Who Tells Your Story: How Women of the Revolution are Portrayed in Historical Musical Productions

By: Kasey Ann Birely

Hamilton: An American Musical, a story about the life of Alexander Hamilton, premiered on Broadway in 2015.[1] It continues to host sold-out shows on a daily basis to crowds who choose to immerse themselves in the historic narrative that plays out in front of their eyes. Producer Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote Hamilton during the historic era that many refer to as “Founders’ Chic”. This was a time of creating Founding Fathers’ biographies that were relatable to the readers.[2] New pieces of work based in the Revolutionary Era are being created at a higher rate than in the past.

Hamilton, however, was not the first Revolutionary War Era musical to hit the Broadway stage. 1776 premiered in 1969 at the Majestic Theater. This is a story of the first Continental Congress and the push towards declaring independence in the American colonies.[3] While on the surface, these productions appear to be great pieces of historical work, the producers of these shows are not trained historians. Historians, through their studies, learn how to interpret sources and communicate their meaning extremely carefully to improve understanding of the information. Musical producers’ roles include making decisions on what information will or will not be included in a show. Ultimately, this may result in the omission of key pieces of information.[4]

Both, 1776 and Hamilton, introduce female characters that do not play vital roles in them. If both are stories of the creation of the American nation, does that mean that women did not play important roles in the founding of the United States? The lack of focus on women throughout both shows erroneously infers that they did not play crucial roles in the fight for independence.

The Women on the Stage

The way historians study their field has changed between the time 1776 was produced and the production of Hamilton. Hamilton shows a sizable leap in progress in the way historians study women, in particular. While Hamilton portrays a man’s point of view, there is a representation of women’s struggles during the American Revolution shown other than the sewing needle and sexual encounter shortages offered by the 1776 musical. That being said, Hamilton does fall short in realizing the gender-based system of society at that time. Hamilton misses a key development of the Revolutionary Era, the challenge of coverture,[5] which Catherine Allgor states is “crucial to understanding our revolutionary origins in terms such as ‘liberty,’ ‘independence,’ and ‘democracy.”[6]

Historian Alfred Young claims that, during the Revolution, there was a change in womanhood.[7] The “tumult of Revolutionary times,” and the absence of men during the period, were the biggest reasons influencing the adaptation of women’s roles during the era.[8] The expression of the struggles women faced can be seen in some characters of Hamilton and 1776 through their actions and dialogue, but is not developed to the fullest ability.

Abigail Adams

Abigail Adams is one of the most prominent women from the Revolutionary Era. Even before this current era of Founders’ Chic, many pieces of work were published regarding her.[9] Historian Mary Beth Norton considered Abigail Adams to be the epitome of Revolutionary mothers, in that Abigail’s views of raising a family was that a wife should be competent enough to raise her children without major reliance on others.[10] Abigail Adams is portrayed in 1776 without her children, reducing her character’s job to only being the wife of John Adams. That, in turn, removes the idea of the influence mothers had on their family unit. Norton asserts that men were the top of the hierarchy within a family unit and dictated the rules for their wife and children to follow.[11] With many men being absent, like John Adams, due to their participation in the war, wives often had to take over the role of the husband.

When John Adams was present at home, Abigail was his political confidant. He frequently shared with her the biggest political secrets of the time.[12] This communication of ideas allowed Abigail Adams to share her own political opinion as well, which was new for women at the time.[13] There was a cultural belief of gender differences between men and women, and politics was solely a man’s purview.[14] This political relationship is discussed in 1776 during the song “Till Then.” In the song, John Adams specifically states: “Oh, Abigail, Abigail / I have such a desire knock heads together!” Abigail replies by expressing the loneliness she feels during her husband’s absence and how sick their children were.[15] This negatively affected her quite a bit. The impending threat of war and the state her children were in caused her to yearn for the company of her husband John, but she understood that Congress needed him more than she did.[16] “Till Then” continues with Abigail Adams asking John to tell the Continental Congress to hasten its vote on independence.

