Yorktown Lyrics – Hamilton

Song Overview

Song Credits

• Featured Vocals: Lin-Manuel Miranda, Daveed Diggs, Okieriete Onaodowan & the Original Broadway Cast
• Producer Team: Black Thought, ?uestlove, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Bill Sherman, Alex Lacamoire
• Composer/Writer: Lin-Manuel Miranda
• Release Date: September 25, 2015
• Genre: Hip-hop / Rap / Show-tune Fusion
• Instruments on Track: Keyboards, Guitar, Bass, Violin, Viola, Cello, Drums, Percussion, Synthesizer
• Label: Atlantic Records & Hamilton Uptown LLC
• Mood: Triumphant, insurgent, a little swaggering
• Recording Studio: Avatar Studios, New York City
• Mastering Engineer: Tom Coyne
• Copyrights © 2015 Hamilton Uptown LLC / Atlantic Recording Corporation

Song Meaning and Annotations

If any track on Hamilton feels like the moment the fireworks finally burst over a freshly minted flag, it’s this one. Yorktown (The World Turned Upside Down) slams Revolutionary-era history against twenty-first-century rhyme schemes, letting snare rolls tango with record-scratches while bayonets gleam in the footlights. Built on a boom-bap chassis with Broadway glitter in the chrome, the tune chronicles the Siege of Yorktown—1781’s decisive checkmate—through Alexander Hamilton’s quicksilver eyes and Marquis de Lafayette’s French-inflected bravado.

The emotional arc is a seesaw: tension coils in whispered orders (“Take the bullets out your gun!”), then catapults into the defiant hook borrowed from “My Shot.” One moment we’re elbow-deep in trench mud; the next, church bells riot through the soundscape. You can almost smell the gunpowder—and maybe a hint of backstage hairspray.

Miranda’s pen laces historical footnotes with pop-culture flex (“Immigrants—we get the job done”), tossing in a wink that lands like a mic-drop from the mezzanine. Musically, the track fuses martial drum cadences, sub-bass thumps, and ensemble chant—think Public Enemy storming a fife-and-drum parade.

Verse 1

“Monsieur Hamilton / Monsieur Lafayette…”

Stage lights up on two foreign-born firebrands. The immigrant framing does double duty—celebrating diversity while slyly reminding modern listeners that America’s story was never monocultural.

First Hook

“I am not throwin’ away my shot!”

A callback to Hamilton’s personal motto and the show’s earlier anthem, now weaponized for literal battle. The reprise underscores how ideals graduate to action.

Lyrical Pivot

“I imagine death so much it feels more like a memory…”

Hamilton’s mortality soliloquy drops the temperature. Pistols on safety for a heartbeat, conscience on full volume. The line foreshadows Act II tragedies while contextualizing wartime dread.

Ensemble Drive

From “Rochambeau!” to Mulligan’s boisterous verse, each cameo is a flash-card on Revolutionary teamwork. Mulligan’s tailor-spy bars splice street swagger with espionage, proving that espionage can spit hot 16s.

Finale Chant

“The world turned upside down…”

Historically, British forces supposedly piped a folk tune titled “The World Turned Upside Down” at surrender. Miranda flips the anecdote into a communal roar—victory sounds like an entire continent doing a cartwheel.

Annotations

In August 1781, Washington learned that Cornwallis was dug in at Yorktown — so he quietly pulled the Continental Army away from New York, marched south, and, with French help, trapped the British. Americans ringed the town by land, the French navy blocked it by sea, and the British ships sent to protect Cornwallis were driven off.

Lafayette, being French, greets Hamilton with

“Monsieur.”.

These teasing exchanges — much like the banter in “Farmer Refuted,” “The Room Where It Happens,” and “Your Obedient Servant” — give the audience a laugh before the storm breaks.

There was real friction over who would storm Redoubt 10. Lafayette wanted his own aide to lead it, but senior officer Hamilton overruled him. Even so, Lafayette had tried as early as October 1780 to get Hamilton his own battalion, proving he had his friend’s back.

Now in command, Hamilton swaggers. It took countless petitions to Washington to win this chance, so he needles Lafayette by mimicking his accent — “how you say” — the very slip Lafayette made in “My Shot.”

The battle call also echoes “Guns and Ships.” Hamilton always wanted to fight, not write.

Ron Chernow notes that most of the war was misery: starvation, disease, retreats. Hamilton and Lafayette have endured enough to scare any soldier, but camaraderie steels them.

Both men are immigrants — Hamilton from the Caribbean, Lafayette from France. The line

“Immigrants — we get the job done.”.

Lafayette helped ignite the French Revolution, yet Hamilton later cooled toward France, backing the Jay Treaty and even serving in the quasi-war with the republic.

Hamilton repeats his promise to meet friends “on the other side.” Onstage, it foreshadows two splits: after Yorktow,n he and Lafayette never meet again, and after intermission, Diggs returns as Jefferson, now Hamilton’s rival.

