Browsing: Adams Family Correspondence, Volume 3

The “Plan de la Baye et Port de la Corogne” is reproduced from plate No. 53 in the fourth volume (l'Europe) of J. N. Bellin's La petit atlas maritime, 5 vols., Paris, 1764.

La Coruña, one of the two harbors, the other being El Ferrol, between Cape Finisterre and Cape Ortegal at the extreme northwest tip of the Spanish peninsula, was the provincial capital of Galicia. There, John Adams on his second mission to Europe, accompanied by his sons John Quincy and Charles and by John Thaxter Jr. and Francis Dana, arrived by boat and muleback on 15 December 1779 for replanning after the leaking frigate, La Sensible, bound for France, had had to put into the nearer El Ferrol (Thaxter to Abigail Adams, 15 December; John Adams to same, 16 December 1779, below). In La Coruña from the 15th to the 26th they were outfitted for the long trip ahead and secured the means of travel across northern Spain. Their stay is described by John Adams in considerable detail in the Diary and Autobiography , 2:409–415 and 4:202–213, including visits to a number of points of interest in the town and vicinity that are identifiable on the Bellin chart. These include the fortifications, the “magasins à poudre,” and the ancient “tour de fer.”

La Coruña was again to be an unexpected haven for an Adams in September 1781, when the frigate South Carolina, Commodore Gillon, bearing Charles Adams on his return voyage home in the charge of Major William Jackson, had to put into the harbor for {p. R12} want of water and supplies. At La Coruña, Major Jackson and his charge, along with John Trumbull and James Searle, unable to endure longer the capricious behavior and doubtful seamanship of Gillon, found another ship to take them to Bilbao and ultimately to America. The misadventures and near escapes from the departure from the Texel to the arrival five months later at Beverly are recounted in volume 4 in the letters to John Adams from William Jackson, 26 September, 26 October and note 2 there; from Benjamin Waterhouse, 30 September 1781; and from Isaac Smith Sr., 23 January 1782 and note 1.