September 17, 2025 • 18 mins
This episode demands satisfaction! Why did Alexander Hamilton and Aaron Burr meet on the dueling ground—and how common were duels in early America? Historian Lindsay Chervinsky joins Bob Crawford on American History Hotline to explore the surprising history of dueling in the United States.
From European traditions to the honor culture of the American South, duels shaped politics, reputation, and even presidential legacies. Learn why Andrew Jackson fought so many duels, how Abraham Lincoln nearly crossed swords, and why Burr’s fatal shot at Hamilton changed his career forever.
We also dive into the laws that eventually outlawed dueling, what rap battles and playground fights have in common with “affairs of honor,” and whether challenging someone to a duel today could still land you in jail.
We get into all these questions about dueling so grab your second, take 10 paces and hit play.
GUEST: Lindsay Chervinsky, presidential historian and the Executive Director of the George Washington Presidential Library. She is the author of the award-winning book, The Cabinet: George Washington and the Creation of an American Institution, co-editor of Mourning the Presidents: Loss and Legacy in American Culture, and the forthcoming book, Making the Presidency: John Adams and the Precedents That Forged the Republic
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Did Burr ever say I could shoot a man on
Fifth Avenue and can get away because he kind of
did in Weehawk, and he's like, I could shoot a
man in wee Hawk and get away with it. You've
reached American History Hotline.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
You asked the questions, we get the answers. Leave a message.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Hey, they're American History Hotliners. Your host Bob Crawford here,
welcome back, you know the droll By. Now send your
questions and I'll find you some answers. That email is
American History Hotline at gmail dot com. That's American History
Hotline at gmail dot com. Okay, let's get on with
it today. We're welcoming back to the show our good
(00:43):
friend Lindsey Schervinsky. She's a presidential historian and executive director
of the George Washington Presidential Library. She's also the author
of the book Making the Presidency, John Adams and the
Precedents That Forged the Republic. Hey, Lindsay, welcome back to
the show.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I hope you can help us answer a question we
got from a listener. They asked, was dueling a really
big part of American history or Was it just something
that happened in a few famous instances like burn Hamilton.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
That is a great question, Happy to answer it. So
dueling was much more prevalent than just a couple of instances.
It did tend to shift over time and was more
prevalent in certain areas than others, especially as American history progressed.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
So was it normal for people to die in the duels?
I mean I've read somewhere that sometimes they would throw
their shot away.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
Yeah, So this is a great question. So a lot
of dueling culture we actually inherited, like so many things
from European culture, especially British culture. And the point of
a duel was not actually to kill someone. It was
to avenge your honor or to prove that you were
a man of honor. That didn't require death, It didn't
even require necessarily hitting flush. It just required a demonstration
(02:05):
that you were willing to engage in this activity. And
there were a lot of rules that regulated how people
participated in this. If anyone is a fan of Hamilton
the musical, the dueling commandments were real things, and there
was actually a book that was published in England that
had all of these dueling commandments they didn't call them
commandments at the time. That was a Manuel Miranda edition,
(02:29):
which I enjoy a great deal. So the idea was
you would engage in what was called an affair of honor.
Joanne Freeman, a wonderful historian, has written a great deal
wrote a book about affairs of honor, and you would
have a second who was sort of like your co conspirator,
and they would negotiate the terms. And oftentimes most affairs
(02:52):
of honor did not actually get to the dueling field,
so they would negotiate an honorable out or a way
that both sides were okay with whatever disagreement being solved.
There were also then different ways that you could fight
a duel, So there was there were sword duels, there
were pistol duels. There were a lot of different ways
that you could engage in this type of activity. In fact,
(03:14):
I think Abraham Lincoln engaged in a sword duel. I
think he selected swords for that particular engagement. Most duels,
again did not end in death. Oftentimes you would go,
you would show up, and you would fire into the air,
and the point was again just to demonstrate that you
were man enough to show up to this thing. Not
(03:34):
to try and kill the other person. So when there
was death or there was injury, that was actually more
the operation than the norm.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
So it kind of sounds like to me, it's the
old grade school, high school three o'clock high thing where
you just had to show up. If the bully said
you and me three o'clock outside the parking lot, you
just really had to show up to preserve your honor.
