Artistic License History / Hamilton

Even in a show as history-geeky as this one, a large number of things have inevitably been changed or compressed for dramatic effect.

• Right off the bat, several characters have undergone dramatic physical and emotional reworks:
  • Alexander Hamilton is portrayed as a flawed yet ultimately well-meaning Byronic Hero, but in real life he was an absolute Insufferable Genius who loved to hear himself talk.^note He still is an Insufferable Genius in the musical but absolutely not to the extent of his real life counterpart. Well known for dishing out Too Much Information and being a complete Troll to people he didn't like, Hamilton was defined by his military aspirations and warmongering attitude, first during Daniel Shays' revolt near the end of the war by enthusiastically taking the army's side in the uprising, then during the Whiskey Rebellion by encouraging Washington to use the military on his own citizens in much the same way, and then during the Quasi-War with France where many of his peers went so far as to compare him to Napoléon Bonaparte. Miranda himself has emphasized how different the real Hamilton was compared to the show's Hamilton several times since the show became popular.
  • Hamilton is portrayed as a passionate abolitionist in the play; one of his main condemnations of Jefferson is involvement in slavery, and he joins Laurens in saying "we'll never be free until we end slavery". In real life, he was far from a firebrand for the cause and was even worse on the issues of slavery and racism than many of his contemporaries. Besides Hamilton's involvement with the slave trade on Nevis (for which he was left two slaves by his mother after her death), he knowingly married into the Schuyler family, who were by far the largest slaveholders in New York at the time, and even brokered numerous slave deals for his father-in-law Phillip Schuyler. Most damningly, Hamilton owned at least three personal slaves by 1796 (along with possibly another enslaved child he purchased in 1798) according to his very own records, and unlike Washington, he never even voiced any thoughts about freeing them; they remained in bondage until his death in 1804, upon which they were auctioned off for 400 pounds each. Although Hamilton did indeed criticize the institution of slavery in his early life, involving himself with the reformist anti-slavery New York Manumission Society together with Burr^note Burr was actually far more progressive than Hamilton on this score; he introduced a bill calling for immediate abolition of slavery in New York, only for it to be rejected by the legislature, while both Hamilton and the rest of the Manumission Society only ever advocated for slavery to be gradually phased out (which eventually came in the early 1800s) and John Jay throughout the 1780s, he had largely abandoned these stances by the height of his political career. This is further evidenced by his position on the Haitian and French Revolutions; while Hamilton voiced support for the National Assembly early on, he strongly condemned the French Revolution once it broke out for actually fully abolishing slavery in 1794 and without compensation for slaveowners, and was even more critical of the concurrent slave revolt in Haiti, sympathizing instead with the white slaveowning refugees that fled to America. It was only when Napoleon came to power and reversed the abolition that Hamilton proposed a trade agreement with Free Haiti, fearing that he could grab Haiti for a potential New World expansion of Napoleon's campaign. This still didn't include diplomatic recognition, nor any kind of official backing for the government or any real meaningful help.
  • The play (especially the lyrics of "My Shot") further paints Hamilton as being much more of an abolitionist than he actually was by conflating abolition with manumission, the latter of which was what Hamilton and many of his contemporaries voiced support for rather than the former. These terms are sometimes used interchangeably, but "manumission" specifically meant encouraging the gradual dissipation of slavery by encouraging slaveowners to free their own slaves, through financial compensation, restrictions on the slave trade and other incentives, rather than immediate, unconditional emancipation. Although Values Dissonance was definitely in play, this was considered a very moderate position even at the time, with Burr actually running afoul of the Manumission Society he and Hamilton were involved with by proposing a bill to abolish slavery outright in New York. John Laurens was also ardently in favor of abolition rather than manumission, but his death during the war prevented him from realizing his goals.
  • Aaron Burr's philosophy of "talk less, smile more" would actually fit Jefferson more than it would Burr. In real life, Burr was incredibly ambitious and wasn't afraid to fight; he was actually the first of the show's characters to join the Revolution, and in his political career he often engaged in very risky practices to undermine the Federalist Party, such as when he founded the Manhattan Company in order to break Hamilton's hold over New York's banks.
