It was brutal. He was born illegitimately, and his mother's former husband seized every (every) opportunity to get revenge, so he could never feign legitimacy. His actual father left the West Indies (Nevis) when Alexander was around ten or so, and his mother died when he was fourteen, leaving he and his brother James to fend for themselves. Those who tried to take care of them ended up either dying or deserting them, and Alexander ended up as a clerk for a shipping company, where his intellect was quickly realized. At seventeen a hurricane struck St. Croix, where was he was then living, and he wrote about it in a letter to his father, which was found by several influential people. They raised money to send him to New York to attend college. His childhood left him with a deep hatred of anar