In a letter to her husband dated June 22, 1775, Abigail Adams questioned why Congress would not move forward with their plan for colonial independence.[17] Abigail was frustrated with Congress because, in her view, the war had already begun.[18] As a result of the new war, John Adams remained away from home even longer. Due to John’s absence, he and Abigail began writing to each other almost weekly. “Till Then” takes excerpts from a real letter Abigail Adams wrote to John Adams, inquiring about sewing pins for her and her friends, since the price has risen for them dramatically.[19] In this song, John Adams requests that the “ladies” support the Congress by making gunpowder for war, ending the song.[20] This song omits other significant parts of the same letter that indicated Abigail Adams’ heavy involvement in the family’s finances. The letter also indicated the worry she carried for her family’s well-being because of their residence in Boston and the looming war.[21] Abigail Adams assimilated the role of taking care of vital decisions for her family, but could not do so with the British army closing in to their residence.

In this letter, Abigail Adams also discusses various events of the Revolutionary War and her opinions on them. It is clear that she developed an opinion about specific events of the time and relates those feelings toward her husband.[22] This is significant because it indicates that Abigail was well-versed in the political events of the time, which was unusual for a woman of that era. This is not fully demonstrated in 1776. Therefore, the producer was not capturing the full persona of Abigail Adams.

The second 1776 musical number in which Abigail Adams appears is “Yours, Yours, Yours,” and its reprise. In the song, Abigail discusses her loneliness while John is absent.[23] She embraced life somewhat as a “single” parent, but it continued to weigh on her that John was absent from not only her, but also her children. Through all of this, Abigail Adams is considered a “psychologically sophisticated adult who understood the sacrifices that love required.”[24] She supported her husband while he was away, even though her life at home was difficult. John Adams completed his work with the Continental Congress at the expense of Abigail’s feelings. This sacrifice by Abigail, in support of the Revolution, is not explored or portrayed in 1776.

One of the most important of Abigail Adams’ communications that 1776 left out was in her letter to John Adams while he was serving in Congress. It included a plea to “Remember the Ladies”, one of Abigail Adams’ most memorable statements of the era.[25] The producers of 1776 left out these important words, ignoring Abigail’s influence on her husband thus, on the Continental Congress. She was asking that the Founders keep women in mind, so they could create a “more generous and favorable” code of law toward women.[26] This omission portrays Abigail Adams as less than the influential woman she was of the time period.

Abigail Adams was a pioneer for women’s rights and independence. She considered that if a new government was to be formed, then women should be protected under the law.[27] With the onset of war, women had begun to fight to protect themselves against British troops that had been quartered forcefully into their homes. Women also began to invade military camps, even with the resentment of men, to aid in the effort of defeating the British.[28] Abigail Adams supported these efforts by continually having correspondence with John, making it clear she would not stand for the mistreatment that women had been enduring. She even claimed, “all men would be tyrants if they could.”[29]

Abigail Adams appears just three times throughout the musical 1776, seemingly when John Adams needs her the most. This role fits in with her persona because she understood that her husband had to serve his country.[30] This, however, is where the similarities between Abigail the person and Abigail the stage character stop. The stage character only scratches the surface of Abigail Adams’ presence and significance in American history.

The musical production of Hamilton originally had a role for Abigail Adams, but it was removed from the cast after a production reading. There was a song lyric in the production where Alexander Hamilton insulted Abigail Adams. However, during a production reading the statement in the line did not sit well with the audience. While the show’s creator Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote the line to be symmetrical with common insults found in the hip-hop music genre, it was obvious to Miranda that “no one messes with Abigail Adams. We won’t have it.”[31] Since Abigail Adams is considered such an extraordinary woman, people do not like seeing her ridiculed. Since there has been additional literature published about Abigail Adams after the production of 1776, the audience may not have appreciated the crude joke attempted by Miranda.

One of the reasons for the removal of the song is that the producers wanted to focus more on the important story at hand, that is, the character development of Alexander Hamilton.[32] This illustrates how women may only be present in historical entertainment for the benefit of developing the character of a male counterpart. If the audience did not like the insult of Abigail Adams, they did like her character. Thus, deleting her from the production of Hamilton was not due to bad writing, but for the purpose of focusing on men rather than accomplished women of the time period.