  • Musical Eliza Hamilton is portrayed as demure, shy, and "helpless", singing, "I have never been the type to try and grab the spotlight". The real Eliza was noted to have been a tomboyish child and to never have lost her strong will and impulsiveness, also said to be suppressing a temper that periodically flared up. Incidentally, she also preferred "Elizabeth" and was almost never called Eliza; "Betsy" was the pet name used by her family and Hamilton himself, and prior to Chernow's book Eliza was rarely addressed as such.^note Which Miranda may have adopted simply because Eliza is an easier name to rhyme than Betsy. But then, she is the one to tell this story...
  • George Washington is portrayed as a Humble Hero who doesn't necessarily want power but will take it if it means he can do his part to help. This is the image intentionally cultivated for himself the time (and this portrayal is incredibly common in modern America), but he was also noted to have very deceitful tendencies and used his humble image to hide a man who loved the power he had and worked to gain more of it. He was also a noted spymaster and expert manipulator, all of which is gone from the show. And, as noted by his own contemporaries, Washington had a nasty temper that he only barely restrained and on top of that, he was easily irked by even the smallest of perceived infractions. In one correspondence from Alexander Hamilton to his father-in-law Philip Schuyler, Hamilton recounts an incident in which Washington, having been kept waiting at the top of the stairs while Hamilton was preoccupied by a passing officer, scolds him, “Col Hamilton (said he), you have kept me waiting at the head of the stairs these ten minutes. I must tell you Sir you treat me with disrespect.”
  • Thomas Jefferson's charismatic and flamboyant mannerisms in the show have little in common with the actual man, who was very socially awkward and nervous (to the point where many historians think he was on the autism spectrum). In a bit of symbolism, his personality here is instead based on the forceful, eloquent and larger-than-life language he authored.
  • James Madison was incredibly sickly, small, and frail, even by the standards of the time. While the show maintains his illness through his consistent coughing, the role is double-cast with Hercules Mulligan, so he's a lot taller and more muscular than in real life (his original actor was a former football player and subsequent castings have gone in a similar direction).
  • King George III is portrayed as a Card-Carrying Villain who gladly and even gleefully starts the war with the Colonies, but while George was obviously not a Laughing Mad maniac (at least not until later on in his life), he also was largely not responsible for the war starting. He certainly kept it going, but the incidents that led to the Revolution starting were mostly due to Parliament and British soldiers actually in the Colonies, not George himself. His portrayal as a sadist and an out-and-out psychopath who delights in seeing war break out also stands in stark contrast to the real King George's reported personality: throughout his life, he was noted to be mild-mannered, humble, and kindhearted (and presumably saw preventing the colonies from defecting as his job). He did genuinely snap and go mad later on in his life, but that was only around 1810, six years after the musical ends.
• Generally, the play emphasizes Hamilton and Burr's relationship for Rule of Drama. In real life, the two men were never intimate friends as shown in the show's first act. They were on cordial-to-friendly terms in the 1780s and 1790s, occasionally socialized with their wives and families and worked together on a few legal cases in New York. Nonetheless, Hamilton wrote even at the time that while he and Eliza found Burr charming and personable, they rarely saw eye-to-eye on politics which, for these two intensely political men, prevented any sort of bond from developing. Miranda is correct to show Burr's campaign against Philip Schuyler causing them to fall out completely, but they had never been especially close to begin with.
• In "Aaron Burr, Sir" Hamilton meets Burr, Marquis de Lafayette, Hercules Mulligan and John Laurens all at the same time in 1776. This was done for the sake of moving the story along and better establishing the quartet as the core group of the narrative. In real life, Hamilton met Mulligan in 1772 (Mulligan actually hosted him in his house for multiple years), he met Lafayette and Laurens in 1777 while he was working with Washington, and while no one can quite pin down when he met Burr, they most likely had met each other in passing by the time Hamilton joined the Army (their first documented meeting was in the late 1780s, but they moved in similar social circles while living in New York, so it's unlikely they didn't at least know of each other).
• In the same song, Burr is called “the prodigy of Princeton College,” and Alexander heard his name there. Princeton College was not always called that, with its name only changing from the College of New Jersey to Princeton in 1896. This one can be chalked up to a temporal equivalent of Translation Convention.
• Unlike what the show claims, there's no evidence that Hamilton ever punched a bursar when he was in college.
• In the same song, Laurens enters the scene having consumed "two pints of Sam Adams." While Samuel Adams was made a partner in his father's malthouse in the 1740s, there is no evidence he was ever a brewer (one who actually brews beer). The beer that bears his name today did not appear on the market until 1985.
