Introduction

Angered by his discovery of Hamilton’s role at the outset of the Washington administration, Julian Boyd, the historian and long-time editor of Thomas Jefferson’s papers, prepared a dramatic exposé, Number 7: Alexander Hamilton’s Secret Attempts to Control American Foreign Policy. According to Boyd, George Beckwith was a “secret agent” (“7” being his code name for Hamilton, his mole inside the U.S. government), and Hamilton’s relationship with him constituted a story of intrigue and deceit. Hamilton either concealed his contacts with Beckwith or reported them in a way designed to advance aims in conflict with official policy. His disclosure to Beckwith of the purpose of military operations planned for the fall of 1790 – they were directed at the Shawnee and Miami tribes in the Maumee River Valley of Ohio, not the British-held post at Detroit – contributed to the embarrassing losses suffered by Brigadier General Josiah Harmar’s force of fifteen hundred men. With Hamilton’s “act of deception there opened a decade of divisiveness in the highest councils of the state.”