious disputes prevalent before capping in the war. She is reminisced today primarily by the letters she sent to her husband while serving in the Continental Congress in Philadelphia. John Adams frequently concerned his wife's opinion of varying subjects and their letters are full of debates about government and politics. These letters are invaluable witnesses at the time of the Revolutionary War and excellent sources of political commentary (Withey, 50-350). She brought five lives to the world in the course of ten years. Mrs. Adams stayed home in Braintree for ten years with doubt and anxiety while her husband was out of town, at first as a delegate to the Continental Congress and then on official diplomatic service in Europe. 1785 marked her role of the ...