• Aaron Burr is portrayed as a rich "trust fund baby" as a contrast with Hamilton's dirt-poor upbringing. This isn't entirely accurate; while Burr really did come from a wealthy family, he had a rocky relationship with them at the best of times and was eventually disowned by his relatives. He graduated from university at 16 not because of his wealthy and important father but because of his smarts and work ethic. Burr actually spent most of his adult life as a middle-class man, whereas Hamilton was able to join the upper classes fairly quickly.
• Mulligan was actually fifteen years older than Hamilton, and by some accounts was The Mentor to him (which may explain the in loco parentis line in "My Shot") rather than a peer roughly the same age as the play depicts. Additionally, while he definitely knew Burr since they were neighbors in New York, there's no evidence suggesting that he ever met Laurens and Lafayette; it's theoretically possible, but if it ever happened then no one chose to document it.
• The show has Hamilton inspiring Mulligan to take a stand and become a revolutionary, while in real life it was actually the exact opposite; Mulligan, a longtime member of the Sons of Liberty, connected Hamilton with William Livingston, a prominent revolutionary, and by 1775 Hamilton had published his first essay arguing for independence.
• While Lafayette says he dreams of "life without a monarchy", the real Lafayette wanted to keep the French monarchy around, believing it would help act as a stabilizing force.
• In the bar scene, the revolution is described several times as "imminent," and Hamilton says "I wish there were a war," despite the narration putting it in 1776, when the fighting would have been well underway. In fact, if this scene does take place in 1776, then Burr would have already been part of the Continental Army - he enlisted in 1775.
• The real Angelica was already married to John Barker Church when she met Hamilton. And rather than a loveless marriage of convenience, they eloped because she feared her father wouldn't approve of his British ties, meaning she wanted to be with him. There were rumors that Angelica engaged in affairs (not only with Hamilton, but Thomas Jefferson, whom she knew during his time in Paris) but they've never been substantiated; by most accounts her marriage with Church was a loving one. Also, in "Satisfied" Angelica says that her father "has no son, so I'm the one who has to social climb for one", which was untrue; in real life she had three younger brothers (hence why she was able to marry for love). According to Lin, by the time he became aware of the Schuyler brothers, he decided to keep the line to emphasize the emotional sacrifice Angelica was making.
• It's highly unlikely that Burr would have tried to become Washington's "Right Hand Man" as the titular song seems to suggest he did. While he did at one point serve on Washington's staff, he quit in June of 1776 to be on the battlefield and then quickly developed an antagonistic relationship with the General due to his lack of commending Burr's war efforts (thus denying him a promotion he believed he deserved).
• It's highly unlikely that anyone in the 1770s would call New York "the greatest city in the world" or evince any of the city pride for which it has become proverbial. While an important trade hub famed for its diverse population, Philadelphia and Boston both outclassed it in size and trade routes, and among the New World, Port-au-Prince in colonial Haiti was the larger city and more profitable one, and internationally of course, Beijing, London, and Paris exceeded it greatly in size, splendour, population, and political and social importance.
• Though Samuel Seabury's loyalist sympathies were well-known to other New Yorkers, he published his pamphlets anonymously under the pen name "Westchester Farmer" or "A.W. Farmer," and his authorship of them wasn't proven until after the Revolution, when he was forced to forswear his allegiance to the British crown. This does explain why the number Seabury appears in is named "Farmer Refuted", at the very least.
• "A Winter's Ball" features Hamilton proudly admitting that the story that Martha Washington named a tomcat after him is true. At the time, this rumor did have a lot of followers, but in modern times it's largely considered to have been a false claim made to discredit Hamilton and his positions^note It's not quite known who started this rumor - some sources, including the Ron Churnow book the musical is based on, claim it was John Adams late in his life, while others claim it was British loyalists who spread it after his death. Miranda himself has admitted that the story is most likely false, but he kept it in on purpose to showcase Hamilton "at his peak cockiness".
• "The Story of Tonight (Reprise)" sets Alexander and Eliza's wedding earlier than it actually was. It's implied that Hamilton was the first of his friends to get married, though historically he was the last (not counting Burr), and none of those friends were present at his wedding (Laurens was the only one invited, but he was in British custody at the time). Also, Burr had just been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel, which actually happened a few years before Hamilton got married.
