By Amanda M. Norton, Adams Papers

On August 15, 1824, the General Marquis de Lafayette, one of the great heroes of the American Revolution, returned to the United States for the first time in forty years, kicking off a nearly thirteen-month tour of the entire country. After Lafayette’s arrival in Massachusetts, John Adams greeted him via his grandsons on August 22, “There is not a man in America who more sincerely rejoices in your happiness and in the burst of joy which your presence has diffused through this whole continent than myself.” “I would wait upon you in person,” Adams lamented, “but the total decrepitude and imbecility of eighty nine years has rendered it impossible for me to ride even so far as Governor [William] Eustis’s to enjoy that happiness.” He instead requested that Lafayette spend a day with him in Quincy. Lafayette in turn noted his regret that he had not been able to go straight to Quincy “on [his] Arrival at this Beloved place . . . and Embrace You.”

John’s grandson Charles Francis Adams was present for the meeting of the old revolutionaries in Quincy on August 29 and recorded his impressions in his Diary:

The Marquis met my Grandfather with pleasure and I thought with some surprise, because really, I do not think he expected to see him quite so feeble as he is. It struck me that he was affected somewhat in that manner. Otherwise the meeting was a pleasant one. Grandfather exerted himself more than usual and, as to conversation, appeared exactly as he ever has. I think he is rather more striking now than ever, certainly more agreable, as his asperity of temper is worn away. . . . How many people in this country would have been delighted with my situation at this moment, to see three distinguished men dining at the same table, with the reflections all brought up concerning the old days of the revolution, in which they were conspicuous actors and for their exertions in which, the country is grateful! It is a subject which can excite much thought as it embraces the high feelings of human nature. . . . My grandfather appeared considerably affected and soon rose after dinner was over.

A few weeks after their reunion Lafayette thanked Adams for the visit: “I Have Been Very Happy to See You, and altho’ I Regretted The shortness of My Visit . . . I Have Cordially Enjoy’d, More indeed than I Can Express it, the pleasure to Embrace My old Respected friend and Revolutionary Companion.” A French brass and marble mantle clock that Lafayette gifted to his old friend in honor of this visit now sits in the office of the Editor in Chief of the Adams Papers Editorial Project at the Massachusetts Historical Society.

By Amanda A. Mathews, Adams Papers

“On Wednesday the third day of this Month, the American Ministers met the British Minister at his Lodgings at the Hôtel de York, and signed, sealed and delivered the Definitive Treaty of Peace between the United States of America and the King of Great Britain.” John Adams reported this news to the President of Congress on September 5, 1783 and congratulated Congress on the “Completion of the work of Peace.”

It was eight o’clock in the morning when John Adams along with Benjamin Franklin and John Jay, met the British peace negotiator, David Hartley, at his residence in Paris and months of negotiations, first the previous year leading to the preliminary peace treaty, and then in earnest from April until the end of August culminated in this definitive treaty.

While this was no doubt a significant moment—after all, eight long years of war were officially ending with complete American independence—the signing was more of an anticlimax for Adams. His immediate feelings, as he revealed to Abigail the following day, were that as the definitive treaty was no more than “a Simple Repetition of the provisional Treaty,” they had “negotiated here, these Six Months for nothing.” Nevertheless, Adams understood that given the political realities of their position relative to Great Britain, “We could do no better Situated as We were.”

The key provisions of the Treaty of Paris guaranteed both nations access to the Mississippi River, defined the boundaries of the United States, called for the British surrender of all posts within U.S. territory, required payment of all debts contracted before the war, and an end to all retaliatory measures against loyalists and their property. Throughout John Adams’s term as minister to Great Britain in the 1780s, he and the British foreign secretary, the Marquis of Carmarthen, regularly discussed the actions each side saw as breaches of and a failure to fulfill the treaty—a debate that went unresolved until the signing of the Jay Treaty in 1794.

When editors at the Adams Papers Editorial Project are asked to name our favorite document in the immense collection that is the Adams Family Papers, John Adams’s copy of the Treaty of Paris, is certainly a top choice. This duplicate original in the Adams Papers is the only original not in a government archive. One can easily imagine that the legal- and legacy-minded John Adams was keen to retain a copy of this founding document over which he had so long toiled so far from his home for his posterity. Of particular interest are the seals—as there was no official seal for the American commissioners to use, each used whatever was convenient to him. See here for a full discussion of the Boylston family coat of arms, which Adams used as his seal on both the preliminary and definitive treaty and for more on Adams’s thoughts at the conclusion see the newly launched digital edition of Papers of John Adams, volume 15.

Image: First and last pages of the Definitive Peace Treaty between the United States and Great Britain (Treaty of Paris), September 3, 1783, Adams Family Papers.