You also mentioned that these dueling guy, this dueling guid
(04:06):
came from England. Sounds like the was it the whole tradition,
the whole exercise of dueling. Is that something that we
of course got from England.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Yes, absolutely so. In the medieval period, dueling was actually
part of the justice system. It was a way to
get justice for certain wrongs, and it was a way
to solve discrepancies or disputes in a way that if
there wasn't evidence. So there was a movie about the
Last Duel that came out a couple of years ago.
(04:39):
That was the last duel that was fought in this
part of the justice system. And then it became more
of a social custom, and it sounds kind of crazy
to us, But if we think about society at the time,
you didn't have a social Security number, you didn't have
a credit check that could demonstrate that you were a
reliable person. Instead, what you had was your honor, or,
(05:00):
your reputation, and your name. What was associated with that
honor and reputation was how you could have business partners,
was how you could get into school, was how you
could make a good marriage, friends, associates. So really, anything
that you wanted to do in society, you had to
have a good reputation in order to do it, and
so people were very touchy about their reputation, and for
(05:24):
men in particular, and in certain cultures, this was especially prevalent.
Your honor was a huge part of your reputation, so
especially in military cultures. So among the military set, the
officers in the Continental Army, honor was really essential. And
then as American history progressed, honor became an especially big
(05:44):
part of Southern culture. And there was a lot of
overlap because a lot of elite Southerners also served in
the military. So you can't say that it was just
one thing, but that honor, the defending the honor was
a huge part of maintaining your reputation as a man.
In American history.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
When to Coville came to America, he had dinner with
John Quincy Adams and he asked him about slavery, and
Adams said that essentially that slavery created equality in southern
white culture, created Southern quality, but it also bred laziness.
(06:24):
Adams said that they devote themselves to bodily exercise, to hunting,
to racing. They are vigorously constituted, brave, full of honor.
What is called the point of honor is more delicate
there than anywhere else. Duels are frequent.
Speaker 3 (06:42):
Yeah, absolutely, I mean, he was totally right, and I
think partially this is a reflection of his New England sensibility.
So the first duel was actually fought in Massachusetts, because
i was one of the early colonies, of course, but
by the time John Quincy Adams was alive, New England
tended to have fewer duels, not that they had none,
(07:03):
but this sense of honor had kind of gone on
the outskirts and some of the states had started to
take action to try and limit who could duel where
they could duel, And so it was frowned upon in
some of the New England states, and as it shifted
farther south, you tended to see more of these duels,
and especially by the time John Quincy Adams was in
(07:26):
public service in the eighteen twenties and eighteen thirties, it
was much more prevalent in the south than in the north.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
So our listener really wants us to talk about the
Burr Hamilton duel. So what was behind that? How did
that transpire?
Speaker 3 (07:41):
So Burr and Hamilton had known each other for a
very long time. They had run in similar circles for
a very long time. They had gone to similar educational institutions.
They had both been in the Continental Army. They both
made their home in New York. So this was a
long standing relationship, and initially all accounts suggest they were
(08:02):
on pretty good terms. But then over the years they
tended to compete a lot when it came to politics,
when it came to elections. So, for example, in eighteen hundred,
Burr was really running the Republican ticket, or what we
call the Democratic Republican ticket. They referred to themselves as Republicans,
and Hamilton was running the Federalist ticket for the state
(08:23):
electors and the state representatives in the New York City area.
And when Burr's ticket won. It really swung the state
to Jefferson in the upcoming presidential election, and Hamilton was
extremely resentful. He blamed Burr for this action. A lot
of people blamed Burr and also blamed Hamilton. Hamilton had
been pretty instrumental in making sure Burr had lost his
(08:47):
reelection campaign for the state legislature a couple of years earlier,
so this was a long standing thing. Once the election
of eighteen hundred was over and Burr and Hamilton continued
to live in New York City, the big shift, I
think occurred in their relationship when there was a contested
election and Burr and Jefferson were tied in eighteen This
(09:08):
is early eighteen oh one, and Hamilton really pushed his
fellow Federalists to support Jefferson because he felt like Burr
had no principles. That's a pretty damning statement, especially for
someone who cares about their honor. And the conflict only
continued to escalate over the next couple of years, and
that was really sort of the background behind their dueling behavior.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
It's resonant to today where you will have certain politicians
that were traditionally of one ideology and one party who
will support a candidate that they would never have agreed
on other than thinking that the democracy was at stake.
