By: Arfa Ul-Haque

The historical document I chose to examine is “Observations on Certain Documents Contained in No. V & VI of “The History of the United States for the Year 1796,” In which the Charge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” or more commonly known as “The Reynolds Pamphlet”. It was written by Alexander Hamilton in 1797 and it was publicly published as a pamphlet. The title of the document demonstrates Hamilton’s flair for excessive writing. The “Reynolds Pamphlet” embodies his tendency to write more than is needed and illustrates the fact that while his writing propelled his success, it also brought about his downfall.

The Reynolds Pamphlet is important because it represents the catalyst that radically changed Hamilton’s career. It tarnished his reputation and changed many of his relationships.

It also represents the idea that history is told by those with the power to tell it. As a woman, Maria Reynolds could not tell her side of the story. Since Hamilton was the only one with power, he may have changed the narrative to get the support of people.

Before I had picked a document, I researched a few of the other options, but what drew me to the Reynolds Pamphlet is the fact that so much of the story is untold and the story changes completely based on which perspective you look at. Hamilton: An American Musical presents the affair as the fault of both parties almost equally. While it does present Maria Reynolds as the one who initiated the relationship, it also shows Alexander Hamilton as much at fault. It was interesting to learn that most historians view the affair as a setup to extort money from Hamilton through blackmail, while in the musical it is portrayed as an affair driven by lust rather than money.

The research this document entails includes historical backgrounds on Hamilton and Mr. and Mrs. Reynolds. It also includes the letters sent between all three parties in order to understand the full picture. I started my research by obtaining as many books as I could on Hamilton and seeing if there were mentions of “The Reynolds Pamphlet” in them. One of the challenges I faced was that most of the information on Hamilton focuses on the success of his political career rather than his domestic affairs, and the books that I found that do focus on his domestic affairs have all been fiction. Since most of the books only skimmed over the affair, they all provided about the same information. I will try to find resources that focused completely on the pamphlet as they would provide more insight.

Another challenge that I faced is that all the historians in the books I’ve read have chosen a stance on the affair rather than presenting the facts, which makes it difficult to distinguish between what is true and what isn’t. By learning as much as I can on the document, I hope to overcome these challenges.

By: Kristen English

Blog Post #2

For my Historical Annotation Project, I choose Washington’s Farewell Address to annotate and analyze. George Washington wrote this letter, with the help of James Madison and Alexander Hamilton, to “friends and fellow-citizens” as a farewell to his reign as President before retiring to Mount Vernon. His address was originally published in the American Daily Advertiser, September 19, 1796. His address was published under the name “The Address of General Washington To The People of The United States on his declining of the Presidency of the United States” (whew! What a title). As popularity of the address continued growing it was reprinted in several newspapers and was even made into pamphlet form.

I think what drew me to this document was the historical significance that the document once held. The document, in it’s time, was celebrated as one of the greatest written works of all time. It was reprinted more than even the Declaration of Independence, and yet in modern history it is barely studied with emphasis being placed on understanding the meaning of the documents of the revolution. I remember briefly talking about the Farewell Address in my high school history class but we never really dove in to the document to interpret meaning and understanding to the tone and language Washington uses. I feel like it is important to bring light to the meaning of this document as Washington tried to directly set a path for the nation to follow after his presidency while also warning against several factors that could tear the new and fragile nation apart.

To fully understand this document, I feel like extensive research must be done on the language and meaning of different words used then vs. how they’re used now, the time period in general, and Washington’s view points on society and how he believed the government should be run to ensure the nation’s survival. A few of the challenges I have encountered while trying to research the document is that a great deal of sources don’t go too in depth with each and every word of the address, rather they take the address as a whole and analyze meaning from the summary of the document. With the annotation project I feel like it is important to be able to gather meaning from almost every sentence in the document and really break down what Washington was trying to convey with every word. I’m confident though that with harder and more extensive research than what I’ve done to date I will be able to properly understand and annotate the Farewell Address!

 

(side note: please enjoy this gif I found of Washington riding into battle on a puppy :) )

By: Ahad Khatri

I decided to research the Articles of Capitulation by George Washington, published in Yorktown, Virginia during October 1781. The surrendering of General Charles Cornwallis during the Siege of Yorktown by the combined forces of George Washington and Comte de Rochambeau preceded this treaty and was one of the key factors that led to the end of the American Revolutionary War.

 

The articles were pivotal because they boosted the American morale, and undermined political support for Great Britain. The articles are interesting because I wish to know how leaders such as George Washington empowered their people during this war and showed their willingness to fight.

One of the effects of this capitulation was the signing of the Declaration of Independence, a document which has outlived Americans today; I wish to delve into the minds of the strong-minded people who made the success of the Articles of Capitulation, the Revolutionary War, and the Declaration, a reality.

