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The Scandalous Hamiltons

A Gilded Age Grifter, A Founding Father's Disgraced Descendant, and a Trial at the Dawn of Tabloid Journalism

Audiobook
3 of 3 copies available
3 of 3 copies available
It's a story almost too tawdry to be true—a con woman prostitute who met the descendant of a Founding Father in a brothel, duped him into marriage using an infant purchased from a baby farm, then went to prison for stabbing the couple's baby nurse—all while in a common-law marriage with another man. The scandal surrounding Evangeline and Robert Ray Hamilton, though little known today, was one of the sensations of the Gilded Age.

When the salacious Hamilton story emerged during Eva's trial for the August 1889 stabbing, it commanded unprecedented national and international newspaper coverage thanks to the telegraph and the recently founded Associated Press.
As lurid details emerged, the public's fascination grew—how did a man of Hamilton's stature become entangled with such an adventuress? Hamilton's death under mysterious circumstances, a year after the stabbing, added to the intrigue.
Through personal correspondence, court records, and sensational newspaper accounts, The Scandalous Hamiltons explores not only the full, riveting saga of ill-fated Ray and Eva, but the rise of tabloid journalism and celebrity in a story that is both a fascinating slice of pop culture history.
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    • Publisher's Weekly

      May 23, 2022
      Design historian Shaffer (George Nelson and the Design of Time) gives a detailed account of the scandal surrounding Robert Ray Hamilton (1851–1890), great-grandson of Alexander Hamilton, and his secret marriage to a prostitute and attempted murderer. After serving four years in the New York State Assembly, Hamilton’s life took a dramatic turn in 1889, when he secretly married Evangeline Steele, a former prostitute with whom he’d had a years-long affair. The impetus for the marriage was the birth of their daughter, Beatrice—or so Hamilton thought. In reality, Evangeline, aided by her common-law husband, Joshua Mann, had purchased an unwanted infant girl from a midwife and passed her off as Hamilton’s child in a scheme to get his money. The plot unraveled months later, when Evangeline stabbed the baby’s nursemaid in a drunken argument. After a sensational trial and divorce proceedings, which were breathlessly documented by the era’s tabloid reporters, including Nellie Bly, Hamilton retreated to the West, where he died under mysterious circumstances in Jackson Hole, Wyo. Shaffer relates these events in a straightforward style that drains the era of some its color, but resists caricature. Historical true crime buffs will be engrossed.

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  • English

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