Even though the Abigail Adams character was present in both the 1776 and Hamilton productions, she is not characterized to the fullest extent. She is presented as the wife of John Adams, a character who misses him dearly, and in need of sewing needles. There could have been more added to her character to illustrate how her interactions with her husband helped him in his role in the founding of America. Even though Abigail Adams is one of the most well-known women of the Revolutionary Era, her historiography is still identified in context with John Adams. The male frame of reference regarding women’s biographies fails to give Revolutionary Era women their own platform within the historical context, not allowing her accomplishments and/or story to be her own.[33]

Martha Jefferson

In 1776 the character of Martha Jefferson is even less prominent than Abigail Adams. Martha was present in two scenes of 1776, and they were both based on her sexual relationship with Thomas Jefferson. The first time Martha Jefferson enters the stage, she does not say a word, and instead she kisses Thomas in a sensual manner.[34] In her second appearance, Martha discusses how attracted she is to her husband merely because of his ability to play the violin. The song is sprinkled with sexual innuendos that lead the audience to believe that Martha’s life and purpose was primarily sexual relations between her and Thomas Jefferson.[35]

While there is not much known about Martha Jefferson due to her early death, she was more than what 1776 portrays her to be. While men in the Revolutionary Era were away from their homes, either in battle or in government, women had to take over the daily tasks of running a family.[36] Evidence of this can be seen by Martha’s entries in the Monticello’s farm ledger, indicating that she was knowledgeable of farming operations and finances. This type of equal partnership of wives and their husbands was “otherwise unusual” within the business sector at that time.[37] Many women embraced “the new definition of womanhood” that came into existence during the Revolutionary War era.[38] Women took on many new roles during the Revolutionary Era due to the absence of men. Men were the heads of households, but now had to leave their families to take part in the war.[39] As Mary Beth Norton describes, this progress was a “necessary shift” of power “because of men’s prolonged absence from the home.” However, there is little evidence of this due to the lack of primary sources, such as the Monticello farm ledger, that indicates how women were forced to take on masculine roles within their households and communities.[40]

The events of the Continental Congress drew Thomas Jefferson away from his homestead. Like Abigail Adams, Martha Jefferson also grew weary of the prolonged absences of her husband, but took them in stride. The abundance of slaves on the Monticello estate allowed Martha to focus her attention elsewhere, such as the efforts of “ladies’ associations” throughout the colonies that supported the poorly-funded troops for the colonial army.[41]

Sadly, after Martha’s death, Thomas Jefferson destroyed all records of their marriage.[42] It is hard to decipher specific feelings or events that may have occurred between Martha and Thomas. There is no known portrait of Martha Jefferson, so all depictions of her appearance are just speculation.[43] This may be a reason why her appearance in 1776 is so short, because little is known about her. The production 1776 focuses on Martha Jefferson as a sexual being rather than a wife in her two minor appearances.

From what historians can decipher about Martha Jefferson, she is known to have been a quiet, passive woman. Author William Hyland argues that she is often overshadowed, because of other influential women like Abigail Adams. However, Martha Jefferson is still important to the story of the American Revolution because she “endured the Revolution as valiantly as some men.”[44] Understanding Martha Jefferson leads to a greater understanding of Thomas Jefferson and his “political journey.” If the perception of the character of Martha Jefferson was based on her character in 1776, there would be no depth to her existence or influence on what we know about Thomas Jefferson, because it was Martha who collected his correspondences.[45]

Elizabeth Schuyler Hamilton

Elizabeth Hamilton is the main female character in Hamilton. She plays a role in many scenes and musical numbers throughout the show. Her character is first introduced along with all her sisters early in Act I, in the “The Schuyler Sisters”. Miranda wrote this song late in the production of Hamilton. The musical producer of the show enjoyed the other songs of the Schuyler sisters so much, that he convinced Miranda to introduce their characters even earlier in the show.[46] Aaron Burr’s introduction in the song claims “Peggy, Angelica, and Eliza / Sneak into the city to watch all the guys at / Work.”[47]The line suggests that women historically watched men work, while they themselves sat on the sidelines. This line allows for development, or lack thereof, in the characters of the Schuyler sisters. Aaron Burr’s line suggests that these women were simple figures, and not of great importance to the story.

In “The Schuyler Sisters,” the audience is introduced to Elizabeth Hamilton’s motif: “Look around, look around at how / Lucky we are to be alive right now!”[48] She discusses her opportunity to live during the ever-changing world of the Revolutionary Era.[49] Women of this time realized that their lives were on the verge of changing, and it was all due to the independence movement. They were the lucky ones to witness this cultural change.

The story of Hamilton moves forward with telling how Alexander Hamilton and Elizabeth first met.[50] Through courting events like Hamilton’s “A Winter’s Ball”, men and women socialized in efforts to find a mate.[51] While men looked for women who could support their future household, women looked for a husband to have children with. It was a woman’s option to accept a man’s courting proposal. Even though it was the woman’s decision, she worked to accelerate the process as quickly as possible.[52] This was a way of life that only upper-class women knew. Having been born into the upper class, Elizabeth had the choice of who she wanted to marry. She decided to marry Alexander Hamilton.