Lafayette’s

“Au revoir.”.

The chorus re-fires Hamilton’s old refrain

“I am not throwin' away my shot.”.

The phrase “world turned upside down” signals a power flip from monarchy to republic and hints at Hamilton’s duel: Burr — usually cautious — fires; Hamilton — usually rash — withholds. Roles reverse, the world flips, and only then does Hamilton “throw away” his shot.

Hamilton still half-expects martyrdom, but Eliza alters his priorities. He recalls her plea to “stay alive.” She is pregnant, and in an October 1781 letter, he assures her the assault took minutes and he is safe.

Washington may have waited for Hamilton to cherish life before handing him command, so he would fight smart, not recklessly.

On 14 October 1781, Hamilton’s column rushed Redoubt 10 with unloaded muskets and fixed bayonets; they took it in ten minutes, suffering fewer casualties than the French at Redoubt 9, who fired their guns.

Code word “Rochambeau” sounds like

“rush on, boys.”.

Lafayette invokes the “American experiment.” Winds scatter the friends, and choreography shows Laurens (historically present) “killing” a Redcoat with the Bullet dancer, foreshadowing his own death.

Laurens’ line

“Black and white soldiers wonder alike if this really means freedom.”.

“Not. Yet.”.

Washington refuses the British Honors of War, a snub mirroring Charleston. Legend claims the Redcoats played “The World Turned Upside Down.” Evidence is thin, but Miranda lifts the image from Chernow: battered Americans on one side, splendid French on the other, British marching out between them.

Stagehands flip furniture upside down, then right it, matching the lyric. Miranda also tips his hat to Mary J. Blige’s “I’m Goin' Down.”

Lafayette’s cry for French liberty hangs unanswered — foreshadowing Act II’s political rifts. Hamilton links his nation’s birth to his son Philip’s impending birth, later echoed in “Dear Theodosia.”

The ensemble’s crescendo mirrors good news rippling through a stunned crowd: a ragtag army really did defeat a superpower.

Similar Songs

1. “One Day More” – Les Misérables Original Cast
   Both tracks marshal an ensemble into military formation, voices overlapping like regiments on the march. Where “Yorktown” fires hip-hop muskets, “One Day More” unfurls operatic banners, yet each captures pre-battle jitters and collective grit. Thematically, they turn personal stakes into national tremors, reminding us that revolutions—French or American—are powered by harmonized hope.
2. “Defying Gravity” – Idina Menzel (from Wicked)
   Elphaba’s airborne declaration mirrors Hamilton’s refusal to “throw away” a single chance. Structurally, both songs climb a staircase of key changes toward a high-altitude payoff. While “Gravity” leans into big-belt bel canto, “Yorktown” leans into punch-line rap, but the libretto of liberation is shared DNA.
3. “Battle Cry” – Angel Haze
   Hip-hop artillery meets survival testimony. Angel Haze’s verses, steeped in resilience, align with Hamilton’s “one shot” ethos. Production-wise, both tracks fuse anthemic choruses with rapid-fire flow, positioning personal revolution beside historical revolt.

Questions and Answers

Which historical event does the song depict?

The Siege of Yorktown in 1781, the final decisive engagement of the American Revolutionary War.

Why does the hook from “My Shot” reappear?

It threads Hamilton’s personal ambition into a national victory, turning earlier bravado into battlefield motivation.

What is the code word “Rochambeau” referencing?

General Jean-Baptiste de Rochambeau, commander of French forces allied with Washington.

Is the song historically accurate?

Within dramatized limits, yes—the timeline, key figures, and spycraft nods (“Hercules Mulligan”) align with documented accounts.

How long did the actual siege last?

Roughly three weeks: September 28 – October 19, 1781, culminating in Cornwallis’s surrender.

Awards and Chart Positions

• Certified Gold by the RIAA on January 31, 2019.
• Peaked in the Top 10 of Billboard’s Cast Albums chart during late 2015.

Fan and Media Reactions

Scroll the comments beneath the official video and you’ll find history buffs rubbing shoulders with hip-hop heads—rare internet peace talks brokered by polyrhythms.

“I teach AP U.S. History; this song hits harder than any textbook diagram.” —MrsHistoryGeek

“The bass drop when Lafayette yells ‘Immigrants!’ should be in the Smithsonian.” —808Patriot

“Every time Mulligan growls his verse, my treadmill gains two extra horsepower.” —CardioKarl

“Some musicals age; this track reloads.” —BroadwayBard

“My kid finally learned the Revolutionary timeline—thanks to rap battles and bayonets.” —DadOfTheYear1776

Critics likewise applauded the collision of scholarship and swagger; The New Yorker likened its breakneck storytelling to “a Ken Burns montage on fast-forward—set to 808 drums.” Even Lin-Manuel admitted in interviews that writing it felt like “packing an encyclopedia into a cannon.”