(09:52):
What happened to Burr after the duel? Here he's killed
one of the founders, one of the men instrumental with
with founding the nation and setting up the economic system
at least, So what happens to a vice president after that?
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Yeah, So that little bit you just threw in there
is pretty essential to this. He was vice president while
this dual happened, and went on to remain vice president
through the end of that term. He was then replaced.
Jefferson replaced him because he didn't want him to be
vice president.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Did Burr ever say I could shoot a man on
Fifth Avenue and can get away because he kind of
did in Weehawk And he's like, I could shoot a
man in Weehawk and and get away with.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
Yeah, I mean he legally got away with it. He
was not, and he stayed out of New Jersey because
there was a question about whether or not charges were
going to be brought up against him for killing Alexander Hamilton,
So he did not really go back to that area.
But there were no legal repercussions. But it certainly had
political repercussions. So Jefferson had already wanted to replace Burg,
(10:59):
but made it very easy to do so it was
a very easy thing to point to. And Burr's later
years were equally dramatic. He went on to maybe commit treason.
It's not totally clear. There was a scheme to try
and start sort of a new Republic at West and
charges were brought against him, and then they kind of
(11:21):
were quashed, and Jefferson really wanted him to be convicted,
and John Marshall sort of interfered. It's a very complicated story.
It's still very complicated today because the truth of the
matter is sort of lost to us, and so we
can put together our best guests. Whatever it was, he
was up to no good and so he was sort
of a pariah and he went out West. He did
(11:42):
all sorts of things, but his life was never the
same and his political stature was never the same.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Who was our most duelingest president?
Speaker 3 (11:50):
Oh, that's a good question. So I think Andrew Jackson
actually fought the most duels, but James Monroe is a
close runner up in how many duels he almost got in.
He almost had a duel with Hamilton in seventeen ninety seven,
I believe, and he was then pretty instrumental in preventing
(12:11):
another duel later. But he was he had a tendency
to get close. But I believe it was Andrew Jackson
who fought the most duels, and he actually killed someone
in one of his.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Duels over horse racing or was that? Did he did
a guy not die over that?
Speaker 3 (12:24):
You know, I don't remember the details of that, but
he What was interesting, and to get back to the
initial question, is it was held against him that this
person died in the duel, because that was unless you
really had antagonism, that was not really the point. And
so people often referred to him as a murderer in
a way that they would not for someone else who
(12:46):
had engaged in a duel. Because of this outcome.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Any other famous duels, or at least public political duels
that come to.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
Mind, well, I don't know if they actually classified this
as a duel, but one of the ones that I
think probably does account for that was the famous Lion
Griswold fight, which took place in Congress in the the
spring of seventeen ninety eight. If I'm remembering my dates, correctly.
(13:16):
So Roger Griswold and Matthew Lion were both in the
House of Representatives, and I think and Roger Griswold had
accused Matthew Lyon of cowardice, of leaving the field of
battle during the revolution, and again for military men, this
is one of the big strikes against your honor if
you're accused of cowardice. So Matthew Lyon then spat in
(13:39):
his face, which was a response according to this, you know,
code of conduct, was one of the responses that you
would give to someone who was not your equal. It
was very insulting. It's almost like if you were to
slap someone today, Like it's a real man, you punch them.
If it's someone beneath you, you slap them. So he
spat in Roger Griswold's face. Griswold waited to see if
(14:01):
Congress would do anything about it, and when they neglected
to punish Lion, he then started beating Lion with a
cane and then I think Lion picked up a fireplace
tong and they were basically having like a full on
brawl in the floor of Congress, which involved many of
their other supporters as well. So you know, we think
(14:22):
Congress is bad today, and I'm certainly not saying it's
Congress's best moment, But for the moment, there have been
no brawls with canes and fireplace tongs in a bit.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
Fireplace songs, they were a popular implement back in the day.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
It's a handy weapon if you need a fire all
the time to stay warm.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
That's right. When did dueling come to an end? And
could I even ask, like thinking of today, why why
did it come to an end?