This process of courting can be seen through Elizabeth’s song “Helpless.” The scene at the beginning of the song starts at the courting phase with Elizabeth and Alexander meeting at a social event. In the next verse, Alexander gains permission from General Schuyler for Elizabeth’s hand in marriage. Then the story quickly progresses to their marriage.[53] Miranda equates this song to Beyoncé’s “Crazy in Love,” to put a historical romance in a modern-day perspective. He does so to make it easier for the audience to understand the “18th-century social distinctions” between Elizabeth and Alexander Hamilton: the affluent, sweet girl who falls in love with a poor, “rough-around-the-edges boy.”[54] This also allows the audience to understand the social difference between Elizabeth and Alexander. Elizabeth could have had any man she wanted, but she chose a lower-class man, something that was out of the ordinary for the time period.

In an original draft of “Helpless,” Miranda wrote the line “I have never been the pretty one / Or the funny one / Or the witty one / I stayed on the side.” This was selling Elizabeth Hamilton’s character short to the audience, who were truly meeting her for the first time. Elizabeth is all that, and more.[55] Miranda goes as far as calling Elizabeth Hamilton the colonial “princess” because of her wealth, beauty, and character, all core attributes of a princess.[56] In life, Elizabeth was highly more sociable than her stage character portrays her. “Helpless” leads the audience to believe that she was always in the shadow of her sister, Angelica. This is far from the truth.

After Elizabeth and Alexander Hamilton wed, the war gains momentum, and Alexander joins the Revolutionary Army at the request of General George Washington.[57] Elizabeth appears briefly in “Stay Alive,” singing the song’s title.[58] Women of the Revolutionary Era felt the impacts of the war on their homelife, their daily routines were changed because of the absence of men.[59] While many women supported their husbands’ service in the war, Elizabeth Hamilton was an outlier who wrote to General Washington to send Alexander home, as reflected in the song “That Would Be Enough.”[60]

“That Would Be Enough” provokes the return of Elizabeth Hamilton’s motif, but with a different meaning in this context.[61] Elizabeth states she is glad that Alexander is alive, when so many men are dying at war. The audience gets a first glimpse into the depth of love Elizabeth feels for Alexander. Act II forces Elizabeth to realize just how much Alexander Hamilton is “non-stop.” Once the Hamilton’s’ first child, Philip, appears in the picture, Elizabeth wants Alexander to “take a break” from Congress.[62] Coming from an urban, affluent family, Elizabeth Hamilton did not understand Alexander’s need to work for success. She continues to beg him to take a break and join her and her family in upstate New York. Elizabeth wanted to have the family together since Angelica Schuyler was coming back to the newly formed United States of America.[63]

While Elizabeth Hamilton joined the rest of her family in upstate New York, Alexander stayed at home. This time apart is when the Reynolds affair happened. Alexander Hamilton worked to clear his conscious by publishing the Reynolds Pamphlet, an account of the events that took place between Maria Reynolds and himself during the affair. Because everyone now knew of Alexander’s infidelity, Elizabeth burned all of the letters between her and her husband.[64] “Burn” becomes the climax of the show, with the realization that Alexander will never be satisfied. The absence of Elizabeth Hamilton’s letters from history gave Miranda the freedom to write a narrative about her and a “dramatic action” about the way she virtually erased herself from history.[65]

While women of the Revolutionary Era knew they were making history, they were also conscious of how they could be involved in the events of the time. Elizabeth Hamilton chose to physically “erase herself from the narrative” by burning off her correspondences.[66] This allowed her to construct her legacy how she pleases. Commonly, biographies of women have only been based within existing biographies of men. To Alfred Young, this standard “fails to give equal attention or significance to women’s identity within their own female world.”[67] By burning her letters, Elizabeth Hamilton ceased to allow this to happen to her when she is gone. She attempted to remove herself from future stories about Alexander Hamilton and the Reynolds affair.

