Long before Alexander Hamilton helped shape the Constitution or design America’s financial system, he was a child on the island of Nevis, raised among the merchants and schools of a thriving Jewish community. For generations, historians assumed Hamilton’s faith was Christian, but recent research from historian Andrew Porwancher tells a different story.
In The Jewish World of Alexander Hamilton, Porwancher pieces together overlooked records from Hamilton’s Caribbean youth and reaches a surprising conclusion: Hamilton was most likely born and educated in a Jewish household. That possibility casts new light on one of the nation’s most complex founders. Porwancher joins us to tell the story of a particular court case where Hamilton stood up for Jews.