Speaker 3 (14:50):
Yeah, so a lot of states started to pass laws
that made dueling illegal, and they were you know, that
started actually fairly fairly early, but it spread over the
states over time. Eighteen states had outlawed dueling by eighteen
fifty nine, so right before the Civil War, dueling was
(15:13):
outlawed in almost all of the North, but it was
still regularly practiced in the South. In the West. I
don't know when the last recorded duel is, because my
guess is it was probably somewhere out west and it
was still illegal. But people were still doing things. And
just because it was legal, as we know, doesn't mean
that people don't always do it.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
I think it still goes on with it every day
at the playground every time.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Yeah, well, it's a great point. I mean, And if
we think about like in modern culture, when there were
the various you know, rap battles and you know, different
feuds between West Coast and East coast, a lot of
that behavior could actually really be classified as dueling behavior.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And what about like gunfights in the wild West, like
the showdown at the Ok Corral something like that exactly.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
Now, I think that maybe did have the intended purpose
of killing someone, So maybe the goals of the duel
was slightly different, But certainly the idea of showing up
to demonstrate your manliness and your courage is something that
has I think remained an integral part of American culture.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Could I challenge someone to a duel today? Or would
I go to jail?
Speaker 3 (16:26):
So you would, I believe, go to jail, because well,
let me back that up and say, probably depends on
the circumstance. A lot of states have what is considered
to be stand your ground clause, so if someone comes
into your home, you can defend yourself in your home
with guns. But if you were to say to someone
(16:48):
I challenge you to a duel and you actually shot them,
then yes, you would go to jail, so probably don't
do that. But you know, if you're interested, there's always
fencing as an option, and that's a perfectly sanctioned way
to play with swords.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
We'll just settle it on the social media site. That's
where all argument sir to be settled or not settled.
Lindsey Stravinsky, thank you so much for speaking with us today.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
You've been listening to American History Hotline, a production of
iHeart Podcasts and Scratch Track Productions. The show is executive
producer is James Morrison. Our executive producers from iHeart are
Jordan run Tall and Jason English. Original music composed by
me Bob Crawford.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Please keep in touch. Our email is Americanhistory Hotline at
gmail dot com. If you like the show, please tell
your friends and leave us a review in Apple Podcasts.
I'm your host, Bob Crawford. Feel free to hit me
up on social media to ask a history question or
to let me know what you think of the show.
(18:01):
You can find me at Bob Crawford Base. Thanks so
much for listening. See you next week.
Did Burr ever say I could shoot a man on
Fifth Avenue and can get away because he kind of
did in Weehawk, and he's like, I could shoot a
man in wee Hawk and get away with it. You've
reached American History Hotline.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
You asked the questions, we get the answers. Leave a message.
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Hey, they're American History Hotliners. Your host Bob Crawford here,
welcome back, you know the droll By. Now send your
questions and I'll find you some answers. That email is
American History Hotline at gmail dot com. That's American History
Hotline at gmail dot com. Okay, let's get on with
it today. We're welcoming back to the show our good
(00:43):
friend Lindsey Schervinsky. She's a presidential historian and executive director
of the George Washington Presidential Library. She's also the author
of the book Making the Presidency, John Adams and the
Precedents That Forged the Republic. Hey, Lindsay, welcome back to
the show.
Speaker 3 (01:01):
My pleasure. Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
I hope you can help us answer a question we
got from a listener. They asked, was dueling a really
big part of American history or Was it just something
that happened in a few famous instances like burn Hamilton.
Speaker 3 (01:18):
That is a great question, Happy to answer it. So
dueling was much more prevalent than just a couple of instances.
It did tend to shift over time and was more
prevalent in certain areas than others, especially as American history progressed.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
So was it normal for people to die in the duels?
I mean I've read somewhere that sometimes they would throw
their shot away.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
Yeah, So this is a great question. So a lot
of dueling culture we actually inherited, like so many things
from European culture, especially British culture. And the point of
a duel was not actually to kill someone. It was
to avenge your honor or to prove that you were
a man of honor. That didn't require death, It didn't
even require necessarily hitting flush. It just required a demonstration
(02:05):
that you were willing to engage in this activity. And
there were a lot of rules that regulated how people
participated in this. If anyone is a fan of Hamilton
the musical, the dueling commandments were real things, and there
was actually a book that was published in England that
had all of these dueling commandments they didn't call them
commandments at the time. That was a Manuel Miranda edition,
(02:29):
which I enjoy a great deal. So the idea was
you would engage in what was called an affair of honor.
