Hercules Mulligan: The Tailor Who Dressed the Enemy and Spied on Him

On May 8, 1780, Major Benjamin Tallmadge sat in Wethersfield, Connecticut, and wrote to General Washington under the alias "John Bolton." He wanted a trustworthy man inside British-held New York City. He asked whether "Mr Duchie, or Mr Mullegan" had ever done anything in this way.¹ That misspelled name is one of the few contemporary mentions of Hercules Mulligan as a possible spy. Almost everything else people say about him was written down decades later.

From Coleraine to New York

Mulligan was born in Coleraine, Ireland, on September 25, 1740. His family came to New York in 1746, when he was six.² He went to King's College, the school that became Columbia, according to the Battlefield Trust and Wikipedia, then clerked in his father's accounting business and set up as a tailor and haberdasher. His customers were the well-off, and in 1774 that meant British officers.²³ In 1773 he married Elizabeth Sanders at Trinity Church. She was the niece of a Royal Navy admiral.³

He was also, on paper, a rebel. The Battlefield Trust says he joined the Sons of Liberty early and later sat on the New York committees that ran the patriot side of city politics.² A shopkeeper sewing coats for the king's officers while sitting on rebel committees. Both things were true.

Hamilton in the Spare Room

Alexander Hamilton reached New York from the West Indies as a teenager in the early 1770s. Mulligan's older brother Hugh worked for a firm that shipped goods to the British army, and Hugh arranged for the young man to lodge with Hercules while he prepared for college.⁴ The Central Intelligence Agency and the Battlefield Trust both say late-night talk in that house pushed Hamilton toward the patriot cause.⁵

What is the paper behind it? Mulligan wrote a Narrative between about 1810 and 1815, because Hamilton's son John Church Hamilton asked him for recollections for a biography of his father. It has errors. The Hamilton Papers editors note that Mulligan put Hamilton's entry to King's College in the spring of 1775 and say the college register does not settle when Hamilton actually attended.⁶ The editors also say that a January 7, 1785 receipt from Mulligan to Hamilton and an entry in Hamilton's cash book are the only known documents that show the two men together.⁷ The friendship is probably real. It rests on Mulligan's own memory, written down thirty-five years later.

Coats, Gossip and the Spy Tradition

The tradition runs like this. When Washington needed a source inside British-held New York, Hamilton, by then on his staff, suggested Mulligan as an informant. Mulligan took measurements, listened to officers talk, and judged troop movements by when they wanted their uniforms back. He sent word to Washington by an enslaved man named Cato.²⁵

Now the record. Tallmadge's 1780 letter shows he was looking for agents and had Mulligan's name in his head. The Smithsonian's account says Townsend agreed to keep working and that Mulligan never joined the Culper Ring that Tallmadge ran.⁸ For Tallmadge's own story, see Benjamin Tallmadge and the Culper Ring. The Washington Papers editors describe Mulligan as a spy who served until the end of the war, and the Smithsonian found no other primary source that confirms it.¹⁸ The Journal of the American Revolution went through the best-known claims and found that most lacked primary support.⁹

Cato, and the Man Who Held Him

Mulligan enslaved at least one person. The 1790 census lists one enslaved person in his household, and the 1820 census lists one enslaved woman aged 45 or older.⁸ The tradition says Cato was his, and that Cato carried the reports. The name first appears in print in Michael J. O'Brien's 1937 biography, which says it was "handed down in tradition," and the Smithsonian found no contemporary document proving it.⁸ Accounts differ on how Cato's story ends. Wikipedia says he was freed in 1778 for his service and moved to Massachusetts.³ The Smithsonian found no record of a manumission. It says a Massachusetts soldier named Cato Howe is often confused with the courier, and it found a Manhattan Cato, held by a Schuyler widow, who ran off in March 1779 and turns up in a church pew ledger in 1782. It does not prove he carried Mulligan's reports, and it concludes that we will likely never know.⁸

Whatever Cato did, he did at risk to his own life, and the record gives us almost none of his own words. Mulligan was also a charter member of the New York Manumission Society in 1785, alongside Hamilton and John Jay, and he kept enslaving people while he belonged to it.⁸ He was a man who opposed slavery in public and held a human being in his house.

