November 11] — October 28, was the wife and closest advisor of John Adams , the second president of the United States , and the mother of John Quincy Adams , the sixth president of the United States. She was a founder of the United States , and was both the first second lady and second first lady of the United States , although such titles were not used at the time. She and Barbara Bush are the only two women in American history who were both married to a U. Adams's life is one of the most documented of the first ladies; many of the letters she wrote to her husband John Adams while he was in Philadelphia as a delegate in the Continental Congress prior and during the American Revolution document the closeness and versatility of their relationship.
John Adams frequently sought the advice of Abigail on many matters, and their letters are filled with intellectual discussions on government and politics. Her letters also serve as eyewitness accounts of the American Revolutionary War home front. Surveys of historians conducted periodically by the Siena College Research Institute since have consistently found Adams to rank as one of the three most highly regarded first ladies by historians.
Through her mother she was a cousin of Dorothy Quincy , who was married to John Hancock. Adams was also the great-granddaughter of John Norton, founding pastor of Old Ship Church in Hingham, Massachusetts , the only remaining 17th-century Puritan meetinghouse in Massachusetts.
Smith married Elizabeth Quincy in , and together they had three daughters and a son; Abigail was the second child. Smith did not focus his preaching on predestination or original sin ; instead he emphasized the importance of reason and morality.
In , at age 77, Smith died. The Smith family were slaveholders and are known to have owned at least four people. A slave named Phoebe took a caretaking role to Abigail and other children; later on she would work as a paid servant for Abigail after she became free. Abigail would come to express anti-slavery beliefs as an adult. Abigail did not receive formal schooling; she was frequently sick as a child, something which may have been a factor preventing her from receiving an education.