Joanne Freeman, a wonderful historian, has written a great deal
wrote a book about affairs of honor, and you would
have a second who was sort of like your co conspirator,
and they would negotiate the terms. And oftentimes most affairs
(02:52):
of honor did not actually get to the dueling field,
so they would negotiate an honorable out or a way
that both sides were okay with whatever disagreement being solved.
There were also then different ways that you could fight
a duel, So there was there were sword duels, there
were pistol duels. There were a lot of different ways
that you could engage in this type of activity. In fact,
(03:14):
I think Abraham Lincoln engaged in a sword duel. I
think he selected swords for that particular engagement. Most duels,
again did not end in death. Oftentimes you would go,
you would show up, and you would fire into the air,
and the point was again just to demonstrate that you
were man enough to show up to this thing. Not
(03:34):
to try and kill the other person. So when there
was death or there was injury, that was actually more
the operation than the norm.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
So it kind of sounds like to me, it's the
old grade school, high school three o'clock high thing where
you just had to show up. If the bully said
you and me three o'clock outside the parking lot, you
just really had to show up to preserve your honor.
You also mentioned that these dueling guy, this dueling guid
(04:06):
came from England. Sounds like the was it the whole tradition,
the whole exercise of dueling. Is that something that we
of course got from England.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
Yes, absolutely so. In the medieval period, dueling was actually
part of the justice system. It was a way to
get justice for certain wrongs, and it was a way
to solve discrepancies or disputes in a way that if
there wasn't evidence. So there was a movie about the
Last Duel that came out a couple of years ago.
(04:39):
That was the last duel that was fought in this
part of the justice system. And then it became more
of a social custom, and it sounds kind of crazy
to us, But if we think about society at the time,
you didn't have a social Security number, you didn't have
a credit check that could demonstrate that you were a
reliable person. Instead, what you had was your honor, or,
(05:00):
your reputation, and your name. What was associated with that
honor and reputation was how you could have business partners,
was how you could get into school, was how you
could make a good marriage, friends, associates. So really, anything
that you wanted to do in society, you had to
have a good reputation in order to do it, and
so people were very touchy about their reputation, and for
(05:24):
men in particular, and in certain cultures, this was especially prevalent.
Your honor was a huge part of your reputation, so
especially in military cultures. So among the military set, the
officers in the Continental Army, honor was really essential. And
then as American history progressed, honor became an especially big
(05:44):
part of Southern culture. And there was a lot of
overlap because a lot of elite Southerners also served in
the military. So you can't say that it was just
one thing, but that honor, the defending the honor was
a huge part of maintaining your reputation as a man.
In American history.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
When to Coville came to America, he had dinner with
John Quincy Adams and he asked him about slavery, and
Adams said that essentially that slavery created equality in southern
white culture, created Southern quality, but it also bred laziness.
(06:24):
Adams said that they devote themselves to bodily exercise, to hunting,
to racing. They are vigorously constituted, brave, full of honor.
What is called the point of honor is more delicate
there than anywhere else. Duels are frequent.
Speaker 3 (06:42):
Yeah, absolutely, I mean, he was totally right, and I
think partially this is a reflection of his New England sensibility.
So the first duel was actually fought in Massachusetts, because
i was one of the early colonies, of course, but
by the time John Quincy Adams was alive, New England
tended to have fewer duels, not that they had none,
(07:03):
but this sense of honor had kind of gone on
the outskirts and some of the states had started to
take action to try and limit who could duel where
they could duel, And so it was frowned upon in
some of the New England states, and as it shifted
farther south, you tended to see more of these duels,
and especially by the time John Quincy Adams was in
(07:26):
public service in the eighteen twenties and eighteen thirties, it
was much more prevalent in the south than in the north.
Speaker 1 (07:32):
So our listener really wants us to talk about the
Burr Hamilton duel. So what was behind that? How did
that transpire?
Speaker 3 (07:41):
So Burr and Hamilton had known each other for a
very long time. They had run in similar circles for
a very long time. They had gone to similar educational institutions.
