Knoxville, Tenn., and afterward in Natchez, where he settled in 1819. He was a member of the legislature in 1828, and was elected a U. S. senator from Mississippi to fill the vacancy that had been caused by the death of Thomas B. Reed, serving from 8 Feb. to 31 May, 1830.
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ADAMS, Samuel, b. in Boston, Mass., 27 Sept., 1722; d. there, 2 Oct., 1803. Among the grandsons of Henry Adams, the emigrant from Devonshire, were Joseph Adams, of Braintree, and John Adams, of Boston, a sea-captain. The former was grandfather of President John Adams; the latter was grandfather of Samuel Adams, the statesman. The second son of Capt. John Adams, b. 6 May, 1689, was named Samuel, and in 1713 married Mary Fifield. Of their twelve children, only two, besides the illustrious Samuel, survived their father. The elder Samuel Adams was a man of wealth and influence. He owned a large estate on Purchase street, with a noble mansion fronting on the harbor, and here the younger Samuel Adams was born. The father was always a leader. He was justice of the peace, deacon of the old South church, selectman, and member of the legislature, where he made himself prominent in the quarrels with Gov. Shute. About 1724, in company with some friends, mostly sea-captains, shipwrights, and persons otherwise connected with the shipping interest, which was then very powerful, he founded a political club designed “to lay plans for introducing certain persons into places of trust and power.” This institution was known as the “caulkers' club,” whence the term “caucus” is supposed to have been derived. It was evidently from his father that the younger Samuel inherited the political tastes and aptitudes which, displayed amid the grand events of the revolution, were to make him on the whole the most illustrious citizen that Massachusetts has ever produced. Young Adams was educated first at the Boston Latin school, then at Harvard college, where he was graduated in 1740. Very little is known of his college life, except that he was noted as a diligent student. He was fond of quoting Greek and Latin, after the pedantic fashion of the time. In 1743, being then twenty-one years of age and a candidate for the master's degree, he chose as the subject for his Latin thesis the question, “Whether it be lawful to resist the supreme magistrate if the commonwealth cannot otherwise be preserved”; and this question he answered in the affirmative. History has not told us how this bold doctrine affected Gov. Shirley and the other officers of the crown who sat there on commencement day and listened to it. It was the wish of the elder Samuel that his son should become a clergyman; but the son had no taste for theology and preferred the law. In those days, however, the law was hardly considered a respectable profession by old-fashioned New Englanders; and after a short time Samuel yielded to his mother's objections and entered the counting-house of Thomas Cushing, a prominent merchant, father of an eminent revolutionary leader. Shortly afterward his father gave him £1,000 with which to set up in business for himself. He lent half of this to a friend, who never returned it, and lost the other half in bad bargains. Then he became partner with his father in a brewery, but the business did not prosper. About this time the father lost the greater part of his fortune in a wildcat banking enterprise. In 1690, at the time of the disastrous expedition of Sir William Phips against Quebec, Massachusetts had issued paper money, with the inevitable results. Coin was driven from circulation, and there was a great inflation of prices, with frequent and disastrous fluctuations. This led to complaints from British merchants trading to Massachusetts, and the governor was ordered by the board of trade to veto any further issue. A quarrel ensued between the governor and the legislature, and, as the governor proved inexorable, two joint-stock banking companies were devised to meet the emergency. The one known as the “silver scheme,” and patronized chiefly by merchants, undertook to issue £110,000 in notes, to be redeemed in silver at the end of ten years; the other, which was known as the land-bank, or “manufactory scheme,” undertook to issue £150,000, redeemable in produce after twenty years. It was with the latter scheme that Mr. Adams's father was connected. There were 800 stockholders, and they not only controlled the Massachusetts legislature, but succeeded in compassing Gov. Belcher's removal. Their plans were nipped in the bud, however, by an act of parliament extending to the colonies an act of the reign of George I. forbidding the incorporation of joint-stock companies with more than six partners. The two Massachusetts companies were thus obliged to suspend operations and redeem their scrip; and, as the partners were held individually liable, they were quickly ruined. Thus the wealth of the elder Adams melted away in a moment. The friends of the bank denounced this act of parliament as a violation of the chartered rights of the colony; and the question as to the extent of the authority of parliament in America began to be agitated. So in a certain sense Samuel Adams may be said to have inherited his quarrel with the British government. After the death of his father in 1748 he carried on the brewery by himself, and obtained from his political enemies the nickname of “Sammy the maltster.” Presently, when he was made tax-collector for the town of Boston, these wits devised for him the epithet of “Sammy the publican.” His office made him personally acquainted with everybody in Boston, and his qualities soon won for him great influence. He had all the courage and indomitable perseverance of his cousin, John Adams, but without his bluntness of manner. As an adroit political manager he was not surpassed by Jefferson, whom he resembled in his thorough-going democracy. He had a genuine sympathy for men with leather aprons and hands browned by toil; he knew how to win their confidence, and never abused it, for he was in no sense a demagogue. In the town-meeting he soon became a power, yet it was not until his forty-second year that his great public career began. In May, 1764, he drafted the instructions given by the town of Boston to its newly-chosen representatives with reference to Grenville's proposed stamp-act. These instructions were the first public protest in America against the right of parliament to tax the colonies. Next year he was himself elected to the legislature, where he remained till 1774, officiating as clerk of the house, and draft-
