The Tragedy of Benedict Arnold

[André] had done his duty with full knowledge of the risk, so could not be dishonored in his death.

—J. W. Fortescue, A History of the British Army

“I should as soon have thought West Point had deserted us as he . . .”

—Ordinary Courage: The Revolutionary
Adventures of Joseph Plumb Martin

—Benedict Arnold to George Washington,
on board the Vulture, September 25, 1780

Conspiracy and Escape Routes of Andre and Arnold

Arnold’s decision to abandon the American cause, driven by injured pride, anger, and the pursuit of honor as he saw it, tragic in itself, spread tragedy to the lives of those about him. When he didn’t return from the Smith House that night his aides were concerned. Franks and Varick were suspicious of Smith, and had picked a fight with him when he dined at their headquarters earlier. Arnold was furious with them for insulting a guest, warning them, “if he ask the devil to Dine with him the Gentlemen of his Family should be civil to him.”¹ Peggy admitted to Franks and Varick that she also distrusted Smith but pleaded with them to drop the matter, assuring them that her husband would never do anything dishonorable. During her stay at West Point Arnold had his aides take her on various outings, presumably giving him the freedom to continue his plans for the surrender of the fort in privacy.

He was back now at his headquarters awaiting events. Everything seemed to be going according to plan. Smith had returned to report all was well when he left André north of White Plains. Washington and his retinue were to return to West Point on September 25. They arranged that Washington and his senior staff, Hamilton, Knox, the Marquis de Lafayette, and other officers would breakfast with Arnold and Peggy at the Robinson House that morning. When they were nearly at Arnold’s headquarters Washington decided to check the state of the redoubts on that side of the river and sent the rest of his men on ahead, joking with the marquis, “I know you young men are all in love with Mrs. Arnold and wish to get where she is as soon as possible.”² He asked that they tell her not to hold breakfast for him, he would join them shortly.

Off they galloped. Peggy greeted them and went upstairs to feed her baby while Arnold joined the officers chatting amiably as they assembled at the table. Suddenly Colonel Solomon Allen appeared at the door with a letter for him. Arnold read it privately. It was from John Jameson, second in command at North Castle, reporting that a John Anderson had been stopped on his way to New York. He had Arnold’s pass and suspicious documents “of a very dangerous tendency” tucked in his stockings with very explicit details about the defenses of West Point as well as information about Washington’s council of war held September 6. Jameson added that he was sending John Anderson to Robinson House but would send the papers he had been carrying directly to George Washington.³ Shocked, Arnold told Allen to tell no one about the contents of the letter, then dashed to the porch and ordered his servant to bring him a horse and to alert his barge crew. He rushed upstairs to tell Peggy he was leaving at once to join the British. The startled young woman fainted. Just as Arnold was placing her gently on her bed a servant of Washington’s arrived announcing that the commander would be there momentarily. Arnold sped downstairs asking Franks to fetch Dr. Eustis for Peggy and leaving a message for Washington that he was off to West Point and would be back in an hour. When Arnold got outside and there was no horse waiting for him, he took Allen’s horse and rode toward the river.

The morning he and Arnold parted, André accompanied by Smith and his servant rode toward Stony Point about two miles away.⁴ They were challenged by a sentry at the ferry, but showing their passes were allowed to continue. Smith was well known to Livingston’s officers and chatted with them while they waited for the boat. At King’s Ferry Livingston offered Smith supper and inquired about his journey. He declined the meal and agreed to deliver a dispatch to Arnold. They rode on. Eight miles east of the river, near Compound, they were stopped. It was now evening and they were questioned about where they were going in the dark and again Smith showed their passes from Arnold and explained to a suspicious captain their urgent business. They were being sent by Arnold to meet a man at White Plains to get intelligence from the British army. The captain allowed them to pass but warned them that traveling at night was exceedingly dangerous since there were groups of bandits preying on travelers. On his advice they decided to spend the evening at a nearby house and continue their journey in the morning.

Early the next day under a threatening sky the three men continued on their way, stopping for breakfast then getting back on their horses. Fifteen miles north of White Plains Smith told André he could go no further as they were now beyond American lines. He planned to head north to visit relatives before reporting back to Arnold and gave André eight Continental dollars and a map of the area. André offered Smith his gold watch in thanks but Smith declined, and he and his servant headed north toward the Robinson House to inform Arnold all was well. André was left alone to find his way back to British lines.

