The next that is known of Alexander is that he was a clerk in the store of a merchant on Santa Cruz, a smaller island, and that the lad was not contented there. When he was twelve he wrote back to a friend in Nevis, “I would be willing to risk my life, but not my character, to exalt my station.”
Alexander studied with a minister of Santa Cruz who did all he could to help the boy to improve his position in life. As Alexander was a devout lad it is believed that the good man was trying to fit him to be a minister.
The first thing young Hamilton did to win credit was to write a wonderful description of a hurricane, or violent wind storm, that did great damage on the island. The article was printed in a London newspaper. When the people who knew the lad read his account, they could hardly believe that one so young could have written it and several wealthy planters decided to give such a bright boy a chance “to exalt his station” by sending him to school in America.
Soon the little Scotch lad who could speak French and write splendid stories in English was on his way to Boston in a British packet boat. It is stated that on that voyage he first heard of George Washington. When Alexander Hamilton reached Boston, he found the people up in arms because the British government had sent soldiers to keep order in that rebellious city; but the boy had been brought up to think that the king and the great men of England were always right.
The little Britisher from the West Indies was first sent to a grammar school not far from New York to prepare for college. He was so keen and studied so hard that he was fitted to enter King’s College in New York City at the age of sixteen. After the war against the king the name of the college was changed from King’s to Columbia.
After a year in college, the British-bred youth went to Boston again. This was about the time when the “Sons of Liberty” dressed up as Indians and threw the taxed tea overboard into Boston harbor. This act was intended to show the king and the English statesmen that the Americans would not pay taxes when they had nothing to say in the government as to what taxes they should pay. No doubt Alexander, while studying for college, had learned something of the history and the spirit of the people in America, so that he did not feel so sure that all the king did was right. After he returned to New York, there was a great mass meeting in “the Fields” to talk about the unjust acts of the king of England. In the city were many Tories, loyal to the king. Young Hamilton went down from college to hear the discussion, and it was not long before he was answering a rich Tory in a sharp, vigorous way. The people shouted to him to go up on the platform, and the brilliant West Indian youth of seventeen made a strong speech that became the talk of New York City.
A little while after this the students called on the president of King’s College. He was a Tory, and very bitter against the people who were fighting for their rights as British subjects. He scolded the students roundly, calling them traitors, rascals, and other hard names. This made the young men so angry that it might have gone hard with the old gentleman if young Hamilton had not jumped up on the porch and spoken earnestly in his defense. The president, seeing who was speaking, and thinking that the youth was talking against the Tories again, put his angry red face out of an upper window and shouted: “It’s a lie! Don’t believe a word that rogue says. He’s crazy!”
As Hamilton was really taking their foolish president’s part, this made the students shout and laugh. The young orator, taking advantage of this, kept on talking till the old Tory made his escape by a back way to a British man-of-war in the river near by. After this Hamilton wrote pamphlets and newspaper articles about the rights of the people. Events began to happen thick and fast. Washington was elected commander-in-chief of the Continental Army and drove the British soldiers out of Boston. Then the Americans decided to separate from England; so the Declaration of Independence was written and signed. Young Hamilton was soon in the midst of the fight—in command of an artillery company. When Washington and his ragged Continentals were retreating from New York, he saw a youth in charge of a battery keeping the red-coats from crossing a wide river, so that the American commander-in-chief and his little army could keep on their way to Philadelphia.
“Who is that young man?” asked Washington.
“That, your Excellency, is Alexander Hamilton.”