They had both been in the Continental Army. They both
made their home in New York. So this was a
long standing relationship, and initially all accounts suggest they were
(08:02):
on pretty good terms. But then over the years they
tended to compete a lot when it came to politics,
when it came to elections. So, for example, in eighteen hundred,
Burr was really running the Republican ticket, or what we
call the Democratic Republican ticket. They referred to themselves as Republicans,
and Hamilton was running the Federalist ticket for the state
(08:23):
electors and the state representatives in the New York City area.
And when Burr's ticket won. It really swung the state
to Jefferson in the upcoming presidential election, and Hamilton was
extremely resentful. He blamed Burr for this action. A lot
of people blamed Burr and also blamed Hamilton. Hamilton had
been pretty instrumental in making sure Burr had lost his
(08:47):
reelection campaign for the state legislature a couple of years earlier,
so this was a long standing thing. Once the election
of eighteen hundred was over and Burr and Hamilton continued
to live in New York City, the big shift, I
think occurred in their relationship when there was a contested
election and Burr and Jefferson were tied in eighteen This
(09:08):
is early eighteen oh one, and Hamilton really pushed his
fellow Federalists to support Jefferson because he felt like Burr
had no principles. That's a pretty damning statement, especially for
someone who cares about their honor. And the conflict only
continued to escalate over the next couple of years, and
that was really sort of the background behind their dueling behavior.
Speaker 1 (09:32):
It's resonant to today where you will have certain politicians
that were traditionally of one ideology and one party who
will support a candidate that they would never have agreed
on other than thinking that the democracy was at stake.
(09:52):
What happened to Burr after the duel? Here he's killed
one of the founders, one of the men instrumental with
with founding the nation and setting up the economic system
at least, So what happens to a vice president after that?
Speaker 3 (10:09):
Yeah, So that little bit you just threw in there
is pretty essential to this. He was vice president while
this dual happened, and went on to remain vice president
through the end of that term. He was then replaced.
Jefferson replaced him because he didn't want him to be
vice president.
Speaker 1 (10:27):
Did Burr ever say I could shoot a man on
Fifth Avenue and can get away because he kind of
did in Weehawk And he's like, I could shoot a
man in Weehawk and and get away with.
Speaker 3 (10:36):
Yeah, I mean he legally got away with it. He
was not, and he stayed out of New Jersey because
there was a question about whether or not charges were
going to be brought up against him for killing Alexander Hamilton,
So he did not really go back to that area.
But there were no legal repercussions. But it certainly had
political repercussions. So Jefferson had already wanted to replace Burg,
(10:59):
but made it very easy to do so it was
a very easy thing to point to. And Burr's later
years were equally dramatic. He went on to maybe commit treason.
It's not totally clear. There was a scheme to try
and start sort of a new Republic at West and
charges were brought against him, and then they kind of
(11:21):
were quashed, and Jefferson really wanted him to be convicted,
and John Marshall sort of interfered. It's a very complicated story.
It's still very complicated today because the truth of the
matter is sort of lost to us, and so we
can put together our best guests. Whatever it was, he
was up to no good and so he was sort
of a pariah and he went out West. He did
(11:42):
all sorts of things, but his life was never the
same and his political stature was never the same.
Speaker 1 (11:47):
Who was our most duelingest president?
Speaker 3 (11:50):
Oh, that's a good question. So I think Andrew Jackson
actually fought the most duels, but James Monroe is a
close runner up in how many duels he almost got in.
He almost had a duel with Hamilton in seventeen ninety seven,
I believe, and he was then pretty instrumental in preventing
(12:11):
another duel later. But he was he had a tendency
to get close. But I believe it was Andrew Jackson
who fought the most duels, and he actually killed someone
in one of his.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
Duels over horse racing or was that? Did he did
a guy not die over that?
Speaker 3 (12:24):
You know, I don't remember the details of that, but
he What was interesting, and to get back to the
initial question, is it was held against him that this
person died in the duel, because that was unless you
really had antagonism, that was not really the point. And
so people often referred to him as a murderer in
a way that they would not for someone else who
(12:46):
had engaged in a duel. Because of this outcome.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Any other famous duels, or at least public political duels
that come to.