Unlike many other musicals, Elizabeth Hamilton, a secondary character, ends the show, singing about the way she finishes Alexander Hamilton’s life story after he is gone. In this song, Elizabeth “speak(s) out against slavery.”[68] Historian David Waldstreicher notes that this is not uncommon. Authors of the Founders’ Chic era often employ the idea of slavery in order to improve “the character of their heroes.”[69] Slavery is mentioned in Hamilton only to make Alexander Hamilton seem like the good guy through the story of his life.[70] While Elizabeth Hamilton is given the stage to tell all that she did to revitalize Alexander Hamilton’s reputation, there is no discussion regarding the hardships she went through after his death. Elizabeth lived in poverty for many years after becoming a widow.[71]

Elizabeth Hamilton is the main female character of Hamilton, receiving more attention than other women in the musical, but her character is still not portrayed in the best light. Elizabeth’s stage character is that of an affluent, careful woman, who fell in love with a street boy. Eventually her heart is broken by her husband Alexander, but she forgives him after his death. In life, Elizabeth Hamilton was a socialite who was excited for adventure, and Hamilton does not give justice to that aspect of her. It seems that Elizabeth only exists within the story of Hamilton to add drama, considering the story related in Act II regarding the Reynolds Pamphlet. Were Elizabeth Hamilton not present within the production, there would be no downfall of Alexander Hamilton’s character. She is only written into the musical to add drama for the audience.

Angelica Schuyler Church

Elizabeth Hamilton had an older sister named Angelica Schuyler. Throughout the Hamilton musical, Angelica’s character is portrayed as the wittiest and most outspoken of the three Schuyler sisters. She seems to have a big personality that is introduced through the song “The Schuyler Sisters”, where Angelica takes the lead. She escorts her two younger sisters to the center of New York City to experience the growth of American culture.[72] When Aaron Burr tries to approach these women, Angelica Schuyler replies to him using a line from Thomas Paine’s Common Sense. This indicated that she was a politically engaged woman, which was unusual for the time period.[73] Being raised in an urban culture, Angelica did not have to spend her time performing the many chores required on rural farms. Rather, she could submerse herself in reading, and did so with new literature and publications that were present during the Revolutionary Era.[74] Angelica Schuyler’s motif first appears in the show during the “The Schuyler Sisters” song but is different from that of Elizabeth Hamilton. While Elizabeth Hamilton’s motif is a statement on freedom and gratitude, Angelica Schuyler’s is simply her name.[75]

Musical motifs are given to a character so that the audience can learn more about the person in question, without having to waste dialogue. Knowing that Elizabeth Hamilton’s motif is a statement about being alive leads the audience to know that she enjoys life during the Revolutionary Era. Angelica Schuyler’s motif speaks to how confident she is within herself. She is upfront about who she is and announces that she is present. The reason why these two women receive motifs within Hamilton is because of their importance to Alexander Hamilton’s story. These female characters are only present to support the storyline of the men in the show.

Angelica Schuyler’s self-confidence is contradicted in her next musical number. Immediately after “Helpless,” the stage physically turns and rewinds itself to depict the same chain of events, but from Angelica’s point-of-view with the song “Satisfied.” The same choreography is performed, but it is now a different perspective.[76] The term “satisfied” can take on many meanings, as it does in this song: “sexually, emotionally, and financially.” These have a particular impact within the show because of their relationship to the character of Alexander Hamilton.[77] Angelica Schuyler admits to falling in love with Alexander from the moment she met him, but knew he was poor.[78] During this time period it was common for the first daughter of any family to marry a man more affluent than her, in order to protect the family’s assets. A woman would not be required to include land in her dowry if the man was able to do so.[79] This is why Angelica Schuyler gratefully permitted Alexander Hamilton to marry her younger sister Elizabeth, but stating “at least I keep his eyes in (her) life.”[80]

Although Angelica Schuyler was married, her infatuation with Alexander did not stop. The audience gets a glimpse into this through “Take a Break,” where the flirting between the two characters is obvious through their correspondence, based on real letters between the pair.[81] Chernow claims that Alexander Hamilton was involved in two affairs: one with Maria Reynolds and another with Angelica Schuyler. Angelica is closer in intelligence level to Alexander than Elizabeth, resulting in an “emotional and intellectual” affair, but an affair nonetheless.[82] The discussion between Angelica and Alexander regarding the changing placements of commas in their letters, to change the meaning of phrases, is an example of the plausibility of this emotional affair.[83]

At the beginning of Hamilton, Angelica is portrayed as a charismatic woman that is a typical older sister protecting her younger ones. As the show progresses the audience sees that Angelica Schuyler has underlying emotions towards Alexander Hamilton. This dwindles the historical portrayal of Angelica to a stereotypical scorned lover of someone she cannot have. The producers lose the history of Angelica Schuyler as a companion to Hamilton through his toughest times, as indicated by the correspondences between the pair. It appears that Angela’s character was written into Hamilton to add more turmoil to Alexander’s downfall, while allowing the audience to question characters’ intentions through the show.

