John Laurens was an American soldier rumored to have been homosexual and the lover of the famous founding father Alexander Hamilton, and was popularized by Anthony Ramos’s potrayal of him in Lin Manuel Miranda’s in Broadway musical, Hamilton: An American Musical.

Born on 28 October, 1754, Laurens was the eldest son of Eleanor Ball and Henry Laurens who survived infancy. He was educated in Europe before sailing back to America in 1777 to join the Revolutionary War, leaving behind a wife who was eight-months pregnant. He soon became an aide-de-camp to George Washington and became extremely close friends with Alexander Hamilton, to the point where some people speculate whether or not they were lovers.

Laurens is perhaps best known for his black levies plan, a regiment of 3,000 slaves from South Carolinian and Georgian plantations, who would all receive freedom after the war. He even asked his father if the forty slaves he would get in his father’s Will be given to him early so they could join the regiment. In other words, he was willing to risk anything for the emancipation of slaves.

Laurens was killed during the Battle of the Combahee River—a meaningless skirmish fought in South Carolina over rice at the end of the Revolutionary War—on 27 August, 1782. He was only 27 years old and was one of the last casualties of the Revolutionary War.

This portrait of John Laurens as a POW was done by Charles Willson Peale in 1780 and is the only portrait that has survived that was done in his lifetime.

American actor Anthony Ramos originated the role of John Laurens on Broadway