As I was skimming the article, I immediately noticed that a lot of confusing terminology, such as “accoutrements”, “redoubts”, “Anspach”, was present! Trying to understand the definition and usage of these words has been challenging. For example, a question I have asked myself is whether the word “Anspach” is a surname or a city, and how it fits into the phrase “A field-officer from each nation, to wit, British, Anspach, and Hessian” in the Articles of Capitulation.

Furthermore, research regarding these articles has led me to find other information regarding articles of Dutch and Canadian origin. To overcome the challenges of making sure I do not confuse any of the time periods present in my research, and my sources, I should be very consistent and organized moving forward. I should create a Word Document with one source, and its description underneath, for example, to make it easy for myself to process every bit of information thrown at me.

 

 

Being detail-oriented will increase the areas where I can research and connect my sources. The Articles of Capitulation are so rich with text and detail that the British, Americans, and French  must have adhered to very comprehensive guidelines. Thus, a skill I need to work on is being as specific as possible with my annotations and my sources. I feel a good place to begin my analysis will be moving from more generalized information through sources like Wikipedia, where I can acquire an overview of the descriptions of each article, to analyzing specific information through, for example,  Washington’s diary entries during the premise of the signed treaty, a primary source.

Finally, I should also be as open-minded as I can with my sources, because there is no telling what kinds of information I will find. The pursuit to and effectively annotate my document continues!

above: Photo of the letters Alexander Hamilton wrote to Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton

Photo source: https://www.gilderlehrman.org/content/hamilton%E2%80%99s-love-letter-day-december-14

Blog Entry 2

By: Ye Jun Kim

For my historical document, I chose the letters Alexander Hamilton wrote to Elizabeth Hamilton in 1781. These letters were published on the National Archives webpage.

Personally, I am not a huge fan of learning history. With that being said, I read the documents and tried to pick one that I found most interesting, which at first was very hard because all of them are basically talking about history of the American Revolution. However, I came across the letters Alexander Hamilton wrote to Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton, and thought that I could work with this. These letters not only has historical facts, but they also have words of affirmation and longing towards Elizabeth Hamilton. I thought that this would be a nice addition to analyze along with the historical evidences.

I found it very interesting that Hamilton reveals his ardent and energetic personality even through the letters. However, the audience and reason would be completely different from when he is expressing his support for the American Revolution. Something I found that was different from what I have observed about him through the musical was his poetic and delicate side. In the middle of the letters, Hamilton seems to speak to Elizabeth, or “Betsy”, as if handling a very fragile puppy.

WIth this interesting point, I thought that it would be interesting to analyze literary devices used and connect that to the time period along with the historical facts regarding the Revolution. One challenge that I found from here is that it is really hard to find primary or secondary documents that explain the way people wrote the way they did. To overcome this obstacle, I might just find other documents around similar time periods and compare them to the letters that I chose.

To understand the documents, I think that understanding the timeline and the people involved are very important. In order to do so, I have found a timeline laid out according to the month and the year of the Revolution from the start to the finish. And while reading those timelines and the letter side by side, I would look up the people involved in the corresponding time periods and look to see if they have any primary or secondary documents associated with them.

As I go on in the research I personally think that I have chosen a rather difficult document to analyze, but I believe that this allowed me to look beyond just the Revolutionary war and just analyze the time period as a whole.

By: Keval Bollavaram

For my Historical Annotation Project, I chose George Washington’s Farewell Address. George Washington originally wrote his farewell along with James Madison at the end of his first term. However, after serving a second term he revised his message due to disputes between Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton. Moreover, this document was first published in the American Daily Advertiser.

I remember learning about the historical importance of George Washington’s Farewell Address in my high school history class. This document represents the hopes of George Washington for the country after experiencing the disagreements between members of his own cabinet. I chose this document because it shows how many of Washington’s fears have come to fruition. Specially, Washington warns against powerful and established political parties that would divide the young nation and lead to either division or invasion.

Researching George Washington has become intertwined with researching the Revolutionary War and conflicts between the Founding Fathers. For example, Washington references mistakes he made during the war and hopes that the people of the United States will forgive him. Here he is referencing his failures as commander and chief as well as he defeats during the Revolutionary war such as his tactical loss and retreat from New York.

In order to connect his ideas through my annotations, some of my beginning research work focuses on the broader history of the time period. Unfortunately, it has been difficult to isolate necessary information from miscellaneous facts. This has caused some of annotations to be long winded and less focused on the text. To overcome these issues, I hope to look over my existing annotations and summarize them. Moving forward, I will focus on specific facts/events that are directly related to George Washington and Alexander Hamilton.

