My Dear Hamilton

by Stephanie Dray

  Even amongst the Six Nations. And I might’ve been more sure of the success of our mission were it not for the fact that the most distinguished Mohawk had not responded to the messengers with the wampum belts. No Seneca. Next to no Cayuga. Only a hundred Onondaga. Disappointed and alarmed, I said to my father, “They won’t even meet with us.”

  Papa squeezed my hand. “There are nearly eight hundred, Betsy. It’ll be enough for word to get to the others.”

  Finally, the ceremony commenced on the common; the Indians arranged themselves in a circle by nation and clan, sitting on the ground upon blankets and furs, men on one side, women on the other, chairs left for the commissioners, and for me.

  In the center, a large pot of meat broth boiled away over a fire. And as a pledge of sincerity, three elderly chiefs delivered to Papa and Lafayette a belt of wampum much more intricate than any I’d seen before, curiously worked with porcupine quills, and handsomely painted.

  When it was my father’s turn to speak, he didn’t dissemble. He merely explained that the King of England was an ocean away and would abandon his Iroquois allies when the Americans won this war. That if the Six Nations didn’t bury their war ax now, they’d soon find themselves facing a new American nation that would treat them as enemies.

  I worried that he would press them too hard, but those who sat nearest to the fire—the Oneida and the Tuscarora—my father praised for maintaining the neutrality they’d once promised. And he pledged our friendship and protection.

  That was all he was permitted to say for the time being. These tawny-skinned people of the longhouse abided by strict rules and rituals, and it was now time to dance.

  An Oneida clan mother named Two Kettles Together approached me, bells in hand. “Are you not One-of-us?”

  She was one of those who had adopted me into the Six Nations. And grinning that she’d remembered me after all these years, I readily fastened the bells on my ankles.

  “I am so happy to see you,” I said, introducing her to Lafayette as a warrior in her own right, who had fought at Oriskany. Armed with two pistols, she’d reloaded her husband’s weapons when he—wounded—couldn’t do it for himself.

  “Like Joan de Arc!” Lafayette exclaimed, in warm greeting. “A French warrior woman. I have an ancestor who fought beside her. Perhaps one day, you should fight beside me.”

  “If you are lucky,” Two Kettles Together said with a shrewd little smile, before taking my hand and pulling me into the dance, where the Indians united by hands and jumped round the pot that hung over the fire, animated by the music of a small drum. One of the chiefs likewise took Lafayette by the hand and danced him round the circle, too. Another blackened Papa’s face with grease from a pot. Whether this was a trick to excite a laugh, or a part of their actual national ceremony, I didn’t know.

  But my very dignified father did not like it.

  And yet, Lafayette insisted he must also have his face greased!

  Apparently charmed by his boisterous participation, the Iroquois adopted Lafayette, too, with a new name. Kayewla. Fearsome horseman.

  I knew this was partly because they liked him and mostly because he was a representative of France. Too many of our fellow Americans dismissed the sons of the forest as simple savages, but we who lived so near to the Six Nations knew better. They were not to be trifled with or tricked. Other Indians lived in fear and dread of them. What the Six Nations wanted was a balance of power in the region. If they couldn’t have it with the King of England, they’d seek it with the King of France, with the Marquis de Lafayette as the conduit.

  And because I was hopeful that peace between our peoples could be achieved, I stayed late with the women, who danced, ate soup, and drank rum. I was quiet, listening to those who didn’t realize I understood their language enough to overhear something not meant for my ears.

  Two Onondaga women complained of going through the motions of this treaty convention. It was a sham, they said, meant only to raise our hopes. I pretended at fascination with the dance, softly clapping my hands. Only when it would draw no notice did I make ready to return to Papa’s side and warn him.

  But when Two Kettles Together rose to walk with me, I feared she knew that I understood. And for a fleeting moment, I felt in the gravest danger of my life.

  A feeling that lessened only a little when she whispered, “You know now that the Onondaga cannot be trusted. Tell your company to be on its guard. I’ve heard talk of a spy in the neighborhood who has eyes on your father and, especially, your Frenchman.”

