
James Reynolds was an American financial speculator and the husband of Maria Reynolds. He served in the Continental Army's commissary department during the American Revolutionary War, and he moved from New York City to Philadelphia in 1791. While there, Maria met with Alexander Hamilton and said that James had abandoned her and had been cheating on her, and Hamilton financially supported her before starting an affair with her. James Reynolds later confronted Hamilton and extorted and blackmailed him. In November 1792, Reynolds was imprisoned for forgery and, hoping to get out of prison, revealed Hamilton's infidelity to his Democratic-Republican rivals. The Republicans refused to make use of such damning information to attack Hamilton, as Thomas Jefferson thought it beneath them, but their private confrontation of Hamilton about the affair led to Hamilton confessing it in the "Reynolds Pamphlet" in 1797.