One cool thing that I stumbled upon while conducting my research was this video from Senator Tim Kaine where he explains the importance of George Washington’s Farewell Address and describes how it is recited each year.

By: Karl Risley

I chose to historically annotate a letter Hamilton wrote to Burr on June 20th, 1804. It is the first letter written by Hamilton to Burr concerning the issue that led to their duel, a response to Burr’s initial letter sent on June 18th, 1804. The letter is the second letter found on this page (https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Hamilton%E2%80%93Burr_duel_correspondences). It was delivered to Burr through Hamilton’s second, Pendleton. I was drawn to the document because when I first looked at it I didn’t understand the contents at all. It was so confusing that I moved on to find another source. After nothing caught my eye, I returned to this letter out of curiosity. I started  getting background on the characters involved. Thirty minutes later I realized I began understanding the letter, and ultimately that I was doing exactly what this project entailed, researching to unveil meaning. I was attracted to this letter for its research potential, and also because the subject concerns Hamilton’s and Burr’s duel, an extremely important moment, one the musical builds too throughout its songs.

This letter requires multiple “types” of research to be done properly. The historical context of different words shed light on the tone and intent of the diction chosen by Hamilton. For example I found that the meaning of the word gentlemen was not simply a polite term like it is used today, it held more prestige. The common format, salutations, and greetings of the time period also reveal the tone of Hamilton’s words. Is he writing to a close friend, an enemy, colleague? All of this can be revealed by how he adheres to the standard format of letters of his time. Basic research of characters is also necessary for understanding. Researching more background on Burr and Hamilton, and gaining information on others involved all lead to a more coherent analysis. Understanding Hamilton more allows me to understand his words better, through knowing his writing style, word choices, and background. Simple definitions of uncommon words is also helpful. I approached this research first by identifying different aspects of the letter I deemed worthy of research, such as learning the 19th century meaning of “gentlemen”. I also used the sources listed at the bottom of the wikipedia pages that surfaced through my searches to find more reputable sources.

I have found that the more research I do, the more research and information it leads too. It is similar to an iceberg, revealing more and more ice as you get deeper.

A very helpful book I have found that might benefit a lot of people, as it focuses on Hamilton, is found here: https://books.google.com/books?id=A1U4AQAAMAAJ&pg=PA231&lpg=PA231&dq=The+World%27s+History+and+Its+Makers:+American+statesman&source=bl&ots=_QwXwZiy01&sig=Z_w0n13MKwTjoBAX12zjbfzHlO0&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiH2vXri7vbAhUJXa0KHWbHCMYQ6AEIODAD#v=onepage&q=The%20World’s%20History%20and%20Its%20Makers%3A%20American%20statesman&f=false.

I have gotten lost in research several times because it is very easy to go off on tangents. If I had a recommendation for the class it would be to identify specific goals of each search you perform for your research. Stick to these goals. Unless you think a tangent is actually relevant you may be wasting your time.

 

By: Carol Rojas Ramirez

Hey there! If you haven’t checked out my Transcription entry, you totally should. It’s on the Reynolds Pamphlet, which is the historical document that I will be using for my annotation project. This Pamphlet was written by our very own Alexander Hamilton when his lover’s husband (James Reynolds) threatened his political career by falsely accusing him of embezzling funds (I know… it’s kind of crazy).

Of course, since Hamilton had beef with literally everyone, the Pamphlet caught many peoples’ attention and it had a lasting impact on his career.  

I was really interested by the document primarily because of the amount of drama that has surrounded it for years. Now that I’ve started doing research on the background, I have found so many more conspiracy theories and stories that explain this bizarre time in Hamilton’s life. More importantly, I have found that a lot of the stuff surrounding the Pamphlet isn’t just cheap gossip but a window into the political and socioeconomic climate of the time. It has been interesting and rather entertaining learning about the blackmail plot and questioning Maria’s involvement in the whole scheme but when you really start reading the document, you start to wonder who James Reynolds was and if he considered Hamilton as an enemy (politically, not just because he was sleeping with his wife). This got me deeper into the political factions of the time as well as Hamilton’s time as the Treasury Secretary. Unfortunately, it has been rather difficult to find primary sources that provide some insight into these topics. There are certainly many articles out there that give you a run-down on the affair and what they think really happened between the three people but there are not documents in which Hamilton describes his time as the Treasury Secretary. Yes, there are many finance and economics journals that describe Hamilton’s ideas and how they have shaped the nation, but they don’t provide specific detail as to how this affected his personal life. Getting any insight into James Reynolds was even worse. This is the stuff that I found on Google Scholar:  

 

Moving forward, I am going to try to do some more reading of Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton as he provides good summaries of the occurrences in during this time in Hamilton’s life. I also think that it will be a good jumping off point for my research. I think that if I can read summaries and then try to get more information on a specific topic, like the Federalists and the Anti-Federalist factions, I’ll be able to piece the different details together to understand the Reynolds Pamphlet a bit better.  

