Uhh concept, idk if I'll pursue with it or not because everytime I draw Laurens (or anyone in amrev of that matter) they always look like crap and my art immediately worsens (not joking at all, it's inevitable)
Some other things I've been drawing (historical yuri and Maxtrix's design of SP6)
(unrelated somewhat but would you be interested in an amrev visual novel)
HOLY PEAK ART also hi thank you so much dude 🥹❤️🩹❤️🩹 and yeah I would be interested in that I like anything to do with amrev even if it doesn't seem like it recently !!
Can someone explain to me how person A is older than person B but yet is the adopted son of person B?? Or am I I reading this wrong (or got the ages wrong somehow)
bruh i was just thinking about the historical sexualisation of Alexander Hamilton and it’s so apparent in everything about him. It’s so sad. I genuinely feel so bad that he’s so sexualised by people now and actual historians, for example, the sexualisation of his relationship with Washington, Burr and Jefferson ITS GROSS UGH.
You may recall @my-deer-friend and I previously discussing a poem reportedly written by John Laurens. There was much speculation and discussion amongst ourselves and other users about why such a poem may have been written, why it was supposedly included on an "undated note from John to his father," and where the poem/its transcript may now be held. I come to you today with answers to some of these questions - and many new questions posed.
The good news: I've located the original poem, held by the South Caroliniana Library
The bad news: It almost certainly wasn't written by John Laurens
The ??? news: It was potentially written by Alexander Hamilton
What follows here is a large amount of speculation about the author of the poem and the author's intent. Handwriting comparisons will be presented to discount Laurens and support Hamilton as the author. We may never be able to fully confirm the poem's author or why it ended up in the Laurens papers, but this presents an opportunity for discussion and further research!
Thanks to @my-deer-friend for their collaboration and input during this endeavor!
As a brief refresher, this whole endeavor began because of a poem referenced by Sara Bertha Townsend in her book An American Soldier: The Life of John Laurens (pp. 46-47):
Across the bottom of an undated note from John to his father is a bit of neatly-turned love poetry. It reads:
Celia, I sued with many a kind caress
For leave to paint her portrait on my breast
She, sweetly answered with a thought quite new
If I must place it, I must paint it too
Then turning round, with a Celestial Air
Look’d in my heart and left her likeness there.
The probable date was when he had been six months or more on Washington’s Staff, at least a year after his return to America. The euphonious Celia he probably used because it is poetic, a diminutive of Saint Cecilia's lovely name; it does not follow that he knew anyone having the name. One can hardly fabricate a fair lady to whom he would write delicate flattery at this era of his busy life, ans he had given no evidence earlier of such a tendency. Perhaps he was only trying his skill at verse-making, or perhaps the girl who had "look'd in his heart and left her likeness there" was definitely the one he married. Henry Laurens would have understood this without comment. At any rate, "Celia" is mentioned nowhere else in John's correspondence.
This is the only place I have ever seen this poem mentioned. Townsend cited this poem as being held by the Long Island Historical Society. The Long Island Historical Society was renamed the Brooklyn Historical Society in 1985 and then became a part of the Brooklyn Public Library in 2020.
I therefore began my efforts by contacting the Brooklyn Public Library (BPL), as the transcript of this poem was likely held in their collection of Henry and John Laurens papers. The collection guide for the Henry and John Laurens papers gives this note about the chain of custody:
This collection was purchased from W. Gilmore Simms of South Carolina and donated to the Long Island Historical Society (now the Brooklyn Historical Society) in 1868. After being transcribed, the papers were sold in 1960. As such, this collection now consists of transcriptions of the papers originally donated to LIHS.
While I was waiting on a response from the BPL, @18thistorixn provided me with some additional information about the scope of the BPL's collection and also helpfully sent me the transcript of the poem from the collection. I eventually received select scans of the Laurens collection from the BPL, including this scan of the poem transcript (Henry and John Laurens papers, 1974.119; Brooklyn Historical Society):
This transcript provided a major clue for locating the original poem - it gave the contents of the "undated note" that the poem was supposedly appended to. @my-deer-friend was able to find a scan of the original note from John Laurens to his father, as held by the South Caroliniana Library (SCL):
The poem was not included with this digitized note, but this find informed us that many (all?) of the Henry and John Laurens letters previously held by the Long Island Historical Society/BPL are now held by the SCL. I reached out to the SCL with the information I had and asked if there was perhaps a reverse to the note or other section of the note that contained the poem. After weeks of dedicated searching, the SCL was able to locate the poem in their collections (huge shout out to Abigail, the librarian who answered my query - she put so much effort into locating this for me, and I am forever grateful). They sent me two scanned versions of the poem. Version 1 (from the Henry Laurens Papers, the South Caroliniana Library, University of South Carolina, Columbia, S.C.):
Version 2 (from the Henry Laurens Papers, the South Caroliniana Library, University of South Carolina, Columbia, S.C.):
After my initial excitement of seeing the original poem, I quickly realized that this was likely not John Laurens's handwriting. When determining if handwriting could belong to John Laurens, I first check the shape of the lowercase r's. John wrote his r's like the r's typed in this text - this was distinct from the other style of the time, which wrote r's like the modern cursive r. (Note: this style of writing r's is not unique to John Laurens, but I find it to be the easiest way of telling his handwriting apart from those who use the other style.) On the left is "round" written by Laurens in a July 18, 1778 letter to his father. On the right is "round" from the poem.
There are a few subtle differences here besides the r shape. For example, Laurens connects his o's near the very top of the letter whereas the author connects their o's on the sides of the letter.