Margarita “Peggy” Schuyler Van Rensselaer

The most unknown Schuyler sister is Peggy. She was the youngest of the three sisters, and throughout Hamilton, is only present for one song, “The Schuyler Sisters.” She is the only sister who does not develop a motif. This is because she is virtually absent for the rest of the show. Peggy Schuyler died young, so her story does not continue.[84] There are no historical writings left behind by Peggy herself, so the only information known is from other writings during this time period.[85]

The only knowledge gained by the audience of Hamilton about Peggy Schuyler is from the musical number “The Schuyler Sisters,” in which Peggy has a few solo lines.[86] The first two, “Daddy said to be home by sundown / Daddy said not to go downtown” plays into her being the youngest sibling of the group. She hides in the shadows of her elder sisters, trying to listen to her father, the head of the household in this Revolutionary Era family. Her last line is “It’s bad enough daddy wants to go to war / It’s bad enough there’ll be violence on our shores.”[87] This particular exchange shows that while she was the younger sister of two outspoken women, she still possesses her own personality and opinions, even though those ideas are commonly masculine ones. The masculine issues, such as war and politics, play as main plot lines in Hamilton. While commonly feminine ideas, such as love and sex, are secondary plot points. When Peggy Schuyler states these masculine ideas in the show, she is silenced because there are “New ideas in the air / Look around.”[88]

There is only a minor presence of Peggy Schuyler in Hamilton. Lin-Manuel Miranda states, “Poor Peggy – she doesn’t stick around the story long enough to merit a musical motif. She married rich and died young, in case you were wondering where she is in Act II.”[89] While historical information regarding Peggy Schuyler is hard to come by, there is still some narrative written about her. In his novel, Alexander Hamilton, Rob Chernow tells the reader about this forgotten Schuyler sister, including a story about a time when Peggy single-handedly defended the Schuyler family against a group of Tories that sneaked into their house.[90]

The portrayal of Peggy Schuyler in Hamilton is lacking in content because, through Chernow’s work, one can discern a masculine character in her based on her interests and relationship with Alexander Hamilton. As portrayed in Hamilton, Peggy had interests that were typically not “female”, like war.[91] In the beginning of Alexander and Elizabeth Hamilton’s relationship, Alexander often confided in Peggy, through his letters, that he was of Elizabeth and told Peggy he was making her his “first confidant” about those feelings.[92] This side of Peggy Schuyler’s historical person is lost in her brief appearance in Hamilton.

Maria Reynolds

Maria Reynolds is at the center of the cause of Alexander Hamilton’s downfall. When Elizabeth and the rest of the Hamilton family left for a family vacation, Alexander stayed behind to focus on his work. He was seduced by Maria, who claimed that her husband had left her, and she was lonely. This is told through the song “Say No to This.”[93] After the first consensual sexual encounter, Maria Reynolds’ husband began using her to extort money from Alexander Hamilton. Maria was essentially forced by her husband to continue the affair with Alexander for the profit. This argument is present within the historical narrative based on a letter from Maria to Alexander during this extramarital affair. This correspondence was included in the Reynolds Pamphlet: “Oh my God I feel more for you than myself and wish I had never born to give you so mutch unhappisness (sic).”[94]

The Reynolds Pamphlet goes into great detail about Maria Reynolds’ involvement in the affair and extortion of money from Hamilton. This affair is included in Hamilton during the number “The Reynolds Pamphlet.”[95] Alexander claimed that Maria’s “violent attachment” to him did not permit him to end the relationship. Her letters to Alexander Hamilton kept him attached, since she seemed to be a “woman truly fond and neglected.”[96] This view from Hamilton leads the audience to believe that the Reynolds affair was a ploy by Maria Reynolds and her husband to extract money from Hamilton.

