The wife of one president and mother of another, Abigail Adams was an intelligent, independent woman. While her husband John Adams (1735-1826; see entry in volume 1) traveled on diplomatic assignments, she was left to fend for herself and her young children for several years. She corresponded with him frequently. The ideas and impressions she expressed have been published and add greatly to official sources from this era.

An early champion of equal rights for women, Abigail urged her husband to put his fair-minded practices into law. "I desire you would remember the ladies and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors. Do not put such power into the hands of the Husbands," Adams urged him in 1776 while he was away in Philadelphia, helping with the Declaration of Independence. "Remember," she added, "all Men would be tyrants if they could."

Parson's daughter

Abigail Smith...