#historians often disagree and that's surprisingly shocking for a lot of people i think

[icarusbetide]

it's fascinating and frustrating at the same time when historians take one event and get wildly different conclusions. i mean, i guess that's an inherent part of history but wow.

a really arbitrary but striking example of this is in regards to washington apparently being caught off guard when recommended hamilton as secretary of treasury, saying that he had never spoken with him on economics so was not aware of his skill.

many historians (including michael e. newton) seem to take this at face value and make the case that it's clear that hamilton and washington weren't close during the war and constitutional convention. given that hamilton was writing letters about economics to morris years before he was considered for the secretary of the treasury role, this indicates the level to which washington and hamilton must have maintained an absolutely professional relationship.

but i just read john ferling who thinks this is probably a deception on washington's part, and that there's no way they had never spoken about economics (or at least that washington did not know of hamilton's interest in that field) during the war when it's known that he had informal discussion with his aides as a group at the end of the day. especially since it would've been right in line with the army's main struggle with finance and supplies. in fact, ferling goes on to say he thinks it's likely that washington had already chosen hamilton as his secretary early on (he elaborates that they weren't personally close but washington knew exactly what benefits a loyal hamilton would bring to him), but was merely waiting until the department was created, etc.

right now i'm not judging on what interpretation is more likely, just saying how this changes how readers view their relationship and characters. it's a relatively meaningless detail, if washington knew about hamilton's economic skills beforehand, but really interesting.