  Sweat beaded upon my nape as I remembered at least two prior occasions when the British sent agents to kidnap or assassinate my father. With damp palms, I squinted in the dim light of the fire, daring a glance at the faces around it, suspicious and mistrustful of everyone. I suppose Papa would be flattered to know he was, even stripped of command, still in their sights. But the marquis was the more valuable prize. “Do they mean to kill him?”

  “I don’t know the plan,” she said. “Only that the British have put a target on his back, and the arrow man is near . . .”

  * * *

  “MADEMOISELLE, YOU ARE a most excellent patriot,” Lafayette said when I returned to the safety of Johnston Hall, where I reported everything.

  To my surprise, the Frenchman seemed sanguine. “It is good you learn of all this in secret while all eyes were upon your father and me. You have been an essential asset to the cause.”

  It was flattery—French flattery at that!—and I wanted to believe it was true.

  But I was crestfallen at the certain failure of our mission, and worried, too.

  “The British aren’t the only ones who have spies,” Papa said to reassure me. “I can say with confidence that the man they’ve sent to make trouble is Major Carleton, the nephew of the Canadian Governor. I suspected he was in the area incognito to suborn the Indians who are friendlier to us. Now we have better reason to think so.”

  I bit my lower lip, thinking it quite a risk for such a prominent British officer and gentleman to take; even if he was not an assassin or kidnapper, if he was caught in disguise he could be hanged as a spy. And perhaps that’s what Lafayette had in mind when he said, “I shall offer a reward of fifty guineas to anyone who will bring him to me alive.” Then, almost as an afterthought, he added, “And since there are Indians who are friendly to us, I will offer them, and only them, trading posts and protection.”

  “But might not attempts to divide them further provoke those who are against us, ending our hopes to get the Six Nations to remain neutral?” I dared to ask.

  Lafayette nodded. “If we cannot get neutrality, perhaps we get something better.”

  At the next day’s council, the Indians were in an uproar, all pretense of accord abandoned. For the magnificent chieftain, Grasshopper, of the Oneida, rose to address the warrior class. “By refusing to make peace, you sow the seeds of your own destruction. You have forced us all to terrible choices. Now, instead of being strong as six arrows all together that cannot be broken, we are in splinters!”

  Six arrows. The Seneca, Cayuga, Onondaga, Mohawk, Oneida, and Tuscarora. Together, they’d formed a confederacy older than Great Britain.

  The chief turned to my father. “The Oneida and Tuscarora will not remain neutral.” Amidst murmurs and shouts, I nearly gasped as Grasshopper raised his voice over the fray. “We say to our brethren, the Americans, that we, too, are a free people with absolute notions of liberty. And we will join your cause and pledge to be buried in the same graves with you or to share in the fruits of your victories and peace.”

  The impact of the moment resounded in my bones.

  I wasn’t alone. Lafayette didn’t hide his tears as he rose. “This man possesses the dignity of a Roman senator. The philosopher Rousseau speaks truly of man’s nobility in his state of nature. For here, as much as any place in America, has taught me that we are, all of us, and of right, to be free.”

  That very day, the Oneida promised to send warr
iors to join Washington’s army at Valley Forge and a clan mother with white corn to help feed the starving soldiers, and teach them how to prepare it so they wouldn’t get sick from eating it dry.

  We had meant to secure neutrality. Instead, we came away with allies, warriors, and food. Though Papa was wary, Lafayette thought it a triumph. Perhaps not as glorious as victory upon a battlefield, but a triumph that would redound to both Lafayette’s and Washington’s credit and help win the war.

  As for me, I was so stunned by what had taken place that I allowed myself a sip of rum that night at the campfire when Lafayette offered it to me.

  And then I coughed on it.

  Which brought a guffaw from the Frenchman. “Do you dislike the taste of rum, Mademoiselle Schuyler?”

  My eyes watered as I struggled to answer.

  He laughed again. “You and I can speak candidly, now that we are kin. Nous sommes une famille, comme frère et soeur.”

  “Pardon?” I asked, hoarsely.

