LOUISA CATHERINE JOHNSON ADAMS: THE PRICE OF AMBITION

This biography rescues from obscurity one of the least known members of the Adams family, Louisa Catherine Johnson Adams (1775-1852). Married in 1797 to John Quincy Adams, her three long memoirs, letters, and other writings are virtually unknown. Yet from her life we can learn much: about the lives of women whose personalities were at variance with dictates of the culture; about the dynamics of the Adams family; about the distaff side of the United States diplomatic corps; and about the strains placed upon politicians' families. This work examines the first half of Louisa's life from 1775 to 1817. Raised in London in an Anglo-American mercantile family, she served with her husband at three courts: Prussia, Russia, and Great Britain. Four of her eight years in America from 1801 to 1809, she was the wife of a United States Senator. By 1817 she was probably the most travelled and sophisticated woman in America, and John Quincy's appointment as Secretary of State put within reach his, and her, ultimate goal--the Presidency. Louisa's psychological life was bounded by ambition, denial, and guilt. She denied a strong ambition because her times prohibited assertive women. Wracked by guilt because she thought the world assumed she and her parents had lured John Quincy into marriage with an impoverished girl, she denied what was essentially her own accusation. She disclaimed her delight in social events in conformity to her husband's stern republicanism. Angry because his career forced her to choose between her husband and children, she felt guilty at either choice. Louisa could never pay with grace the exactions her goal demanded. Forced by the culture to deflect her strivings on to her husband, Louisa could not face herself honestly. So insecure was Louisa that she wrote one memoir to let the world know that she existed. Since many women of her era also failed to find outlets for strong, yet prohibited, feelings, historians may find important clues to women's tensions in nineteenth-century America. Unheeded in her own lifetime, overlooked by modern historians, Louisa is here given the attention she deserves.