Speaker 3 (12:55):
Mind, well, I don't know if they actually classified this
as a duel, but one of the ones that I
think probably does account for that was the famous Lion
Griswold fight, which took place in Congress in the the
spring of seventeen ninety eight. If I'm remembering my dates, correctly.
(13:16):
So Roger Griswold and Matthew Lion were both in the
House of Representatives, and I think and Roger Griswold had
accused Matthew Lyon of cowardice, of leaving the field of
battle during the revolution, and again for military men, this
is one of the big strikes against your honor if
you're accused of cowardice. So Matthew Lyon then spat in
(13:39):
his face, which was a response according to this, you know,
code of conduct, was one of the responses that you
would give to someone who was not your equal. It
was very insulting. It's almost like if you were to
slap someone today, Like it's a real man, you punch them.
If it's someone beneath you, you slap them. So he
spat in Roger Griswold's face. Griswold waited to see if
(14:01):
Congress would do anything about it, and when they neglected
to punish Lion, he then started beating Lion with a
cane and then I think Lion picked up a fireplace
tong and they were basically having like a full on
brawl in the floor of Congress, which involved many of
their other supporters as well. So you know, we think
(14:22):
Congress is bad today, and I'm certainly not saying it's
Congress's best moment, But for the moment, there have been
no brawls with canes and fireplace tongs in a bit.
Speaker 1 (14:31):
Fireplace songs, they were a popular implement back in the day.
Speaker 3 (14:36):
It's a handy weapon if you need a fire all
the time to stay warm.
Speaker 1 (14:40):
That's right. When did dueling come to an end? And
could I even ask, like thinking of today, why why
did it come to an end?
Speaker 3 (14:50):
Yeah, so a lot of states started to pass laws
that made dueling illegal, and they were you know, that
started actually fairly fairly early, but it spread over the
states over time. Eighteen states had outlawed dueling by eighteen
fifty nine, so right before the Civil War, dueling was
(15:13):
outlawed in almost all of the North, but it was
still regularly practiced in the South. In the West. I
don't know when the last recorded duel is, because my
guess is it was probably somewhere out west and it
was still illegal. But people were still doing things. And
just because it was legal, as we know, doesn't mean
that people don't always do it.
Speaker 1 (15:33):
I think it still goes on with it every day
at the playground every time.
Speaker 3 (15:37):
Yeah, well, it's a great point. I mean, And if
we think about like in modern culture, when there were
the various you know, rap battles and you know, different
feuds between West Coast and East coast, a lot of
that behavior could actually really be classified as dueling behavior.
Speaker 1 (15:55):
And what about like gunfights in the wild West, like
the showdown at the Ok Corral something like that exactly.
Speaker 3 (16:01):
Now, I think that maybe did have the intended purpose
of killing someone, So maybe the goals of the duel
was slightly different, But certainly the idea of showing up
to demonstrate your manliness and your courage is something that
has I think remained an integral part of American culture.
Speaker 1 (16:21):
Could I challenge someone to a duel today? Or would
I go to jail?
Speaker 3 (16:26):
So you would, I believe, go to jail, because well,
let me back that up and say, probably depends on
the circumstance. A lot of states have what is considered
to be stand your ground clause, so if someone comes
into your home, you can defend yourself in your home
with guns. But if you were to say to someone
(16:48):
I challenge you to a duel and you actually shot them,
then yes, you would go to jail, so probably don't
do that. But you know, if you're interested, there's always
fencing as an option, and that's a perfectly sanctioned way
to play with swords.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
We'll just settle it on the social media site. That's
where all argument sir to be settled or not settled.
Lindsey Stravinsky, thank you so much for speaking with us today.
Speaker 3 (17:16):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 2 (17:21):
You've been listening to American History Hotline, a production of
iHeart Podcasts and Scratch Track Productions. The show is executive
producer is James Morrison. Our executive producers from iHeart are
Jordan run Tall and Jason English. Original music composed by
me Bob Crawford.
Speaker 1 (17:40):
Please keep in touch. Our email is Americanhistory Hotline at
gmail dot com. If you like the show, please tell
your friends and leave us a review in Apple Podcasts.
I'm your host, Bob Crawford. Feel free to hit me
up on social media to ask a history question or
to let me know what you think of the show.
(18:01):
You can find me at Bob Crawford Base. Thanks so
much for listening. See you next week.
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