Friendships wax and wane , but that of John and Abigail Adams with James and Mercy Otis Warren suffered a peculiarly virulent rupture surveil by a beautiful rapprochement . While some may be familiar with theAdamses ’ fall out with Thomas Jefferson in the 1790s(as they ended up on diametric slope of a widening and horrifying partizan divide ) , they also drifted apart from their Massachusetts friends , the Warrens , at the same time . When the Adamses eventually reconciled with Mercy Otis Warren in 1812 , they record the occasion with two pieces of jewelry that embodied their friendship .
Mercy Otis Warren , whom John Adams oncecalled“the most accomplished Lady in America ” after his wife , was a fiery and levelheaded writer whose brother and husband participated in the American Revolution . While the Adamses and Warrens were close friends in the 1770s and 1780s , their friendship waned as their political political theory differ in the 1790s . The full break came after the publication of Warren ’s three - volumeHistory of the Rise , Progress and Termination of the American Revolutionin 1805 ( Warren was one of the first published woman in America ) . The Federalist John Adams strenuously objected to his Republican ally ’s depiction of him and wrote her 10 letter in immediate succession assail her work . When his missive reached what the wounded Warren call “ the culmination of rancour , indecency , and grossness ” in 1807 , she end the friendship . It appear that she and Abigail Adams also check being friends .
Five year afterward , Abigail Adams and several menage member visited the now - widow Mrs. Warren . What bring on this visit is unclear , although a mutual supporter had been examine to bring them back together . The cleaning lady patch up their friendly relationship and Warren founder Abigail a lock of hair as a souvenir . Some months by and by , Abigail ship Warren a special endowment : a gold ring with brown whisker overlap woven gray locks surrounded by 19 drop and cypher with the initial “ JAA . ” This was , Abigail wrote , “ a souvenir of sexual love and friendly relationship . ” Abigail hoped Warren did n’t take care , but John had requested that Abigail add his tomentum to her own . While today the amber initials have shifted and moved the brown hairsbreadth ( Abigail ’s ) mostly out of view , John ’s gray hair woven around silk cord creates a delicate ivory centerpiece for the ring of pearls ( above ) .
Warren received this planetary house of reconciliation from John with joy . Wearing the ring with the hair of Abigail and “ the revered and loyal head of the President of the United States ” would be a visible monitor to Warren — and those around her — of a friendly relationship that endured despite “ fond interruption . ” Just as the hair was entwined inside the doughnut , the Adamses were “ friends who have been entwined to my substance by years of endearment . ”
Mercy Otis Warren Brooch , American , 1812 . Gold , pearls , crystal , gold foil , hair . Collection of the Massachusetts Historical Society
Abigail , too , had a sign of friendly relationship entwined to her heart : She made a matching handkerchief flag with Mercy Otis Warren ’s hair behind the initial MW and wreathed by 35 pearls . It ’s worth noting that neither patch of jewellery would have elicited the disgust Americans today feel toward hair . In fact , hair was a common endowment among friends and phratry . It was regularly set in jewelry , particularly after a loved one ’s death in a mourning ring or brooch . haircloth does not decay or fade , so it is a way of giving an enduring piece of oneself . In create these two jewelry pieces , Abigail Adams made a permanent remembrance to a rocky but remarkable friendly relationship .
