Abigail “Nabby” Adams Smith
| Abigail "Nabby" Adams Smith | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Born |
July 14, 1765 Quincy, Province of Massachusetts Bay, British America |
| Died | August 9, 1813 (aged 48) Quincy, Massachusetts, U.S. |
| Cause of death | Metastatic breast cancer |
| Resting place | Hancock Cemetery in Quincy, Massachusetts |
| Spouse(s) | William Stephens Smith (m. 1786; her death 1813) |
| Children | William Steuben Smith John Adams Smith Thomas Hollis Smith Caroline Amelia Smith DeWint |
| Parent(s) |
John Adams Abigail Adams |
| Family | Adams, Quincy |
Abigail "Nabby" Amelia Adams Smith (July 14, 1765 – August 15, 1813) was the firstborn of Abigail and John Adams, founding father and second President of the United States. She was named for her mother.
At the age of 18, Nabby met and fell in love with Royall Tyler. Her father thought she was too young to have a suitor, but he eventually accepted it. At one point the two were even engaged to be married. But John Adams, then the U.S. minister to the Kingdom of Great Britain, eagerly called for his wife and daughter to join him in London. For a time, Nabby maintained a long distance relationship with Tyler, but eventually broke off the engagement, leaving Tyler depressed.
Shortly afterward Nabby met Colonel William Stephens Smith, who was serving as her father's secretary and was 10 years her senior. They were married at the American minister's residence in London on June 12, 1786. Nabby's observations of European life and customs, and of many of the distinguished statesmen of the day, were later published.
Their children were:
In 1810, Nabby was diagnosed with breast cancer. On October 8, 1811, a mastectomy was performed by John Warren. The operation was performed by Warren and several assistants without any anesthesia in an upstairs room of the Adams home. Her mother, husband, and daughter, Caroline, were also on hand to assist.
The exact details of the surgery are not known but it was described as a typical 19th century operation. The instruments used during the surgery consisted of a large fork with a pair of six-inch prongs sharpened to a needle point, a wooden-handled razor, a small oven filled with heated coals, and a thick iron spatula. Before the surgery began Dr. Warren strapped "Nabby" into a chair to restrain her, and then began to remove the clothing to expose the area on which he would operate. Once the diseased breast was exposed, other physicians held her left arm back, so that Dr. Warren would have better access to the diseased tissue. He began the surgery by thrusting the large fork into her breast and lifting it from the chest wall. He then sliced at the base of the breast until it was completely severed from her chest. After removing the breast, he saw that the cancer had spread to the lymph nodes under Abigail's arms, and he worked to remove those tumors as well. To stop Abigail's bleeding, Dr. Warren applied the heated spatula to cauterize the open cuts, and then sutured the wounds. The surgery took around 25 minutes, but dressing the wounds took more than an hour. Warren and his assistants later expressed astonishment that Abigail endured the pain of the surgery and cauterization without crying out, despite the gruesomeness of the operation, which was so horrifying it caused her mother, husband, and daughter to turn away.
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