Washington himself emerged from a respected planter family in Virginia, and from an impressionable age, he became closely acquainted with courtly manners and customs of the best English culture. In contrast to Washington’s dignity and poise, Hamilton grew up in the Caribbean as an impoverished orphan from the “bastard brat of a Scottish peddler.” Nevertheless, these diverse backgrounds provided each man with a unique repertoire of skills and experiences that would benefit their future alliance. The authors claimed that Washington learned valuable skills such as surveying, horsemanship, and the arts of manners, deference, and genteel conversation, while Hamilton learned essential knowledge in management, bookkeeping, currency exchange, and republican ideals of Enlightenment. Together, these men complemented each other with the skills that forged an “indispensable
Washington himself emerged from a respected planter family in Virginia, and from an impressionable age, he became closely acquainted with courtly manners and customs of the best English culture. In contrast to Washington’s dignity and poise, Hamilton grew up in the Caribbean as an impoverished orphan from the “bastard brat of a Scottish peddler.” Nevertheless, these diverse backgrounds provided each man with a unique repertoire of skills and experiences that would benefit their future alliance. The authors claimed that Washington learned valuable skills such as surveying, horsemanship, and the arts of manners, deference, and genteel conversation, while Hamilton learned essential knowledge in management, bookkeeping, currency exchange, and republican ideals of Enlightenment. Together, these men complemented each other with the skills that forged an “indispensable