  “We are sister and brother, yes? Having been adopted by the Indians. We are both savages, you and me.” Lafayette said this word as if it were more glorious than his noble title. But then, as if fearing I didn’t understand, he added, “The Iroquois forests are peopled by my friends; to me, the despots of Europe are the true savages.” He leaned in with a grin. “After we leave this place, come to Washington’s headquarters at Valley Forge with me.”

  I blinked. “Whatever for?”

  “Because you shall have a bevy of admirers. I would even count myself amongst them.”

  Fearing that the Frenchman, despite being married, meant to press an improper flirtation upon me, I’m afraid I was quite tart. “I do not think even with your encouragement that my father would consent for me to become a camp follower.”

  Lafayette threw up his hands. “Mon Dieu! I suggest nothing dishonorable. Men like me, the wilds remind us that when stripped of luxuries and titles, we are all the same but for our honor.” With that, Lafayette’s chin gestured in the direction of my father. “And weary men of honor need to be reminded of what they fight for. Come with me to Washington’s camp, ma chère Mademoiselle Schuyler. You and your father, who may be safer in a military camp than facing spies and treachery on his own.”

  I was touched by Lafayette’s concern for my father. And just then, across the campfire I spied Two Kettles Together, who went where she pleased, wore what she pleased, did what she pleased, and fought when she pleased. I knew that if it were my choice, I would go with Lafayette. But it was not my choice. “You forget the matter of Papa’s court-martial . . .”

  “Bah! The stain on your father’s name will be lifted soon enough. Now that France is involved, the war will be so swiftly over, you will miss it all if you do not come.”

  I hoped Lafayette was right that the war would be over swiftly, and when it was finally time for us to part ways, I said, “Farewell, General. I hope to see you again soon.”

  “You will. I am certain of it.”

  But in the end, Lafayette was wrong. My father’s court-martial didn’t take place until autumn. I wouldn’t see the eccentric young Frenchman again for another three years.

  And even then, the war was far from over.

  Chapter Five

  June 1778

  Albany

  MAMA WAS DANGEROUSLY ill, burning with fever in the confines of her curtained bed, pale and weak as a lamb. Though my father was sometimes afflicted by bilious fevers and gout, my sturdy mother’s Dutch constitution had seemed a shield against every ailment.

  Every ailment but one.

  Childbirth. The most dangerous female ailment of all. And even though none of us spoke the words aloud as my mother tossed upon her fevered bed, we all feared it might claim Mama and her baby, too.

  After a difficult delivery, Mama presented my father with a frightfully little infant son. As was the custom, we’d celebrated the birth with sweet pastries and cinnamon caudle, but Mama had been too sick to take part. And now, only weeks later, her milk had dried up.

  Because none of our servants were breeding, we had no wet nurse. Nor could I coax the babe to suck cow’s, sheep’s, or goat’s milk from a cloth. As the sickly little thing trembled in my arms, withering by the hour, I felt, for the first time in my life, an ache in my breasts to feed a hungry child.

  “Betsy,” Mama whispered to me, and I looked up from the rocking chair beside her sickbed. Sweat poured from her forehead, and her braid of long black hair had come frayed and lay wild. “If the Lord should take me, I need for you to know something.”

  Intent upon her every rasping word, I leaned closer, mopped the sweat from her brow with a cool cloth, and wondered if I should fetch the doctor again.

  “You can marry,” she said. “You needn’t. But you mustn’t think that you can’t.”

  For her to say such a puzzling thing, I decided that the tincture of saffron, sage, and snakeroot must not have done her any good. “Don’t tire yourself with talk,” I said, trying to hush her as I patted the baby’s back.

  But twisting against the sheets, Mama continued, “A son-in-law could be a great blessing to your poor father, who is so . . . harried.”

  “Just get well, Mama,” I said, wondering if she remembered that she already had a son-in-law in Jack Carter, even if he was in faraway Boston with Angelica. “Don’t worry about anything else but getting well.”

  After all, I worried enough for the both of us. Papa had been torn between staying close to my mother in her illness, collecting rents from our tenants, and rebuilding the charred ruins of our mills at Saratoga. Our wealth was in the timber we cut and the flour we milled there. And I knew Mama worried our family fortune would never entirely rebound.

