Histories must perforce deal with the political aims, successes and failures of men; must cover a big canvas and sing a large and impersonal song. But just here we have only to think of these old-time phantoms of ours as they affect or are affected by the old-time regions in which for the nonce we are interested. To Richmond Hill—with its white columns and shadow-flinging portico, its gardens and its oak trees and its silver pond—it was of small import that the master just missed being President of the United States, that he did become Vice-president, and President of the Senate, and that he was probably as able a jurist as ever distinguished the Bar of New York; also that he made almost as many enemies as he did friends. But it was decidedly the concern of the sweet and imposing old house on Richmond Hill that it was from its arms, so to speak, that he went out in a cold, white rage to the duel with his chief enemy; that he returned, broken and heartsick, doubly defeated in that he had chanced to be the victor, to the protection of Richmond Hill.
I cannot help believing that the household gods of a man take a very special interest and a very personal part in what fortunes befall him. More than any deities of old, they live with and in him; they at once go forth with him to battle, and welcome him home. I can conceive of some hushed and gracious home-spirit walking restless by night because the heart and head of the house was afar or in danger. And a house so charged with personality as that on Richmond Hall must have had many a ghost,—of fireside and of garden close,—who wept for fallen fortunes as they had rejoiced for gaiety and bright enterprise.
Aaron Burr and Alexander Hamilton were born antagonists: their personalities, their ideals, their methods, were as diverse and as implacably divergent as the poles. Hamilton, as a statesman, believed that Burr was dangerous; and so he was: sky rockets and geniuses usually are. Hamilton did his brilliant best to destroy the other's power (it was chiefly due to his efforts that Burr missed the Presidency), and, being a notably courageous man, he was not afraid to go on warning America against him.
And so it all came about:—the exchange of letters—haughty, courteously insolent, utterly unyielding on both sides—then the challenge, and finally the duel.
I am glad to think that Theo Alston was safe among her husband's rice fields at that time. She worshipped her father, and everything that hurt him stabbed her to her devoted heart.
It was in an early, fragrant dawn—Friday the sixth of July, 1804—that Burr and his seconds left our beautiful Richmond Hill, where the birds were singing and the pond just waking to the morning light, for Weehawken Heights on the Jersey shore.
At about seven, Burr reached the ground which had been appointed. Just after came Hamilton with his seconds, and the surgeon, Dr. Hosack. The distance was punctiliously measured, and these directions read solemnly to the principals:
"The parties, being placed at their stations, shall present and fire when they please. If one fires before the other, the opposite second shall say 1—2—3—fire; and he shall then fire or lose his fire."
Then came the word "Present!" from one of the witnesses. Both duellists fired and Hamilton dropped. Burr was untouched. He stood for a second looking at his fallen adversary, and then (as the story goes), "with a gesture of profound regret, left the ground...."
Back to Richmond Hill and the troubled household gods. Burr was no butcher, and he did not dislike Hamilton personally. I wonder how many times he paced the cool dining-room with the balcony outside, and how many times he refused meat or drink, before he despatched his note to Dr. Hosack? Here it is: