^Lot 2 John Adams

ALS, one page, 7.75 x 9.75, August 16, 1792. As vice president, Adams writes Mr. Hammond. In full: “I have this moment received your kind letter of the 18th and congratulate you on your arrival in New England. If you will do me the honour to take a Family Dinner with me on Sunday at two o’clock you will very much oblige your old Friend and faithful humble Servant.” In very good condition with intersecting folds, mild toning, trimmed edge, a well done replacement to small area of paper loss to top left corner, and a small chip to right edge.

As Adams wrote this letter in 1792, relations between the United States and the United Kingdom were still on shaky ground. Thomas Jefferson and his Democratic partners preferred their French allegiance, although Adams and his Federalist colleagues supported relations with the British. British leaders, for their part, were less than enthusiastic at the time to embrace the government of their one-time colony, slowly evacuating frontier forts and critical of US navigation laws that were harmful to trade.

In fact, it was eight years before an envoy was actually named. That man would be George Hammond, the recipient of this letter, a British diplomat, and the UK’s first British envoy to the United States, serving in that post from 1791 to 1795. His relationship with Adams, however, preceded the current official capacity, as Hammond and his “old friend” likely first met after Congress appointed Adams ambassador to Britain's Court of St. James in 1785. His arrival in the United States in 1791 and a subsequent reception in November of that year formally established relations between the two countries after years of strife. Interestingly enough, Hammond had been quoted as saying during this time that if he had accepted all of the invitations he received for tea or dinner, he would not have time to work. One might assume that he made an exception for his friend, the vice president.