Alexander Hamilton

**Alexander Hamilton** was a United States Secretary of the Treasury and a Governor of New York. Hamilton was also known as the founder and Chairman of the Federalist Party, and a General in the United States Army.

## Military Service

###### Early Military Career

In 1775, after the first engagement of American patriot troops with the British at Lexington and Concord, Hamilton and other King's College students joined a New York volunteer militia company called the Corsicans, whose name reflected the Corsican Republic that was suppressed six years earlier and young American patriots regarded as a model to be emulated.

Through his connections with influential New York patriots, including Alexander McDougall and John Jay, Hamilton raised the New York Provincial Company of Artillery of 60 men in 1776, and was elected captain. The company took part in the campaign of 1776 in and around New York City; as rearguard of the Continental Army's retreat up Manhattan, serving at the Battle of Harlem Heights shortly after, and at the Battle of White Plains a month later. At the Battle of Trenton, the company was stationed at the high point of Trenton at the intersection of present-day Warren and Broad streets to keep the Hessians pinned in their Trenton barracks.

Hamilton participated in the Battle of Princeton on January 3, 1777. After an initial setback, Washington rallied the Continental Army troops and led them in a successful charge against the British forces. After making a brief stand, the British fell back, some leaving Princeton, and others taking up refuge in Nassau Hall. Hamilton transported three cannons to the hall, and had them fire upon the building as others rushed the front door and broke it down. The British subsequently put a white flag outside one of the windows; 194 British soldiers walked out of the building and laid down their arms, ending the battle in an American victory.

While being stationed in Morristown, New Jersey from December 1779 to March 1780, Hamilton met Elizabeth Schuyler, a daughter of General Philip Schuyler and Catherine Van Rensselaer. They married on December 14, 1780, at the Schuyler Mansion in Albany, New York. They had eight children, Philip, Angelica, Alexander, James, John, William, Eliza, and another Philip.

### Washington's Staff

Hamilton was invited to become an aide to Continental Army general William Alexander, Lord Stirling, and another general, perhaps Nathanael Greene or Alexander McDougall. He declined these invitations, believing his best chance for improving his station in life was glory on the Revolutionary War's battlefields. Hamilton eventually received an invitation he felt he could not refuse: to serve as Washington's aide with the rank of lieutenant colonel. Washington believed that "Aides de camp are persons in whom entire confidence must be placed and it requires men of abilities to execute the duties with propriety and dispatch."

Hamilton served four years as Washington's chief staff aide. He handled letters to the Continental Congress, state governors, and the most powerful generals of the Continental Army. He drafted many of Washington's orders and letters under Washington's direction, and he eventually issued orders on Washington behalf over his own signature. Hamilton was involved in a wide variety of high-level duties, including intelligence, diplomacy, and negotiation with senior army officers as Washington's emissary.

### Field Command

While on Washington's staff, Hamilton long sought command and a return to active combat. As the war drew nearer to an end, he knew that opportunities for military glory were diminishing. On February 15, 1781, Hamilton was reprimanded by Washington after a minor misunderstanding. Although Washington quickly tried to mend their relationship, Hamilton insisted on leaving his staff. He officially left in March, and settled with his new wife Elizabeth Schuyler close to Washington's headquarters. He continued to repeatedly ask Washington and others for a field command. Washington continued to demur, citing the need to appoint men of higher rank. This continued until early July 1781, when Hamilton submitted a letter to Washington with his commission enclosed, "thus tacitly threatening to resign if he didn't get his desired command."

On July 31, Washington relented and assigned Hamilton as commander of a battalion of light infantry companies of the 1st and 2nd New York Regiments and two provisional companies from Connecticut. In the planning for the assault on Yorktown, Hamilton was given command of three battalions, which were to fight in conjunction with the allied French troops in taking Redoubts No. 9 and No. 10 of the British fortifications at Yorktown. Hamilton and his battalions took Redoubt No. 10 with bayonets in a nighttime action, as planned. The French also suffered heavy casualties and took Redoubt No. 9. These actions forced the British surrender of an entire army at Yorktown, marking the *de facto* end of the war, although small battles continued for two more years until the signing of the Treaty of Paris and the departure of the last British troops.

### Second American Civil War

Hamilton was not as involved in the Second American Civil War, being mostly oriented on the home life. In one excursion Hamilton would lead into Norfolk, being the leading General there until Theophile Lybaert arrived, taking over command of the Battle of Norfolk. Hamilton returned back north after this.

## Political Career

### Secretary of the Treasury

Hamilton received a commission as Secretary of the Treasury on March 21, 1790, becoming the 1st ever Secretary of the Treasury. During Hamilton's tenure as Secretary of the Treasury the economy would remain mostly stable, Hamilton would oversee the Customs Act of 1791, creating the Coast Guard. In mid 1793 Hamilton would get the Funding Act of 1791 passed, assuming state's debts. Hamilton would oversee the creation of the first taxes in the Taxes Act of 1793, and would leave the nation in a good spot when he resigned to serve as Governor of New York in early 1795.

Hamilton would be reappointed as the Secretary of the Treasury on July 30, 1800, the nation was in dire need of help, and Hamilton would be able to stabilize the banks while the nation plunged into the Second American Civil War.

### Governor of New York

While serving as Governor of New York, Hamilton would undergo one of the biggest sex scandals in United States history, the Reynolds Affair, the first one to be exact. The sex scandal involved multiple times of sleeping with one Maria Reynolds, and a one-night stand with Anna Banks, the widow of Jonathan Banks Sr.. The story first circulated in 1795 when Anna was pregnant with and later gave birth to John Banks, a child that was born out of wedlock. In 1797 under heaves of pressure, Hamilton finally wrote the Reynolds Pamphlet, exposing his engagement with Maria Reynolds. Much later in 1844 Alexander's son John Hamilton would discover through a letter the truth about the affair with Anna Banks and his father paying for the child. Hamilton would not be elected to another term.

## Personal Life

Alexander Hamilton was born on January 11, 1755 or 1757 depending on who you ask, Hamilton was the bastard son of James A. Hamilton and Rachel Faucette, but Hamilton and his Brother James Jr., later James A. Hamilton would abandon the family. The Hamilton's mother Rachel Faucette would contract yellow fever in 1768, passing quickly, they would be taken in by their cousin Peter Lytton for a little while before he took his own life, leaving the Hamilton's orphaned, and eventually separated.

Hamilton would work as mostly a trader up until 1772, when he bought passage to the Americas, moving to Boston then New York City, and began attending college at King's College in 1773. In 1780 Hamilton would marry Elizabeth Schuyler, and in 1782 would have their first son Philip, in total having 8 together, with Hamilton having one extra bastard son.

* Philip Hamilton (January 22, 1782 - November 24, 1801)
* Angelica Hamilton (Born: September 25, 1784)
* Alexander Hamilton Jr. (Born: May 16, 1786)
* James Hamilton (Born: April 14, 1788)
* John Hamilton (Born: August 22, 1792)
* John Banks (Born: May 5, 1795)
* William Hamilton (Born: August 4, 1797
* Eliza Hamilton (Born: November 20, 1799)
* Philip Hamilton II (Born: June 1, 1802)