A Jewish Founding Father? Alexander Hamilton’s Hidden Life

Thousands of miles from the Old World, on a sun-kissed island in the West Indies, a young boy named Alexander Hamilton began a most unlikely journey in the 1750s. His meteoric rise from Caribbean obscurity to American founder has long captivated historians and, more recently, Broadway audiences. Yet one crucial aspect of Hamilton’s life has remained submerged for centuries: the weight of the evidence suggests that he was in fact Jewish.

Drawing on untapped sources in the West Indies, Professor Porwancher make the case for Hamilton’s Jewish ancestry and explore his ongoing relationships with Jews throughout his lifetime. Although he cast off any Jewish identity in his adulthood in the United States, Hamilton never forgot his origins. He emerged as a singular champion of American Jewry against the forces of anti-Semitism. Hamilton fought for Jewish rights in the courts, collaborated with Jewish merchants, and secured a position for the first Jew on the board of an American college.

Andrew Porwancher / University of Oklahoma
Andrew Porwancher is an Assistant Professor at the University of Oklahoma. He is the author of “The Devil Himself: A Tale of Honor, Insanity, and the Birth of Modern America.” Dr. Porwancher has published articles in the Journal of Supreme Court History, History of Education, Journalism History, Paedagogica Historica, and American Educational History Journal. He is currently at work on a book entitled, “The Jewish Founding Father: Alexander Hamilton’s Hidden Life.” In 2013-2014, he served as the Alistair Horne Fellow at the University of Oxford.

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