Mad Old Man From Massachusetts  PrintPrintEmailEmailAfter his
defeat for re-election to the Presidency in 1828, John Quincy
Adams cloistered himself in his Quincy, Massachusetts, home and
wrote in anguish, “I have no plausible motive for wishing to
live when everything that I foresee and believe of futurity
makes death desirable, and when I have the clearest indications
that it is near at hand.” Bitterly, Adams resigned himself to
the political graveyard, complaining, “My whole life has been a
succession of disappointments. I can scarcely recollect a single
instance of success to anything that I ever undertook.”  Short,
paunchy, and almost completely bald, Adams was old before his
time. Infirmities overwhelmed him. His hand shook almost
uncontrollably when he wrote. He complained about his “smarting,
bloodshot eyes,” so weak and inflamed that rheumy tears often
trickled from the corners. His voice, always shrill, tended to
crack. He slept little and badly, and his diary was filled with
continual laments of “d