With desolate eyes, Alexander continued. “You must believe I tried to set him right. I told Philip it was ill-mannered to accost a man in the middle of a play and that he must apologize. I told him he wouldn’t want this man’s blood on his hands. I thought that would end the matter. I thought . . .” My husband’s head dropped. “Next I heard, the apology hadn’t been accepted and Philip was already rowing across the river to the dueling place. There was no time to do anything but race to find a doctor . . .” His voice broke off then, as if he could say no more. And yet, he did. “Why couldn’t I stop this from happening? I’ve stopped armies but I couldn’t stop a duel.”
My anger ebbed at the sight of his anguish. In its place, regret and pity rushed in for a father unable to save his son. My husband had led troops, advised a president, and built a nation, but he’d been powerless in that moment when it mattered most.
And now, from that prodigious mind, always spinning with plans and schemes, came an eerie vacancy. From that eloquent mouth, always arguing, proposing, and teasing, came a humbled silence. From those tireless hands, constantly scribbling out letters and essays and proposals, came only stillness.
And so, together, we were both vacant, silent, and still.
Our boy was dead. Dead for his own hubris, having initiated both a confrontation and a duel. I thought we’d taught him better. And it poured more sorrow into the bitter cup from which I was now forced to drink. All I had for consolation was the knowledge that he’d stood brave on that field, and that he hadn’t taken a life. Instead, he’d let a villain shoot him so he could keep his honor.
*
Never did I see a man so completely overwhelmed with grief as Hamilton has been.
—ROBERT TROUP
Winter 1801
Albany
“When is Philip coming home?”
The question came in the middle of the night, spoken by my seventeen-year-old daughter with a lantern in her hand. Disoriented and blinking against sleep, I was actually convinced for a moment that we’d come to the Pastures ahead of my eldest son. That he’d caught the next sloop, and would be with us by dawn. Then the crushing reality overtook me with all its accompanying heartbreak.
We’d buried Philip in the yard of Trinity Church, where, in dropping a handful of dirt onto our son’s casket in farewell, Hamilton faltered and was kept upright only by our friends. That was weeks ago. Since then, Papa had sent a coach to fetch us to Albany where he might care for us himself. In truth, I think it eased his own grief in the loss of Mama to tend us in our grief for Philip, a grief which Papa of course shared and, as a father who himself had survived several of his children, one which he understood.
But even as Alexander and I struggled to pull ourselves from bed and force small morsels of food down our throats, Ana now seemed to be caught in some blissful waking dream in which she believed Philip was still very much alive.
Throwing the blankets aside, Alexander rose from the bed to embrace her. “Philip has gone to heaven, my darling girl. A haven of eternal repose and felicity.”
Ana’s expression crumpled. “No. He’s only gone riding just this morning. I made a pie for his breakfast. Remember?”
She didn’t know where we were. She didn’t know when we were. She didn’t remember that Philip was dead. Truly, she didn’t. So for the next hour, she sat on our bed and asked question after question about how Philip died, her grief as fresh and raw as if she was reliving the nightmare.
And we lived it all again with her.
Worrying for my health and that of our unborn baby, Alexander insisted I go back to sleep and led Ana out of the room. But I awakened to the sound of splashing water in the upstairs hall, my daughter singing with her aunt Angelica. In coming with us to the Pastures, my sister had left her own husband and children behind to offer comfort to mine; now I found that Angelica had Ana in a copper tub and was brushing her hair as if she were still a very little girl. “You’ll feel better soon, my darling. Especially after a fresh, clean bath.”
“But when is Philip coming home?” Ana asked, and I put a hand to my mouth, grateful for my sister’s help and wondering how many times I would have to remind my daughter that Philip was dead.
Standing beside me, his face strongly stamped with grief, eyes downcast, as if staring into a bottomless pit of despair, my husband put a hand on my shoulder. “Let her believe whatever she must. Her mind has become disordered by the wound. We must let it heal.”
The disordering wasn’t entirely new or caused only by this wound. Now I saw Ana’s distress when Fanny had been taken from us in a new light. The depth and intensity of my daughter’s confusion was so much worse now than it was then, and in my grief and despair, it was terrifying. But because I felt as if my own mind had become disordered by the wound of Philip’s loss, I could scarcely gainsay my husband. None of us would.