Another distinct difference is the shape of the capital F. Laurens makes his F's with the “hat” of the F being written separately from the vertical line, but the poem's author writes their F with a loop/one motion. On the left is Laurens's "Father" from the undated note shown/linked above. On the right is "For" in the poem.
There are several words that can be directly compared across the poem and Laurens's known writings. Here is a comparison of "request," with Laurens's writing on the left (from an August 22, 1778 letter to his father) and the author's on the right.
Again, note the differences in the r's. The loop of the q is also made differently (connected to the u in Laurens's, not connected in the poem). Generally, the words are not a good match.
Now compare the word "with," with Laurens's writing on the left (from a June 15, 1778 letter to his father) and the author's on the right.
The slant of the writing, the shape of the w, and the crossing of the t all noticeably differ.
Here is "it," with Laurens's writing on the left (from a January 23, 1778 letter to his father) and the author's on the right.
Laurens's "it" is much taller and tighter while the author's is wide, short, and loopy.
Many more comparisons could be made, but as it stands, I am reasonably confident that John Laurens did not write this poem. So who did?
Allow me to propose Alexander Hamilton as the author.
To begin, the handwriting in the poem is a much better fit to Hamilton's. Hamilton writes his lowercase r's and capital F's very similarly to the author. On the left is "rapture" written by Hamilton in a 1774 poem on the death of Elias Boudinot's child. On the right is "round" written by the author.
On the left is "For" written by Hamilton from the same source. On the right is "For" written by the author.
Another word that can be directly compared between Hamilton and the author is "breast." The left is Hamilton's writing (from an April 11, 1777 letter to Catharine Livingston), the right is the author's writing.
The "bre" is a very close match. The "ast" in the poem is more scrawly, perhaps because it was written at the end of the line/near the edge of the page.
Several small words/prepositions also closely match between Hamilton and the author. On the left is "with" written by Hamilton in his April 1779 letter to Laurens. On the right is "with" written by the author.
The slant of the writing, shape of the w, and crossing of the t (or lack thereof) are a much closer match between Hamilton and the author than between Laurens and the author (see above).
Here is "it," with Hamilton's writing on the left (from his April 1779 letter to Laurens) and the author's on the right.
Both of these words are wide, short, and loopy and stand in contrast to Laurens's writing shown above.
Besides the handwriting, there is other compelling evidence that Hamilton could have been the author of the poem. Hamilton wrote poetry throughout his life, and he even referenced a Celia in a poem published in the Royal Danish American Gazette. @my-deer-friend found this great article from the Library of Congress that discusses several of the poems Hamilton wrote. Given Hamilton's proclivity for poetry and previous use of Celia as a muse (or perhaps a stand-in for the poem's true subject), it's not unreasonable to think that he wrote this poem that describes another Celia. Laurens, in contrast, was much more well known for his gifts in the arts of drawing and painting, and I am unaware of any poetry that has been accurately attributed to him.
So if John Laurens likely wasn't the author (and Hamilton potentially was), why is this poem associated with a note from John Laurens to Henry Laurens? It's possible that the poem and note are completely unrelated and only became associated as the Laurens papers were repeatedly collected, organized, transcribed, and archived over the years. The items appear to be written on different types of paper, with the poem on laid paper and the note on wove paper. I believe Townsend would have had access to the original note and poem held at the Long Island Historical Society before they were transcribed and sold, so it's possible she observed them in a different state that more clearly connected the two items. However, she also made several mistakes in her biography on Laurens, so I would not be surprised if her connection of the note and the poem was incorrect. She even made a mistake in the transcription of the poem - she gave the first line as ending in "caress" when it clearly ends in "request," as noted both by the original and the transcript from the BPL.
Because the poem and note may actually be unrelated, dating the poem becomes difficult. @my-deer-friend pointed out that the note may be an unsent draft of this letter from Laurens to his father dated January 5, 1778. Both the note and the dated/sent letter mention needing the help of a "french acquaintance" for translating some tricky words. It's possible that the poem also dates to the Valley Forge time period, though Hamilton would been away from headquarters until late January 1778. But again, there's no concrete reasoning that the poem and the note had to have been written at the same time.
There's also the question of the author's intent with and subject of this poem. It could simply be a verse-writing exercise, as suggested by Townsend, or a poem addressed to a real-life Celia or other woman. But of course, the most interesting scenario to me is that this poem was potentially written by Hamilton for Laurens. The use of artistic imagery (painting, portraits) in the poem parallels Laurens's own artistic talents. The name Celia could have been used in the poem to disguise its homoromantic meaning. If this was a poem from Hamilton to Laurens, it is incredibly telling that this poem written on a small scrap of paper was safely kept amongst Laurens's belongings. It was not lost, discarded, or destroyed - it was preserved with care. Certainly we have many affectionate and tender sentiments that exist in the surviving Hamilton-Laurens letters, but this poem somehow feels more intimate. Letters were the standard form of communication, and they often were read by people besides the specific addressee. The poem, in contrast, feels like a more intentional act. It's a carefully crafted expression of love - not widely published for others to read, but only intended for and fully understood by its disguised subject.
As I stated at the beginning of this post, much of this is speculation. I feel confident in stating that Laurens is unlikely to be the author of the poem, but proving the "true" author is a much harder task. It may not have been written by Hamilton. It could have been written by Hamilton, but it may not have been about Laurens. Multiple interpretations and arguments are possible, and I invite others to offer their own opinions.
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