Washington at the Shop

British troops left New York on November 25, 1783, which New Yorkers still call Evacuation Day.¹⁰ Mulligan had reason to fear reprisal. He had dressed the occupiers. According to the tradition, Washington came to his house for breakfast and then bought clothes from him, which cleared any doubt about Mulligan's loyalty. Mulligan later hung a sign reading "Clothier to Genl. Washington."²⁵

Sources disagree on when. Wikipedia says the day after, the CIA says after the Evacuation Day parade, and the Washington Papers editors say only that Washington reportedly breakfasted with him after the British left.¹³⁵ The Journal of the American Revolution lists the breakfast as reported but not verified.⁹ The documented part comes later. A February 6, 1792 order to Mulligan from Tobias Lear for Washington's clothing is cited by that journal and by the Washington Papers editors.¹⁹

Where the Evidence Comes From

Strip the tradition away and four things stand on paper: Mulligan's Narrative, the 1785 receipt, Tallmadge's 1780 question, and the Lear order. The dramatic stories come from John Church Hamilton's 1834 book and O'Brien's 1937 biography, which relied on family tradition.⁸⁹ A memoir by his son Hercules Jr. is sometimes mentioned. None of the sources checked for this lesson describes one, so nothing here rests on it. Ron Chernow's biography of Washington, the Journal of the American Revolution notes, leaves Mulligan out altogether.⁹

He died on March 4, 1825, and lies in the Trinity Church burial ground near Hamilton.³² A tailor, a lodger, a few papers. The rest is a story that stayed in the family.

Mulligan's Life at a Glance

1. 1740 Born September 25 in Coleraine, Ireland.
2. 1746 Family settles in New York City.
3. Early 1770s Hamilton arrives in New York and lodges with Mulligan.
4. 1773 Marries Elizabeth Sanders at Trinity Church.
5. May 8, 1780 Tallmadge, as "John Bolton," names Mulligan to Washington as a possible agent.
6. November 25, 1783 British leave New York. Washington reportedly breakfasts with Mulligan.
7. 1785 Joins the New York Manumission Society.
8. 1810 to 1815 Writes his Narrative about Hamilton.
9. March 4, 1825 Dies in New York City.

Learn more

• Smithsonian Magazine: Cato and the Mulligan legend: census records and the search for the real Cato
• Journal of the American Revolution: The Incredible Story of Hercules Mulligan: a claim-by-claim check of the legend
• Founders Online: John Bolton to Washington, 8 May 1780: the letter that names Mulligan
• American Battlefield Trust: Hercules Mulligan: the standard short biography

Notes

1. "To George Washington from John Bolton, 8 May 1780," Founders Online, National Archives, with editors' note 3 identifying Hercules Mulligan, on the letter's wording, the alias for Tallmadge, and the editors' statements that Mulligan was a spy until the war ended, that Washington reportedly breakfasted with him and that Lear wrote in 1792. Read it online. ↩
2. American Battlefield Trust, "Hercules Mulligan," on his birth, King's College, the Sons of Liberty, his 1774 shop, the Cato tradition, the Washington sign and his death. Read it online. ↩
3. Wikipedia, "Hercules Mulligan," on the 1746 emigration, the 1773 marriage, Cato's reported freedom in 1778 (not supported by the Smithsonian), the Manumission Society, the breakfast timing, his death and burial. Treated as a lead. Read it online. ↩
4. Journal of the American Revolution, "The Incredible Story of Hercules Mulligan" (2021), on Hugh Mulligan's firm, the arrangement for Hamilton to board, and the sources of the Narrative. Read it online. ↩
5. Central Intelligence Agency, "The Legend of Hercules Mulligan," on Hamilton's boarding, his recommendation of Mulligan, the two warnings, Cato and the sign. Read it online. ↩
6. "Matricula of King's College, [1774]," Alexander Hamilton Papers, Founders Online, editorial note on Mulligan's narrative and Hamilton's entry. Read it online. ↩
7. "Receipt from Hercules Mulligan, 7 January 1785," Alexander Hamilton Papers, Founders Online, footnote on the Narrative of 1810 to 1815 and the two known documents. Read it online. ↩
8. Smithsonian Magazine, "Did an Enslaved Chocolatier Help Hercules Mulligan Foil a Plot to Assassinate George Washington?" on Tallmadge's letter, the 1834 and 1937 books, the census entries, the Manumission Society, Cato Howe and the Manhattan Cato of 1779. Read it online. ↩
9. Journal of the American Revolution, same article, on the 1779 and 1781 stories, Lafayette's note of February 25, 1781, the Lear order, Chernow and the unverified breakfast. Read it online. ↩
10. Wikipedia, "Evacuation Day (New York)," on the November 25, 1783 date and Washington's entry into the city. Read it online. ↩