Hamilton, the ten dollar Founding Father musical released in May 2015, is among the most successful musicals in history. With the all-time best selling cast recording and a total gross of $463 million by January 2019, not to mention 11 Tony awards and a thoroughly lovable collection of alternative “Hamildrops,” the musical continues to remain in the popular imagination. But one question that needs to be asked is – Just how true to its history is Hamilton?
Alexander Hamilton, by John Trumbull (1806)
Nobody listens to a musical for a history lesson. While a new play by novelist Ishmael Reed asks rather pointed questions about the musical’s accuracy, it can be stated that Lin-Manuel Miranda, the creator of Hamilton, went to great lengths to bring a certain amount of historical heft to his work. Miranda hired Ron Chernow, author of the Hamilton biography which inspired the musical, as an adviser. Chernow’s role was to point out and correct historical errors and explain character motivations in a historically correct manner. While Miranda did not always accept Chernow’s advice, his work helped provide a basic historical backbone for the musical.
Some of the historical errors Chernow pointed out were retained, often for reasons of clarity and time. Others may be more egregious. Nancy Isenberg echoes the thoughts of other historians by claiming that Hamilton’s characters follow well-known literary tropes. “(Aaron) Burr’s behavior is traced back to the loss of his parents, which supposedly led to him to lose his moral compass,” she writes, and also explains that Hamilton himself is written in a traditional heroic fashion, mostly flawless except for hubris. Marvin McAllister points out the lack of certain narratives that would have been incredibly important in Hamilton’s day, namely slavery. Even though slavery was alluded to in many places, such as the line “Sally, be a doll, won’t you open it?” (referring to Sally Hemings, a slave owned by Thomas Jefferson) and lines sung by John Laurens and Eliza Hamilton, the connection between the founding fathers and slavery could have been more explicit.
Yet in other places, Hamilton remains true to its primary sources. In fact, some of the songs in the musical directly quote documents written by Hamilton or others. The infamous and lengthy Observations on Certain Documents Contained in No. V & VI of “The History of the United States for the Year 1796,” In Which the Charge of Speculation Against Alexander Hamilton, Late Secretary of the Treasury, is Fully Refuted, better known as the Reynolds Pamphlet, is quoted word for word. Other documents, like George Washington’s farewell address, uses both the actual text and imagined meetings to create an image of the relationship between Washington and Hamilton. Letters between Hamilton and his wife Eliza Schuyler Hamilton inspired “That Would be Enough”. Sprinkled throughout the musical are other documents, some of which are only used as inspiration, like “Farmer Refuted” and “The World Turned Upside Down”.
Interested in learning more about Alexander Hamilton or any of the other characters in the musical? Curious about the Revolutionary War and the beginnings of the United States? Want to know more about musical theater and primary documents? Ask us! iueref@iue.edu, and may you always be satisfied.