Raise first person among many (5)
I believe the answer is:
hoist
'raise' is the definition.
(hoisting is a kind of raising)
'first person among many' is the wordplay.
'first person' becomes 'i'.
'among' is an insertion indicator.
'many' becomes 'host' (I've seen this in other clues**).
'i' put inside 'host' is 'HOIST'.
(Other definitions for hoist that I've seen before include "Come down" , "set of flags" , "Heave upwards" , "Raise with ropes" , "Substance forming outer skeleton of insects, etc" .)