• In the show the Battle of Monmouth, Laurens' duel with Charles Lee, and Hamilton's break with Washington are depicted as happening after Alexander and Eliza were married. Historically the Battle of Monmouth took place in 1778 while Alexander and Eliza were married in 1780. In the show the battle and the duel are moved to happen at a later date. Historically Washington and Hamilton's break was not caused by the duel and Hamilton resigned as aide while Washington wanted him to stay on.
• Burr was not Lee’s second in his duel with Laurens. The real second was Major Evan Edwards, a commander of the Eleventh Pennsylvania Regiment and Lee's aide-de-camp. Little else besides this fact is known of Edwards' life, apart from his history in the war (he fought in fifteen battles, including Yorktown). Also, unlike Burr, there is no indication that Edwards disliked Lee, and, in fact, what evidence exists indicates that he ended the war on good terms with Lee, as he would go on to name one of his children after him.
• In "Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down)" the show places Laurens in South Carolina where he will later be killed in action, but historically Laurens was at the Battle of Yorktown; he fought side-by-side with Hamilton and helped negotiate the British surrender.
• The battle in which Laurens is killed is portrayed as something like the Battle of New Orleans in the War of 1812- as a battle which only occurred because the combatants hadn't heard that the war was over. In actuality, the war wasn't over at that point- the final peace treaty wasn't signed until the following year.
• "Dear Theodosia" has Burr singing to his daughter Theodosia around the same time that Hamilton receives word that John Laurens has been killed in action. Theodosia wasn't actually born until 1783, while Laurens was killed in August of the previous year.
• While Burr and Hamilton really did defend Levi Weeks during the first recorded murder trial in America^note Historically, Henry Brock Livingston was the third defense attorney on the case, "Non-Stop" places this event shortly after the revolution and before Hamilton wrote the Federalist Papers. In real life, this trial didn't happen until 1800, but Burr and Hamilton are already on the outs by this point going by the show timeline ^{The verdict, if you're interested...} Weeks was acquitted for the murder, but the general public opposed the verdict and he was eventually forced to flee New York.
• There's no evidence that Hamilton asked Burr to help write the Federalist Papers, nor would he have likely done so; Burr, while still on friendly terms with Hamilton at that point, had already aligned himself with the anti-Federalist/Republican faction in New York.
• In "Take A Break", a nine-year-old Philip at one point says "I have a sister but I want a little brother!" The real Philip actually had two younger brothers by this point, and would eventually have two sisters and five brothers.
• The show has Jefferson's resignation as Secretary of State and his running to succeed Washington as occurring in close sequence, while in the real world Jefferson resigned in 1793, shortly into Washington's second term. Additionally, Washington states that Jefferson resigned from his post so that he could run for president, but in real life, Jefferson was alongside Hamilton in trying to convince Washington not to give up the office in the first place.
• Washington's farewell address is incredibly condensed and paraphrased for the musical - an appropriate response, considering the actual document is 32 pages long and written in archaic English.
• Aaron Burr didn't actually switch political parties in order to run against Phillip Schuyler as depicted in the show; he had been a member of the Democratic-Republican party for several years by the time he was elected to the Senate.
• James Madison boasts about his writing of the Bill of Rights. While it's certainly true that he wrote the Bill of Rights, it is unlikely that he would brag about it, as he was against the idea. Madison believed that the government's powers as listed in the constitution were few, limited and defined, and that a Bill of Rights, which illustrated specific things the government was not allowed to restrict, would be not only redundant but actually destructive, and raise the implication that the government had more power than its authors intended.
• In "It's Quiet Uptown", Hamilton mentions taking his children to church on Sundays and making the Sign of the the Cross at the door. In reality, Hamilton was raised Presbyterian (the Sign of the Cross is a Catholic gesture), but became less religious as an adult and didn't regularly attend services.
• In the 2nd Cabinet Battle, Hamilton is depicted as wanting to stay neutral in the French Revolution while Jefferson wants to send soldiers and aid, creating a clear-cut battle between the two. Ironically, while Jefferson did publicly support the revolutionaries and aided Lafayette as much as he could, the notion that America should stay neutral in the revolution was one of the few things the two ever agreed on in their entire lives^note More specifically, while Hamilton wanted to outright declare neutrality in the conflict, Jefferson wanted to stay neutral without declaring it so as to not alienate their French allies (he also believed that the President didn't have the power to declare neutrality in the first place, arguing that if someone had the power to declare war, there was no such thing as a power to declare peace).