He picked his way along, stopping to water his horse and sort out his directions as he entered the dangerous “neutral grounds.” Five miles from his destination, stopping to consult a map, he was waylaid by Paulding, Williams, and Van Wart, local men on militia duty but also on watch for likely victims to rob. One man was standing lookout while his friends played cards. Spotting the lone rider they quickly blocked the road pointing their muskets at André. The tallest of the three, Paulding, was wearing a red-faced green coat and the cap of a Hessian soldier, the disguise he had used to escape from a British prison camp. Seeing the coat and cap André thought they were loyalists and called out, “Gentlemen, I hope you belong to our party.”⁵ “What party?” Paulding asked. André replied “the Lower Party.” “We do,” Paulding said. “Thank God! I am once more among friends,” André answered. “I am a British officer.” He then showed them his gold watch to prove he was a British gentlemen. That was all they needed to see. Paulding then admitted, “We are Americans.” Realizing his mistake André changed his demeanor, chuckling, “God bless my soul, a man must do anything to get along.” Paulding asked his name and André answered John Anderson, showing them the pass signed by Arnold. He claimed he was on the general’s business and must not be detained. Paulding shot back, “We care not for that,” and ordered him to dismount. “Damn Arnold’s pass,” one of his associates shouted, and demanded his money. When André said he had none they decided to search him.

They led him off into the woods, Paulding assuring André they did not mean to take anything from him but that there were many bad people traveling the road and they had to be sure he wasn’t one of them. They ordered him to undress. As he did so he handed each article of clothing to Williams to search. They found and took his gold watch and eight Continental dollars. They had noticed that although he was wearing rustic clothing he had fine, expensive boots and ordered him to take them off. He pulled off one boot and handed it to Williams who found nothing in it. But when he began putting the boot back on one man noticed the bulge in his stocking. They ordered him to take his stocking off and then they discovered the documents hidden there. Paulding, who could read, examined the papers and exclaimed that André was a spy. They found the documents in his other stocking and asked what he would pay them if they let him go. André agreed they could have the horse, his watch, and one hundred guineas. But studying the documents again they decided they ought to take him to the nearest army post. The lowering clouds produced a fine drizzle as the little procession with André, followed by his three armed captors, rode along. André offered them money to take him to Kingsbridge. They debated whether to accept the bribe but turned down his tempting offer, fearing if they took him to British lines they would be arrested.

After various stops for food and drink they delivered André and his documents to Colonel James Jameson at North Castle. Jameson was the second in command there but decided to take action on his own. He rewarded André’s captors for their loyalty with a gift of André’s watch and horse. Examining the documents André had been carrying, however, Jameson decided they must have been stolen. He ought to have waited for Colonel Tallmadge, Washington’s intelligence chief, who was due back shortly before deciding on a course of action. Instead he ordered Colonel Solomon Allen, with an escort of four militia men, to deliver John Anderson to Arnold together with a letter explaining events. He intended, however, to send the documents themselves to George Washington. Jameson also wrote a letter to Washington accompanying the documents. In it he claimed, oddly, that Arnold had wanted all the documents sent to him but that he thought the documents “of a very dangerous tendency” and “thought it proper your Excellency should see them.”⁶ Of course it was all untrue. Arnold didn’t even know of the seizure of the documents let alone give any instructions to Jameson. Jameson’s entire behavior was strange.

As soon as Tallmadge returned and saw the documents he recognized Arnold’s handwriting and suspected treason. He and Jameson argued over what was to be done. Tallmadge apparently suggested some drastic measure, perhaps arresting Arnold, which Jameson refused. Jameson did agree though to reverse the decision to deliver John Anderson to Arnold. Instead André and his escort were ordered to reverse direction. André was to be taken to South Salem instead, where there was a detachment of dragoons. But Jameson utterly refused to countermand his order for Allen to deliver his letter to Arnold informing him that John Anderson had been arrested and the documents he carried sent to Washington.⁷ As soon as Tallmadge set eyes on André, despite André’s rough dress and dirty condition, he was convinced he was a military man and a gentleman.

Washington arrived at Robinson house just after Arnold’s departure. Major Franks greeted him with apologies for Arnold’s absence, explaining he had gone to West Point and would be back in an hour and that Mrs. Arnold was feeling ill. Washington took a hasty breakfast and, when Arnold hadn’t returned, decided to go to West Point to meet him and inspect the garrison. He took a barge across the river with Lafayette and Knox. Colonel Lamb came down to greet them, surprised at the visit. But when Washington asked where Arnold was, Lamb pointed out he hadn’t been at the fort for the past two days. Washington thought this odd but as he was at the fort he decided to inspect the defenses. For the next two hours he examined the fortifications and was thoroughly dismayed by their state of disrepair, the half-empty magazines, broken walls including one wall of Fort Putnam, rusty wheels, crumbling parapets.⁸ When he questioned the West Point officers about the sorry state of the defenses he was told there was a serious shortage of manpower to fix the problems and Arnold had added several additional projects for them to undertake.