For my annotation project, I chose the Hamilton and Burr Duel correspondence document. The document I chose consisted of letters sent back and forth from Hamilton and Burr. These letters would then lead to the duel between the two that would result in the death of Hamilton. When looking at the document choices, I automatically drawn to this one because it was basically giving me the steps that would lead to the climax of the whole story. As far as research goes, I have started looking for insight just yet. I wanted to take time and read over the letters a couple of times to make sure I knew exactly what was going on and how each of the two were feeling toward each other. I wanted to establish my own personal annotation before I went to get information from another source. My biggest obstacle is trying to accurately paraphrase what the two were saying to each other. If it was just a regular document with one person expressing their feelings, then it would have been easier for me to comprehend. But since it is two people that are writing back and forth to each other, some of the things they say to each other could have a deeper meaning than what is perceived and that would lead to me displaying false information to the people reading my annotations. To help with this obstacle, I am going to try and look at the document as if I were either Hamilton or Burr. This would help me see things from their perspective and it could help with some of the lines that are hard to annotate. Other than that everything else is going smooth with the project, it should be interesting trying to annotate what was essentially a beef with Hamilton and Burr.

By: Adair Garrett

I chose the letters of correspondence between Eliza and Alexander Hamilton.  These letters were published on “Founders Online”, which is an official website of the United States government administered by the National Archives and Records Administration.  I chose these documents because I was very interested in the love story between Hamilton and Eliza, especially since their relationship lasted through many trials and tribulations.  I also believed that choosing these documents would allow me to understand Hamilton’s true ideas about many of the choices he made as a politician since he would probably be more honest in his correspondence with his wife.  These documents are important because they include Alexander Hamilton’s honest feelings about what was occurring in his life. What I found throughout the letters was that he travelled frequently for work but seemed to always want to return home, which, for Hamilton, was with Eliza.  Hamilton writes extremely sweetly to his wife, and reading them were truly heartwarming at times.

I read through almost all of the documents available from this website to get a sense of what I wanted to use as my historical annotation piece, but I decided on the two I published for very specific reasons.  First of all, they are taken from the same date 23 years apart. Second of all, the first one took place within the week that Hamilton became George Washington’s second hand man. Finally, the last letter was written the day before his fatal duel with Aaron Burr.  These letters have helped me understand large, life-changing decisions that Hamilton made, giving me the brief summaries of his life that have a different perspective than the one that Miranda gives in his musical.

 

These letters have allowed me to challenge my ability to research and deeply understand American history in a way I’ve never had to before.  While I have enjoyed this research and newfound understanding of the founding fathers, I have struggled with finding sources for my document.  The requirement to find at least 20 sources, including five peer-reviewed, academic sources, has been difficult to fulfill. Since I’ve struggled with this, it would be really amazing if we could work as a class to compile a long and diverse list of peer-reviewed sources that we could turn to if we can’t find enough on our own.  In doing my research, I have already run into many sources that would prove more useful to other people’s research than to my own, and I believe that working collaboratively to share these resources could allow our historical annotations to be richer and more well-rounded.

By: Max Jarck

The due date for the first project is still over two weeks away but June 19^th is approaching faster than I’d like to admit.  I’m still in the early stages of research but I’ve done enough where I feel comfortable giving an update.

I chose to annotate the beginning of the Pacificus-Helvidius Debate. The debate consists of argumentative essays written by founding fathers hidden by pen names. Alexander Hamilton is Pacificus while James Madison is Helvidius. The essays center around President Washington’s Proclamation of Neutrality (1793) and the constitutionality of the proclamation. Hamilton defends the proclamation with strong arguments, remember from the play how much emphasis is placed on Hamilton’s writing ability. Madison attacks the proclamation but with less skill than Hamilton’s defense. The debate was published as essays in a series of newspapers over the course of 1793.

When choosing a document, I read over most of the options and tried to see what had enough information in it that could be annotated and explained. I didn’t want to pick a document and then a few weeks later realize there was very little to annotate. I find the debate fascinating because it’s a constitutional debate by two of the founding fathers; two people who have intimate knowledge of the document because they helped write it.

Research has been well honestly its been a bit rough. There isn’t a surplus of material specifically about the debate but I am digging. I’m searching databases and looking up books. I requested a book from the GT library but it turned out to be unavailable. This was a minor inconvenience but not the end of the world. The research task is tedious and pulling together all this information into annotations is a challenge. I think that it will just take time and patience and a lot of reading to complete what seems like a hard task.