• The duel between Phillip and George Eacker went about as different in real life as it possibly could've gone. In the show, Phillip fires his shot into the air, but Eacker cheats and shoots him before the count is over. In real life, both turned around but neither one shot until Phillip slowly began to raise his gun, at which point Eacker shot first in preemptive self-defense; while it's possible that Phillip never intended to kill Eacker, there's no way of knowing for certain.
• Peggy Schuyler's death is moved up a few years so Peggy's actress can change into Maria Reynolds for "Say No to This". In real life, Peggy died in 1801, which would be much later in Act Two.
• "The Election of 1800" has Hamilton emerging from mourning for his son Philip to place his vote for Jefferson, rather than Burr. In reality, Philip didn't die until 1801, when the election was long over.
• There are multiple discrepancies with how the musical portrays Hamilton's affair with Maria Reynolds and the subsequent Reynolds Pamphlet.
  • "Say No To This" implies that the affair only took place for a few months. There's conflicting information over just how long the real life affair lasted, but the smallest amount of time generally considered to be plausible is still around a full year (summer of 1791 to July 1792).
  • While not outright stated, the show implies Maria and Hamilton are around the same age, if not Maria being slightly younger. In reality Maria was anywhere from 11-13 years younger than Hamilton, and was freshly 23 when she first approached him (Hamilton himself was in his mid 30s at the time).
  • Maria Reynolds actually had a daughter, who was just shy of turning six^note she was born just shy of five months after her mother's seventeenth birthday when the affair began and was freshly twelve when the pamphlet was published.^note As in, a week after her birthday fresh Most accounts agree Maria mentioned her when begging for help and the pair were living in the same boarding house, and if not, James later mentioned her in a letter. Considering there was no way to fit her in, especially not without further making Hamilton look like a jerk, (and considering the ultimately minor roles of both of her parents), she wasn't featured.
  • The show places Hamilton negotiating with Jefferson and Madison to give Virginia the nation's capital after he begins his affair with Maria. While the two events did occur very close to each other, D.C. actually became the capital in 1790, while his affair didn't start until the next summer.
  • In the real life investigation into the Reynolds affair, Jefferson's role was more of a "behind the scenes" nature and Madison and Burr weren't involved at all, but because future president James Monroe doesn't fit into the rest of the narrative, his role was split up into the three already-established antagonists of the show.
  • In the show, the confrontation between Hamilton and the investigators occurs after the events of "The Adams Administration". Disregarding the fact that the real-life investigators were completely different people, the confrontation that this scene is clearly based on occurred in December of 1792, long before Adams became President.
  • "The Adams Administration" has Hamilton releasing his public response to Adams' comments about him ("Sit down John, YOU FAT MOTHERFUCKSTICK!") before the events that lead to the Reynolds Pamphlet begin. The Reynolds Pamphlet actually came first in 1797, while the Adams Pamphlet that the song hints to was released in 1800.
  • Eliza already knew about Hamilton's affair with Maria Reynolds long before he admitted it publicly; in the show she finds out along with everyone else when the Reynolds Pamphlet is published, maximizing the hurt and betrayal she feels. Although she didn't exactly cut him off during this time, as they conceived two children, a son and a daughter, in the years between the scandal breaking and Philip's death.
  • In real life, the situation that caused Hamilton to release the pamphlet was much more complicated than depicted in the show^Explanation It began in 1792 when Monroe, the man who actually led the investigation into the affair, informed his friend Thomas Jefferson about it despite promising Hamilton he would keep it secret. Jefferson sat on this information until 1797, when he proceeded to spread the rumor around to their peers to discredit his enemy. This eventually made its way to journalists, who published the story alongside documents confirming it as truth - though they discounted Hamilton's infidelity and focused instead on his supposed partnership with James Reynolds, who'd recently been arrested for defrauding veterans' pensions and was trying to use the dirt he had on Hamilton to get himself out of trouble. These journalists outright accused him of several financial crimes, meaning the public and the government were both calling for his head. To protect himself from the charges, Hamilton released the pamphlet and admitted to the affair while denying any financial wrongdoing, hoping that by being honest about the affair but denying the financial crimes he would still be considered trustworthy and the charges would go away. The musical removes all of this to cut down a convoluted situation for time and to make Hamilton's belief that he can write his way out of anything a Fatal Flaw that ultimately ruins his career, alongside emphasizing the stupidity of the move.