It was nearly four o’clock that afternoon when Washington crossed the river and returned to Robinson House. He was given a large packet containing the documents taken from André, along with a revised report from Jameson and a letter from André himself disclosing his real identity. When André arrived filthy and exhausted at South Salem, and learned the documents he had carried were to be sent to Washington, he had decided to reveal his true identity. During a walk with Lieutenant King, commander at South Salem, in the garden of the house where he was confined, he confessed he was Major John André, British adjutant general. He asked for pen and paper to write directly to the commander in chief. André explained to Washington that he was writing “to rescue myself from an impression of having assumed a mean character for treacherous purposes or self-interest, a conduct incompatible with the principles that activate me, as well as with my condition in life. . . . The person in your possession is Major John André, Adjutant General of the British Army.”⁹ André explained that he was to meet someone to get intelligence but was detained and then unable to return to his ship as planned. He had proceeded under a flag of truce and had a pass on his return. “Thus I have the honor to relate, I was betrayed into the vile condition of an enemy in disguise within your posts. . . . I am branded with nothing dishonorable, as no motive could be mine but the service of my King, and as I was involuntary an imposter.” In Arnold’s letter to General Clinton after arriving in New York he made the same plea. He was sure of André, having proceeded under a flag of truce and a pass “being immediately sent to New York.”¹⁰ In André’s letter to Washington he mentioned some American officers taken prisoner at Charleston who were engaged “in a conspiracy against us” and might do as an exchange for him.

Trying to take all this in, Washington summoned Knox and Lafayette into a private room to inform them of André’s arrest and Arnold’s treason. Washington was deeply disturbed: “Arnold has betrayed us. Who can we trust now?” Orders were promptly given to intercept Arnold and bring him back unhurt. Ten ships were ordered to take up positions to protect West Point from any British attack.

Washington’s dismay was well placed. There were fears that Arnold’s example would prompt further defections. Arnold’s Life Guards at West Point left for home.¹¹ Eight days after Arnold’s flight Adjutant General Colonel Alexander Scammell wrote of the shock, “That a man so high on the list of fame should be guilty as Arnold, must be attributed not only to original sin, but actual transgression,” but in seeming contradiction he echoed Washington’s fear, “We were all astonishment, each peeping at his next neighbor to see if any treason was hanging about him: nay, we even descended to a critical examination of ourselves.”¹² British intelligence reporting on the American reaction to Arnold’s treason reported that the treason revealed “their distrust of themselves.”

Arnold had been on his way down the Hudson to New York for an hour by the time Washington returned to the Robinson House. When Arnold left Peggy and his assembled breakfast guests behind, he rode directly to the river where he had found his bargemen waiting. He ordered them to row him south, down the Hudson. When they passed Verplanck’s Point he spotted the Vulture. On Arnold’s command the crew rowed toward the British sloop while he frantically waved a white handkerchief tied to his cane in a sign of truce to the British crew on the Vulture and to Livingston on shore not to fire on the barge. Once alongside the Vulture Arnold climbed aboard and informed Robinson that André had been arrested. He called down to his astonished bargemen, “My lads, I have quitted the rebel Army and joined the standard of his Britannic Majesty.” He offered them commissions in the British army if they defected, promising one, Larvey, “to do something more.” Larvey called up to him, “No, Sir, one coat is enough for me to wear at one time.”¹³ Two of his bargemen did agree to the offer. The others were taken prisoner to New York where Clinton gave them parole. Just before the ship sailed off Arnold hurriedly penned a letter to Washington along with one to Peggy and left them at the blockhouse. About three o’clock that afternoon the Vulture set sail down the Hudson River to New York, every mile taking Arnold farther from home, family, friends, colleagues, and his place as a hero of the American revolutionary army. His scheme to surrender West Point had been discovered and there was no going back. There could be no retreat.

Had Arnold planned to arrange for the British to capture Washington and his staff? While that was bruited afterward, it seems highly unlikely. When he and André parted there was no certainty when an attack on West Point would take place and Washington had no plan to stay there. The plot would have had to be set for September 25, when Washington was scheduled to return to West Point, for that to have been the scheme. Nevertheless, the plot to permit the West Point fortress to fall to the British would have been a grievous loss for the American army, especially after the recent loss of Charlestown with its defending army.