This extortion affair was not the idea of two people, rather, it was forced. Historian John Miller describes Maria’s husband as using her as “delectable bait” for Alexander Hamilton, for the purpose of blackmail, so Maria Reynold’s husband could gain some money.[97] This controlling relationship between Maria Reynolds and her husband was not uncommon in the Revolutionary Era. Once a woman married, she became the property of her mate, and everything of hers was at the husband’s disposal.[98] While sexual affairs during this time period were more common than in years past, the forcing of sexual gratification towards others was not.[99]

In the beginning of the Revolutionary Era, women were held tight under the control of their husbands. Couples were always together, so it was easy for men to keep authority over their wives. Due to the separation of wives from their husbands because of the events of the period, women gained new freedoms not experienced before. Only when husbands were absent from the everyday lives of their wives did women’s rights evolve with more freedoms than in the past.[100]

Sally Hemings

Sally Hemings, while not playing a big role in Hamilton, did play a major role in the historiography of Thomas Jefferson. Sally was moved to the plantation of Monticello in 1774.[101] Her placement on the farm is one of speculation,because it is not well-documented. By 1873, Sally Hemings’ son published an article in a local Ohio newspaper, claiming that his father was Thomas Jefferson.[102] He stated that his mother became Jefferson’s mistress during a trip to France, and enticed her to return with him by promising freedom for her children. Shortly after their return to the United States, Sally gave birth to her first of six children fathered by Thomas.[103]

Sally Hemings appears once in Hamilton. Her history is summed up with one line of Hamilton in “What’d I Miss?,” placed in the historical timeline of when Jefferson returned from France. He asks: “There’s a letter on my desk from the President / Haven’t even put my bags down yet / Sally be a lamb, darlin’, won’tcha open it?”[104] Though Sally Hemings played a large role in Thomas Jefferson’s life, it is all dwindled down to one line within the show; she is overlooked.

When Sally Hemings returned from France, she seemingly returned to “the duties of an enslaved household servant and lady’s maid.”[105] However, Sally’s personal quarters were moved to be located next to those of Thomas Jefferson. This was only recently discovered by archaeologists using manuscripts to locate the room beneath the existing floors and walls of Monticello.[106] For years, Sally’s relationship with Jefferson was dismissed as false, most claiming that Jefferson was too good of a man to have relations with an African-American slave.[107]

The drastic increase of the African-American population in the colonies in the 18th century changed the dynamics between slave and master. The master needed to define power hierarchies due to the rising slave demographic, and usually did so through “sexual controls.” There was a double standard among colonists. Caucasian women were barred from having sexual relations with African Americans, but Caucasian men were completely free to do so. Many masters saw these slave women as economic bonuses, since they could produce more slaves through childbearing.[108]

One cannot fault the producers of Hamilton for the lack of pre-existing historical materials to represent Sally Hemings, but her character was not well-developed. The idea of slavery is highly downplayed in the musical, only getting attention when it can either “upraise the character of their heroes, and diss their flawed characters.”[109] It may have been more appropriate for the producers to leave the character of Sally Hemings out of the entire musical, than to be criticized for their portrayal of her character. Sally is portrayed as a willing participant in a one-sided sexual relationship.

Conclusion

The portrayals of the women presented in 1776 and Hamilton are historically lacking. Because both productions are centered on the achievements of men, the women are “reduced to a derivative place as a woman in a man’s world.”[110] These women have all had an impact, not only on the men they interacted with, but also on the American Revolution as a whole. Allowing them to be overshadowed completely by the male characters infers to the audience that women did not play an important role in the Era at all.

These two historical musical productions seem to favor some women partially, while giving the portrayal of others not as much attention. Hamilton does have many female characters throughout the show, but none of their stories seem to be told in full. 1776 has a better telling of Abigail Adams than Martha Jefferson. However, Martha Jefferson’s character is poorly developed. This bias of minimizing a woman’s story appears to have nothing to do with the size of the historiography available for a character, rather how much drama she can add to a show. For example, there are many letters of Abigail Adams questioning political events of the Era, but none are included in 1776 because they neither add drama, nor progress the storyline of the men of the show.