  • In the musical, Burr takes great pleasure in watching Hamilton's political career crumble due to the pamphlet. In real life, Burr was actually one of the few who sympathized with him and had served as Maria Reynolds' divorce lawyer in the past (indeed, Burr is generally the only person involved in the scandal considered to have behaved honorably during the shitstorm that followed the release of the pamphlet). Conversely, while Washington showcases his disappointment in Hamilton in the musical, the real Washington's opinion of Hamilton was reportedly unchanged by the pamphlet, with Washington still holding him in "very high esteem". Washington even gifted the Hamiltons a wine cooler, accompanied by a letter with no reference to the scandal, which has been interpreted as a tacit show of support.
  • The Reynolds Pamphlet did next to nothing to Hamilton's political career. While "The Reynolds Pamphlet" portrays it as a career-ending scandal, in real life Hamilton's influence was pretty much untouched, with him still controlling many of John Adams' cabinet from behind the scenes. It was actually the "Adams Pamphlet", the pamphlet Hamilton wrote attacking Adams, that wrecked both his career and the entire Federalist Party (in essence, the pamphlets and their respective damage to Hamilton are flipped in the timeline).
  • The pamphlet is propped as a literal two page pamphlet - the actual document, including the supplementary letters and financial documents, is 95 pages long.
• Hamilton becoming Commanding General of the Army during the Quasi-War with France is not even mentioned, even though the first act of the play establishes Hamilton’s aspirations for military glory.
• Hamilton's break with John Adams didn't occur until 1800, when he published a pamphlet attacking Adams on the eve of the presidential election. In the play, this happens before he publishes the Reynolds pamphlet, which occurred in 1797. "The Adams Administration" also claims Hamilton was "fired" by Adams - Hamilton had in fact resigned as Treasury Secretary in 1795, while Washington was still president, though he remained an unofficial adviser to Washington and enjoyed no such rapport with Adams. Indeed, Hamilton angered Adams by trying to influence policy through his cabinet members, whom Adams in turn fired, thus inspiring Hamilton to publicly denounce him. Adams had also undermined Hamilton’s military efforts by sending a second (successful) peace envoy to France, removing the need for a standing army and making Hamilton’s commission irrelevant. ^note Understandably, Miranda has said that he chose to gloss over this because other works on the period, including John Adams, had already covered Adams and Hamilton's feud.
• "The Election of 1800" also greatly simplifies the political trainwreck that led to Hamilton having to choose between Jefferson and Burr. ^Explanation In reality, Jefferson and Burr were originally on the same ticket (as Democratic-Republicans), not running against each other; Burr was supposed to be running for vice president, and up until the electors voted it seemed like there had been a straightforward Democratic-Republican victory. However, the rules at the time had each elector cast two votes, with the President being whoever came in first and the VP being whoever came in second; due to some confusion or miscommunication, the Democratic-Republican electors tied Jefferson and Burr instead of giving Jefferson one vote more as they'd intended. This threw the election to the lame-duck Federalist-controlled House, who considered giving the presidency to Burr to spite Jefferson and the rest of the Democratic-Republicans. Burr, although he didn't actively encourage his nomination, also did nothing to discourage it, which did not help his reputation afterwards. It was in this context that Hamilton, still a leading Federalist figure despite his political humiliations, denounced Burr as lacking principles in a speech before Congress and convinced his fellow Federalists not to go with him. The musical simplifies this convoluted situation into a straightforward Burr vs. Jefferson election that viewers are more likely to understand.
• Burr's final challenge to Hamilton was not a direct result of the 1800 presidential race, although it was certainly a contributing factor to Burr's anger. Hamilton actually censured Burr as a candidate in two races; in 1804 it was in New York's gubernatorial race, another political clusterfuck that Burr took far more personally than his presidential defeat.^note Burr ran against fellow Republican Morgan Lewis, a protégé of outgoing Governor George Clinton (who would ironically replace Burr as Vice President). As the Federalists failed to field their own candidate, Burr campaigned to gain Federalist support along with the state's anti-Clinton Republican faction. For Hamilton, Burr's fishing for Federalist votes confirmed his view that Burr completely lacked principles; subsequently, he convinced the state's leading Federalists to withdraw support from Burr while also publicly denouncing him. Burr lost to Lewis in a landslide; unlike in 1800, he blamed Hamilton personally for his defeat and became convinced that Hamilton was obsessed with destroying his career. Then, in the same year, Charles Cooper revealed that Hamilton was slandering him further to his professional colleagues, and that is when Burr finally snapped and decided to duel him^note Whatever Hamilton said to prompt this is a Riddle for the Ages; Hamilton refused to specify and Cooper never publicly repeated it. Many historians, however, believe it was an insinuation that Burr had an incestuous relationship with his own daughter. This was all likely left out in the interests of time and not making Hamilton look like a complete jerkass.^note If you do want to hear a somewhat more historically version of the events in the musical, just check the demo version of "Your Obedient Servant" as it mentions "Charles Cooper" and also includes more lines taken verbatim from Burr and Hamilton's letters at that time. This also has the unfortunate side effect of implying that the duel took place in 1800 instead of 1804.
