On Saturday, March 2, 1776, Abigail Adams began a letter to husband, John, then serving in the Second Continental Congress in Philadelphia. It took her more than a week to finish it. “You see in what purtubation it has been written and how many times I have left of,” she said by way of apology at the end.

The source of her “purturbation”? The long-running siege of Boston had taken a surprising—and ultimately decisive—turn.

Henry Knox’s “Noble Train” of artillery, salvaged from Fort Ticonderoga and dragged across the winter landscape, offered a sudden game-changer. Initial artillery emplacements opened fire on the night of March 2, but the decisive blow came on March 4 when American forces took possession of Dorchester Heights on the south side of Boston and adorned the hilltop with cannon.

The Adams farm in nearby Quincy sat at the base of another prominence known as Penn’s Hill. From that vantage point, Abigail had watched the battle of Bunker’s Hill the previous June. She returned to that perch to watch the March cannonading.

Abigail was already in a feisty mood. “I heartily wish every Tory was Extirpated [from] America,” she wrote to John on March 2, before the cannonading began. “[T]hey are continually by secret means undermineing and injuring our cause.”

As she wrote, she was suddenly interrupted by the sounds of the opening barrage. “I have been kept in a continual state of anxiety and expectation ever since you left me . . .” she wrote. “but hark! the House this instant shakes with the roar of Cannon. I have been to the door and find tis a cannonade from our Army, orders I find are come for all the remaining Militia to repair to the Lines a monday night by twelve o clock. No Sleep for me to Night. . . .”

Rather than send her letter, she continued writing it, on and off, providing running updates and commentary. Below are excerpts:

Sunday, March 3, 1776 (evening):

I went to Bed after 12 but got no rest, the Cannon continued firing and my Heart Beat pace with them all night. We have had a pretty quiet day, but what to morrow will bring forth God only knows.

Monday, March 4, 1776 (evening):

I have just returnd from [Penn’s] Hill where I have been sitting to hear the amazing roar of cannon and from whence I could see every shell which was thrown. The sound I think is one of the Grandest in Nature and is of the true Speicies of the Sublime. Tis now an incessant Roar. But O the fatal Ideas which are connected with the sound. How many of our dear country men must fall?

Tuesday, March 5, 1776 (morning):

I went to bed about 12 and rose again a little after one. I could no more sleep than if I had been in the ingagement. The ratling of the windows, the jar of the house and the continual roar of 24 pounders, the Bursting of shells give us such Ideas, and realize a scene to us of which we could scarcly form any conception. About Six this morning, there was quiet; I rejoiced in a few hours calm. I hear we got possession of Dorchester Hill Last Night. 4 000 thousand men upon it to day—lost but one Man. The Ships are all drawn round the Town.To night we shall realize a more terible scene still. I sometimes think I cannot stand it—I wish myself with you, out of the hearing as I cannot assist them. I hope to give you joy of Boston, even if it is in ruins before I send this away. —I am too much agitated to write as I ought, and languid for want of rest.

Thursday Fast day, March 7, 1776:

All my anxiety, and distress, is at present at an End. I feel dissapointed. This day our Militia are all returning, without effecting any thing more than taking possession of Dorchester Hill. I hope it is wise and just, but from all the Muster and Stir, I hoped and expected more important and decisive Scenes; I would not have sufferd all I have for two such Hills. Ever since the taking of that, we have had a perfect calm nor can I learn yet what Effect it has had in Boston. I do not hear of one persons escapeing since.

As the military situation unfolded around Boston, Abigail also pondered the larger military and political scene. She was deeply enmeshed in her confidences and took time in her letter to comment on a political delegation recently appointed to go to Canada. She also commented on the reassignment of General Charles Lee from Boston to New York, sent there to prepare against an expected British movement.

“I am charmed with the Sentiments of Common Sense,” she added, “and wonder how an honest Heart, one who wishes the welfare of their country, and the happiness of posterity can hesitate one moment at adopting them; I want to know how those Sentiments are received in Congress?” At the time, John was still trying to gauge those sentiments for himself; the idea of independence stirred by Common Sense seemed slower to mature in Congress than among the general population.

Aside from Abigail’s observation of the bombardment, the other aspect of the letter that stands out—that makes it so perfectly “Abigail”—is that she quotes Shakespeare. She often quoted poetry and other works of literature in her letters to John, who understood and appreciated her references. In this instance, she cited a resonating passage from Act 4, Scene III of Julius Caesar:

“There is a tide in the affairs of Men
Which taken, at the flood leads on to fortune;
omitted, all the  voyage of their life
is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat;
And we must take the current when it serves,
or lose our ventures.”

“I had scarcly finished these lines when my Ears were again assaulted with the roar of Cannon,” she wrote the next day, March 10, referring to the poem. “I could not write any further. My Hand and heart will tremble, at this domestick fury, and firce civil Strife, which cumber all our parts. . . .”

I feel for the unhappy wretches who know not where to fly for safety. I feel still more for my Bleading Country men who are hazarding their lives and their Limbs. — A most Terible and incessant Cannonade from half after 8 till Six this morning. I hear we lost four men kill’d and some wounded in attempting to take the Hill nearest the Town call’d Nook Hill.

That evening, March 10, Abigail decided to finally wrap up the letter and send it. “I have not got all the perticuliars I wish I had but, as I have an opportunity of sending this I shall endeavour to be more perticuliar in my next . . .” she told her husband. “Adieu pray write me every opportunity.”

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Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, 2 – 10 March 1776 [electronic edition]. Adams Family Papers: An Electronic Archive. Massachusetts Historical Society. For the full letter, including scans of the handwritten text, visit the Massachusetts Historical Society’s website.

For more on John and Abigail’s experiences during the Revolution, check out Atlas of Independence: John Adams and the American Revolution (Savas Beatie, 2026)