In early December 1780, Alexander Hamilton finally received leave from his position on Gen. Washington's staff as an aide-de-camp, and headed north to Albany, NY to marry his fiancee Elizabeth Schuyler. It was his first leave away from the army since accepting his position in 1777. The young lieutenant colonel had performed his responsibilities so well that he'd become virtually indispensable to the general, who only grudgingly granted permission, and only for a few short weeks at that.
The wedding was a small family affair, with the service taking place in the parlor of The Pastures, the Schuyler family home overlooking the Hudson River. There are no surviving records of what either the bride or groom wore for the ceremony, or for the celebration that likely took place afterwards. The description of Eliza's gown that you'll find in my historical novel I, ELIZA HAMILTON is drawn from a suggestion for bridal dress for a fashionable winter wedding in a 1780 copy of The Lady's Magazine, the Georgian precursor of Vogue, and I also consulted with Janea Whitacre, the Mistress of the Mantua-making Trade at Colonial Williamsburg.
In a letter written to Eliza shortly before Alexander embarked for Albany, he asked if she'd prefer him to wear his uniform for the wedding, or civilian clothes. Alas, there's no surviving reply from her, so it's unknown which choice she made. I'm guessing that she chose his military attire, given that it was a war-time wedding.
None of Alexander's uniforms from the Revolution are known to survive today. Uniforms from the war saw considerable hard wear, and there are only a handful from the entire Continental Army that still exist. Among them is the uniform, above left, that was worn by another of Washington's aides-de-camp, and one of Alexander's close friends, Lieutenant Colonel Tench Tilghman (1744-1786) of Maryland. Shown on a museum mannequin, the uniform is missing some key elements: the white linen shirt, gold officer's epaulettes, a sword and sword belt, boots, cocked black hat, and the green ribbon sash worn by members of the general's staff. The portrait, above right, shows Gen. Washington himself, with the Marquis de Lafayette in the middle, and Lt. Col. Tilghman to the right, all in uniform.
Alexander likely wore a very similar uniform for his wedding, and the not-terribly-flattering miniature portrait of Alexander, below left, shows him in uniform from about the same time. This may be the miniature that Alexander sent to Eliza at her request.
In any event, the epaulettes shown in the photo lower right did in fact belong to Alexander, and may well have been the same ones shown in the miniature portrait. Epaulettes were a relatively new feature of military dress in the 1770s, and were worn to make officers more visible to their men in battle. They were also considered to have less of the aristocratic baggage of the ribbons and sashes traditionally worn by British officers, and were embraced by the Continental Army as being more democratic.
I saw Alexander's epaulettes on display at the American Revolution Museum at Yorktown, VA. Even though the gallery was in half-light to protect the artifacts (and make photos fuzzy!), the gold bullion still glittered despite being more the two centuries old. Imagine how those golden epaulettes and rows of polished buttons must have sparkled on Alexander's coat in the sunny parlor during the wedding, and imagine, too, how wonderfully dazzled Eliza must have been by her groom. Ahh, the sartorial power of a man in uniform....
Above left: Uniform worn by Lt. Col. Tench Tilghman, c1777. Above right: Washington, Lafayette, and Tilghman at Yorktown, by Charles Willson Peale, 1784. Both collection of Maryland Historical Society. Lower left: Miniature portrait of Lt. Col. Alexander Hamilton, by Charles Willson Peale, 1777, Museum of the City of New York. Lower right: Epaulettes Belonging to Alexander Hamilton, c1777-1783, The Society of the Cincinnati.
Read more about Eliza Schuyler and Alexander Hamilton in my historical novel, I, Eliza Hamilton. My latest historical novel, The Secret Wife of Aaron Burr, is now available everywhere. Order here.
