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Abigail Adams Facts & Worksheets

Abigail Adams was President John Adams' wife and John Quincy Adams' mother.

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Abigail Adams was President John Adams’ wife and John Quincy Adams’ mother. She proved to be a lot more than a first lady figurehead, as she had great influence with President Adams.

See the fact file below for more information on the Abigail Adams or alternatively, you can download our 21-page Abigail Adams worksheet pack to utilise within the classroom or home environment.

Key Facts & Information

EARLY LIFE

  • Abigail Smith was born in Weymouth, Massachusetts, on November 11, 1744. A minister’s daughter, she had been a devoted reader, studying the works of William Shakespeare and John Milton, among others.
  • Abigail Smith and John Adams were third cousins and knew each other as children. The two met at a 1762 social event, where John saw, from different eyes, a petite, timid 17-year-old, and he was immediately smitten.
  • The couple married three years later and soon welcomed their first child, a daughter named Abigail, in 1765. With the addition of John Quincy in 1767, Susanna in 1768, Charles in 1770, and Thomas Boylston in 1772, their family continued to expand.
  • Sadly, Susanna died as a toddler, and the family later suffered another tragedy when Abigail delivered a stillborn daughter in 1777.

REMEMBER THE LADIES

  • Abigail herself advocated equality with passion, and she argued widely that it should be extended to both men and women.
  • During the Second Continental Congress, as John Adams and his fellow delegates discussed the issue of officially proclaiming independence from Great Britain, Abigail wrote to her husband from their home in Braintree, Massachusetts, on March 31, 1776: “And, by the way, in the New Code of Laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make, I desire you would Remember the Ladies, and be more generous and favourable to them than your ancestors… Remember all Men would be tyrants if they could. If particular attention is not paid to the Ladies we are determined to foment a Rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any Laws in which we have no Voice, or Representation.”
  • Though her husband replied to her appeal quite jokingly — expressing fear of the “Despotism of the Petticoat”, Abigail later fought back, making it clear that she was serious about the consequences that liberty from the British had for women’s status in a potential independent republic.
  • She strongly supported women’s education, writing to John in 1778 that “you don’t need to be told how much female education is being ignored, nor how trendy it was to mock female learning.”

FIRST LADY

  • John Adams served as the United States ambassador to France and then to England in the years following the Revolutionary War. Abigail initially remained at home, keeping her husband well informed in her letters about domestic relations.
  • In 1784, she joined him in Europe, and they stayed abroad for another five years, returning home in 1789 so that John could take on the vice presidency under George Washington. Abigail divided her time between the U.S. capital (New York and then Philadelphia) and Braintree during the next decade, where she was managing the family farm.
  • Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson stepped down in Washington’s cabinet in 1793 in the midst of severe fissures between the Federalists and anti-Federalists (known as Jeffersonians).
  • When Washington announced its intention to retreat in 1796, John Adams emerged on the Federalist side as the leading candidate, with Jefferson as his main opponent.
  • Like her husband, Abigail had considered Jefferson a good friend and had regularly written letters to him, but their correspondence stopped once he and John Adams began competing against each other for the nation’s highest positions.
  • Abigail, as first lady, maintained and expressed strong opinions on the country’s political issues and debates, including the Federalist vs. anti-Federalist struggle. At the time of her struggles, she wrote about keeping herself in control:
    “I have been so used to freedom of sentiment that I know not how to place so many guards about me, as will be indispensable, to look at every word before I utter it, and to impose a silence upon myself, when I long to talk.”
  • Abigail spent much of her time at home in Massachusetts, but in 1800, she moved with him to Washington, D.C., the new presidential mansion, becoming the first lady to live in the White House.
  • XYZ Affair was a diplomatic incident between France and America in the late 18th century that led to an undeclared war at sea. During the XYZ Affair, Abigail had been famously disagreeing with her husband, as she felt war against France should be declared.
  • Abigail and John Adams collaborated on the 1798 Alien & Sedition Acts. Abigail saw the Sedition Act as a means to ban false anti-government writings while providing justice to those who wrote lies about their spouse.

RETIREMENT

  • During the hotly fought presidential election of 1800, Abigail was criticized by the Jeffersonian press as too blunt and imperious. One critic, Albert Gallatin, wrote memorably, “She’s Mrs. President, not from the United States, but from a faction. It’s not right.”
  • Abigail wrote to her son that she had “few regrets” about retiring from public life after Adams lost to Jefferson. “I’ll be happier at Quincy (Massachusetts) at my age, even with my bodily infirmities.”
  • Their son Charles, who had been dealing with drug addiction, died a few days before the election, hitting the Adams’ family harder than the John’s defeat in the presidential election.

LEGACY

  • Abigail maintained a brisk correspondence in retirement, including a renewed relationship with Jefferson (with whom John Adams would exchange letters until both died on the same day: July 4, 1826, the 50th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence).
  • Abigail and John saw the political career of their son, John Quincy, flourish, including a London diplomatic post and his appointment as Secretary of State under James Madison in 1817. Unlike John, Abigail did not live to see John Quincy Adams elected as the sixth president of the nation in 1826. She died from typhoid fever at home in Quincy in October 1818. She was 73 years old.
  • Abigail Adams refused to allow her correspondence to be published during her lifetime, judging a woman’s letters as a private matter.
  • However, in 1848, her grandson, Charles Francis Adams (the youngest son of John Quincy), arranged for her first volume of letters to be published, preserving forever her unique experience and perspective on American life and democracy.

Abigail Adams Worksheets

This is a fantastic bundle which includes everything you need to know about the Abigail Adams across 21 in-depth pages. These are ready-to-use Abigail Adams worksheets that are perfect for teaching students about Abigail Adams who was President John Adams’ wife and John Quincy Adams’ mother. She proved to be a lot more than a first lady figurehead, as she had great influence with President Adams.

Complete List Of Included Worksheets

  • Abigail Adams Facts
  • A. A. Page
  • History Timeline
  • Advocacy
  • Truth and Lies
  • Quote to Remember
  • Dictionary Corner
  • Praise & Criticism
  • First Ladies
  • Anti-Pro Federalist
  • Given Words

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Use With Any Curriculum

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