• After Jefferson wins the presidential election, he rejects Burr's position as Vice-President, claiming that as president he can now change the rule that states the person with the second most votes becomes Vice-president. In reality, this was not changed until the next election (1804). Aaron Burr actually did serve as Jefferson's Vice-President during his first term in office. The two did have an extremely frosty relationship, however, which led Jefferson to drop Burr as a running mate in 1804.
• Disregarding whether or not the real Hamilton intended to kill Burr during their duel, we know that he didn't aim his pistol straight in the air and "throw away his shot"; the shot he fired ended up hitting a tree directly behind Burr, proving that he at least aimed in his general direction even if he intended to miss. The standard practice for "throwing away" one's shot (formally known as deloping) in a duel was to fire a pistol into the ground, making it nearly impossible either to harm one's opponent, or for the opponent to misinterpret his intent. Unless Hamilton's intentions were communicated to Burr beforehand (for which there's no evidence), Burr would have no reason to assume Hamilton, by aiming his pistol over Burr's head, wasn't in fact trying to kill him.
  • It's also noted that Hamilton put on his glasses and lined up several practice shots before the duel, giving Burr every reason to believe he was serious and undermining claims he intended to throw away his shot. He also chose the pistols and neglected to inform Burr that they were a more sensitive design with a hair-trigger, meaning it's possible that instead of throwing the duel he attempted to rig it in his favour.
• Hamilton is portrayed as being opposed to duelling when in reality he took part in ten duels over the course of his life prior to his fatal one with Burr and never spoke out against the practice even after his son Philip died in one. His posthumous claims he opposed duelling and intended to throw away the first one-to-two shots (something both duellists' seconds agree he did not do) should therefore be taken with a pinch of salt and may simply have been an attempt to ensure Burr's reputation would be destroyed if he won.
• "The World Was Wide Enough" has two large examples of this. First, Burr in real life had next to no remorse for his killing Hamilton until much later on in his life (he really was quoted with the whole "world was wide enough" line, though there is dispute among historians on whether he was serious or sarcastic); indeed, close friends of his were downright concerned over how little he seemed to care. Second, the song overdramatizes the effects of Hamilton's death on Burr's political career. He was ruined internationally (Hamilton was much more popular overseas than he was in America) and did face severe backlash domestically, but he was never charged for the duel and he finished his term as Vice President without further incident.^note As noted above, Jefferson had already decided not to renominate Burr, irrespective of the duel, which is why Burr had been running for Governor of New York It wasn't until the 1807 Burr Conspiracy that his career was truly destroyed and he was forced to flee to England. It's really only in modern times that Burr is now mostly known as the man who killed Hamilton.
• Jefferson, Madison, and Burr refer to their party as the Democratic-Republicans, in line with how the party is usually described by historians in order to avoid confusion with the modern-day parties. Circa 1796, the party was usually referred to as the "Republican" party; it changed its name to the Democratic party around the time Andrew Jackson was elected, with some parts splitting off into smaller splinter parties that were eventually absorbed into the modern Republicans.
• Hamilton is portrayed as pro-immigrant, while the Democratic-Republican characters are portrayed as anti-immigrant; in reality his Federalist party was opposed to non-English immigration and denied citizenship to people from elsewhere even if they fought for the Patriots in the Revolutionary War, while the Democratic-Republicans supported it.
• In the show, the rules for the duels are referred to as "The Ten Duel Commandments". In real life, it was actually more like the 25 duel commandments. Lin clearly cut it down for conciseness and to fit with his Biggie homage to "Ten Crack Commandments".