Dearest Friend: A Life of Abigail Adams
by Lynne Withey

List Price: $16.00
Our Price: $5.34
You Save: $10.66 (67%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.01 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions

Book Summary Information

Book Reviews of Dearest Friend: A Life of Abigail Adams

Book Review: Remember the Lady
Summary: 5 Stars

As a staunch revolutionary, she foresaw the need for independence from England perhaps even before her husband, John. She advocated education and political freedom for women long before it was respectable to do so.

As practical homemaker, she worked the farm, raised the children, and handled the family finances including investments. Abigail liked investing in securities; John preferred land. They made investments in both. Her dependability in these matters secured the home front. This allowed her husband to attend the Continental Congress, sign the Declaration of Independence, serve as minister to France and then England, as well as serve as the first vice president, and then 2nd President of the fledgling USA. Without her shepherding the family finances, either the family would have been ruined; or the United States would have lost one of its great founding fathers.

As a post-revolution political conservative, she hated the republicanism of Jefferson, although she respected him as an honorable man. She foresaw the problems with the French Revolution before Jefferson and his Republican cohorts. She did not understand the criticism of the free press. She strongly advocated the Alien and Sedition Act, passed by congress during her husbands presidency. It addressed the two of what she thought were the serious threats to the security of the USA that of foreigners and criticism of the government by the press.

The paradox of Abigail Adams is that she had always established her identity through her husbands achievements. The author tells us that Probably Abigail would have been astonished to find herself transformed into something of a celebrity one hundred fifty years after her death. Yet surely she would have approved of the reasons for her fame: the interest of a later age in the history of family and domestic life, as well as the history of politics, and above all its interest in the emancipation of women and the discovery of women in the past who spoke out on behalf of their sex.

The beauty of this book is that Lynne Withey presents Abigail Adams as a real human being, not an icon. It is easy to understand why Abigail was Johns Dearest Friend.

I highly recommend this book.

Summary of Dearest Friend: A Life of Abigail Adams

John and Abigail Adams married for love. While John traveled in America and abroad to help forge a new nation, Abigail remained at home, raising four children, managing their estate, and writing letters to her beloved husband. Chronicling their remarkable fifty-four-year marriage, her blossoming feminism, her battles with loneliness, and her friendships with Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, Dearest Friend paints a portrait of Abigail Adams as an intelligent, resourceful, and outspoken woman.

Political Books

• Books > Subjects > Biographies & Memoirs > Leaders & Notable People
• People, A-Z > ( A ) > Adams, John
• Specific Groups > Women
• Social Sciences