  But what she rasped was, “Peggy is quite pretty.” My brow furrowed as I tried to follow the workings of her fevered mind. She blinked, as if struggling to scrutinize my face with the honest frankness of our shared Dutch heritage. “But you’re pretty enough, my dear child.”

  “Worry not, Mama. I shan’t let such praise go to my head.” It was so mild a compliment that in the past, I might have taken pleasure in it, knowing it was not false flattery. But even though I’d had no letter from Monroe, our flirtation—and my adventure with the Marquis de Lafayette—had opened my mind to possibilities for my future I hadn’t previously considered. Even as I felt the weight of my responsibilities here, with my family, as never before.

  And if my mother should not survive . . . no, I couldn’t think of that.

  “But if you do marry . . .” Her words trailed off. “You must promise not to run off with some macaroni like Jack Carter.”

  “Mama! I thought you’d come to like him.”

  “I do. But oh, to have missed my own daughter’s wedding . . .”

  “I won’t give you such a pain,” I promised, trying to soothe her. But my heart ached at the turn of her thoughts, and the fact that a breach between us remained. Moving to sit at the edge of the bed, I asked, “Can’t you ever forgive me for helping Angelica to run off?”

  Mama reached for my hand and clutched it with a surprising strength. “It’s forgiven, my dear child. Forgiven and forgotten.”

  Blinking back bittersweet tears, I gave a quick nod. But before I could tell her how much it meant to me, she slipped into a fitful sleep.

  Then the babe gave a frightening weak cry and I hurried down the stairs, determined to do for him what my mother could not. I found Peggy on the lawn overseeing the littlest children as they played hoops and leapfrog. “Take the baby,” I said. “I’m going to get help.”

  I needed to find a willing woman to take my infant brother to the breast, and I wasn’t averse to using our status to secure assistance. Whatever my father’s reputation, the Schuylers, the Livingstons, the Van Cortlandts, and the Van Rensselaers were the great families of the region. If I couldn’t impress upon the people here, then I would cross the river to Fort Crailo, where my mother was born and raised.

  “You’re
going to leave?” Peggy asked, a little panicked. “Mama is too ill to know her own name, the servants are gone, and someone needs to play mistress of the Pastures.”

  The servants were gone to celebrate Pinkster, she meant.

  For Dutch settlers, the springtime holiday was a time for religious services, but for slaves it was a week free from work, a week during which they might travel to nearby plantations to visit family, or dance and sing at one of the festivals in Albany or New York City. Papa had been eager for the arrival of Pinkster, from which his servants usually returned cheerful. But now he feared some might not return at all.

  For amongst our slaves that spring had passed sullen looks and dark whispers. From the kitchen, Dinah had sent up only cold dishes. Our dairy maid had the temerity to refuse Papa some trifling request with the cows, and he seemed too bewildered by the incident to have punished her.

  I initially attributed the insolence of our people to fear. For everyone was fearful. No sooner had the leaves on the trees come to bud, than did four of the Six Nations attack nearby villages and settlements, just as Two Kettles Together had warned. Our slaves might’ve worried about the Indians, who also kept Negroes in bondage and were said to treat them harshly.

  I think now, though, upon more mature reflection, that the people of our plantation must have been weighing their loyalty between us and the British, who offered freedom to runaways. Our slaves must’ve wondered at men like my father, ready to die for his own freedom, while holding others in bondage.

  And they were not wrong to wonder.

  In those desperate hours, though, I thought only of the sick little baby. “You’ll just have to manage by yourself, Peg,” I said, giving her the swaddled infant before bolting for the stable and galloping down the drive, bypassing azalea-festooned festival stalls, dancers, and drummers in town.

  I went first to our Livingston relations at the Elm Tree Corner, where I pleaded with an indentured Irish girl who was breeding. But by the time we returned, my infant brother was struggling to breathe, let alone suckle. I’d barely dismounted when the sweet babe, with a head so tiny it fit in my palm, gasped and shuddered and perished in my arms.