History critics are known to question both 1776 and Hamilton on their accuracy of the historiography they are attempting to play out.[111] And, both musicals do have their flaws. Hamilton, for example, can be regarded as only an idea of what the audience would like Alexander to be, not the actual truth to the story.[112] It is not a problem to question the historical accuracy of a musical production. It is a way to “reflect critically on what cultural work (the show) may be doing, for good and ill.”[113]

Miranda does bring to the reader’s attention in Hamilton the Revolution that it is impossible for anyone to know the full story of events that took place during past time periods. This allows musical producers to have the freedom to eliminate to add something to the narrative to produce a more entertaining show. For example, the heightening of Martha Jefferson’s sexual characteristics in 1776 allows an audience to feel something for Thomas Jefferson as he is torn away from Martha Jefferson for so long. The deletion of Peggy Schuyler from Hamilton in Act II allows the producers to play more into the idea of Alexander Hamilton and Angelica Schuyler being enthralled with each other. To the writers of broadway shows, historical accuracy does not matter as much to them because they are creating a show that will bring in audiences, and therefore, money.

Both musicals are simply productions, someone’s view on the history behind the chosen plot. It “focuses on human drama above all else.”[114] Since the main character is male in both productions, ideas that were commonly “masculine” were the focus of the show, such as war and politics. That caused typically “feminine” ideas to play only minor parts of the show, such as love, sex, and family.[115] This may explain why all female characters are secondary to their male counterparts in these productions.

Miranda has been quoted as saying that “(he) wants historians to take (Hamilton) seriously.”[116] That is why he put so much work into it, even with its historical inaccuracies. But through the veil of historical inaccuracies, is there a broader significance missing? Hamilton and 1776 are musical productions, that is, art by association.[117] There are common limitations that any piece of art may encounter. Their limitation is the available scholarly writing.

Pre-20th century historical writings see a scarce amount of women who have been highly researched. Alfred Young claims that male historians refuse “to take women seriously as a category worthy of research,” and that is why women have been “all but invisible.”[118] Not researching women seriously has allowed the idea of gendered-roles to continue through the historiography of the Revolution, and is why we have poor representation of women in historical musical productions such as 1776 and Hamilton. Even though the producers are the ones that write the show, they had to base their research on the available sources in the history field. It is not the producers’ fault that these women have been portrayed so poorly, the fault rests on the historians who refuse to improve the historical content that is available for these women, both as individuals and for the gender as a whole.

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  4. “The Role of the Producer in Theatre,” Lionheart Theatre Company, accessed December 4, 2018, http://lionhearttheatre.org/the-role-of-the-producer-in-theatre/. ↑

  5. Coverture is the way a woman become one with her husband upon marriage. In the legal system, a woman was not identified as her own person; she did not exist without her husband. Thomas G. West, Vindicating the Founders: Race, Sex, Class, and Justice in the Origins of America, (Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 1997), 100. ↑

  6. Catherine Allgor, “Remember…I’m Your Man: Masculinity, Marriage, and Gender in Hamilton,” in Historians on Hamilton: How a Blockbuster Musical Is Restaging America’s Past, ed. Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter, (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2018), 95-6. ↑

  7. Alfred F. Young and Gregory H. Nobles, Whose American Revolution Was It?: Historians Interpret the Founding, (New York: New York University Press, 2001), 229. ↑

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  52. Elizabeth Maurer, “Courtship and Marriage in the Eighteenth Century,” Colonial Williamsburg Interpreter, Winter 1997. ↑

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  99. Richard Godbeer, Sexual Revolution in Early America, (Baltimore: John Hopkins University Press, 2002), 15. ↑

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  103. Madison Hemings, “Life among the Lowly, No. 1,” Pike County Republican (Waverly, Ohio), March 13, 1873. ↑

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  106. M. Andrew Holowchak and Vivienne Kelley, “Monticello Claims to Have Found Sally Hemings’s Room. Is This True?” Columbian College of Arts & Sciences. May 16, 2018, https://historynewsnetwork.org/article/168841. ↑

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  108. Richard Solomon, “Sexual Practice and Fantasy in Colonial America and the Early Republic,” Indiana University Journal of Undergraduate Research, accessed November 14, 2018, file:/// home/chronos/u-e27125c37cadd97072ff4f7028e7f2707182ef2f/Downloads/23364-Article%20Text-55389-2-10-20180218.pdf. ↑

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  113. Hogeland, “From Ron Chernow’s Alexander Hamilton to Hamilton, 35. ↑

  114. Joanne B. Freeman, “Can We Get Back to Politics? Please?’: Hamilton’s missing Politics,” in Historians on Hamilton: How a Blockbuster Musical Is Restaging America’s Past, Ed. Renee C. Romano and Claire Bond Potter, (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2018), 43. ↑

  115. Allgor, “Remember…I’m Your Man,” 98. ↑

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