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  • Published: 1 November 2016
  • ISBN: 9781592409693
  • Imprint: Nal
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 496
  • RRP: $34.99
Categories:

War Of Two



In War of Two, John Sedgwick explores the long-standing conflict between Founding Father Alexander Hamilton and Vice President Aaron Burr. A study in contrasts from birth, they had been compatriots, colleagues, and even friends.

In War of Two, John Sedgwick explores the long-standing conflict between Founding Father Alexander Hamilton and Vice President Aaron Burr. A study in contrasts from birth, they had been compatriots, colleagues, and even friends. But above all they were rivals. Matching each other’s ambition and skill as lawyers in New York, they later battled for power along political fault lines that would not only decide the future of the United States, but define it.

A series of letters between Burr and Hamilton suggest the duel was fought over an unflattering comment made at a dinner party. But another letter, written by Hamilton the night before the event, provides critical insight into his true motivation. It was addressed to former Speaker of the House Theodore Sedgwick, a trusted friend of both men, and the author’s own ancestor.

John Sedgwick suggests that Hamilton saw Burr not merely as a personal rival but as a threat to the nation. Burr would prove that fear justified after Hamilton’s death when, haunted by the legacy of his longtime adversary, he embarked on an imperial scheme to break the Union apart.

  • Published: 1 November 2016
  • ISBN: 9781592409693
  • Imprint: Nal
  • Format: Paperback
  • Pages: 496
  • RRP: $34.99
Categories:

About the author

John Sedgwick

Gerald Nissenbaum has been named one of the top ten divorce lawyers in America and has been practicing law in the Boston area for over forty years. His fees are around $700 dollars an hour.

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Praise for War Of Two

Sedgwick’s War of Two, like Chernow’s great biography, has depths and details that the musical [Hamilton] cannot match

Gordon Wood, The New York Review of Books

[A] lively, wide-ranging and immensely readable book. The world of War of Two is often more personal than political, an intimate portrait of Hamilton and Burr as they plunged toward their fatal collision

The New York Times

John Sedgwick has done a great thing here: he has painted a compelling and original portrait of a defining American rivalry. A story of ambition, conviction, and finally of bloodshed

Jon Meacham, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Thomas Jefferson: The Art of Power

In crisp, lively prose, the author presents evenhanded and insightful profiles of two highly intelligent, driven men with substantial flaws and very different characters . . . [An] entertainingly irreverent account of two consequential men from the dawn of the American republic

Kirkus Reviews

John Sedgwick rescues the most famous duel in history from musty mythology and gives us a richly textured, spirited, absorbing tale of yearning, rivalry, and pathos. War of Two reads like the Great American Novel—but it’s all true

Evan Thomas, New York Times bestselling author of Being Nixon: A Man Divided