Arnold’s letter to Washington after his flight opened with a plea that however others may, indeed, would see his behavior, he intended only the good of his country:¹⁴

The heart which is conscious of its own rectitude, cannot contemplate to palliate a step which the world may censure as wrong. I have ever acted from a principle of love to my Country, since the commencement of the present unhappy contest between Great Britain and the Colonies. The same principal of love to my Country actuates my present conduct, however it may appear inconsistent to the world, which very seldom judges right of any man’s actions. I have no favor to ask for myself. I have too often experienced the ingratitude of my Country to attempt it. But from the known humanity of your Excellency, I am induced to ask your protection for Mrs. Arnold from every insult and injury that a mistaken vengeance of my country may expose her to. It ought to fall only on me; she is as good and innocent as an angel, and is incapable of doing wrong. I beg she may be permitted to return to her friends in Philadelphia, or come to me, as she may choose.

He asked that Peggy be permitted to write to him. A letter for Peggy was enclosed in his letter to Washington. Arnold assured Washington that his close aides, Colonel Varick and Major Franks, were also ignorant of his intentions.

Arnold also took responsibility for André’s situation, writing Washington that it was at his direction that André had come to him with a flag of truce and returned in disguise. Robinson also wrote to Washington but his letter was a plea for André’s innocence and a demand for his freedom. André had gone “with a flag at the request of a General Arnold, on public business with him, and had his permit to return by land to New York,” Robinson argued. That being so, he “cannot be detained by you, without the greatest violation of flags, and contrary to the custom and usage of all nations. . . . I must desire you will order him to be set at liberty and allowed to return immediately. Every step Major André took was by the advice and direction of General Arnold, even that of taking a feigned name, and of course he is not liable to censure for it.”¹⁵

Washington’s response was to write to his officers up and down the river near West Point to strengthen the fort as quickly as possible and to order Colonel Jameson to take every precaution to prevent André from escaping. André was to be escorted under heavy guard to Robinson House. Contrary to Robinson’s plea that André was entitled to immediate release, Washington wrote Jameson, “I would not wish Mr. André to be treated with insult, but he does not appear to stand upon the footing of a common prisoner of war. Therefore he is not entitled to the usual indulgences they receive, and is to be most closely and narrowly watched to insure that André must not escape.”¹⁶ Washington also wrote summoning Colonel John Laurens, judge advocate general of the Continental Army who, nine months earlier, had prosecuted Arnold at his court-martial.

Peggy, stunned by Arnold’s unexpected and desperate announcement that he was leaving immediately to join the British army, had fainted. When she regained consciousness he was gone. She was wild with fears for her own and her baby’s safety, feeling quite rightly abandoned in this remote military post far from friends and family. To her terrified mind no one could be trusted, they were plotting to kill her child. Peggy’s guests and Arnold’s aides did not yet know of his flight. Varick testified later that Peggy was in “the most alarming distress of mind.”¹⁷ He was told “that she had complained that she had no friends, she was left alone, and on your [Franks] telling her that she had many friends (here enumerating yourself, me, and General Arnold)—on your mentioning him, she exclaimed in an agony of grief, Oh no, he is gone, gone forever.” This statement confirmed what were still just suspicions of Franks and Varick that Arnold had fled. Washington had just recently arrived for breakfast and knew nothing of Arnold’s flight. Once he and his officers learned the truth, Alexander Hamilton left, trying in vain to catch up with Arnold. As Hamilton explained in a letter to his fiancée Elizabeth, General Schuyler’s daughter, “I saw an amiable woman, frantic with distress for the loss of a husband she tenderly loved, a traitor to his country and to his fame, a disgrace to his connections, it was the most affecting scene I ever was witness to.”¹⁸ Unable to calm her, Franks sent for Washington. She knew Washington—he had dined at her father’s table in Philadelphia, he had freed her brother Edward when he was captured. Yet when Washington appeared she did not recognize him, and flailing in her fright her gown dropped from her shoulder. Washington was embarrassed and quickly left the room.

Later there were claims, apparently started by Aaron Burr, that Peggy knew about Arnold’s plot and was instrumental in it, just feigning distress.¹⁹ But those who knew her best and knew her at the time, her family, Arnold’s aides, and Washington himself were convinced of her innocence and her very genuine hysteria. Hamilton described Peggy’s anguish to his fiancée: “You may imagine that she is not easily to be consoled. Added to her other distresses, she is very apprehensive the resentment of her country will fall upon her (who is only unfortunate) for the guilt of her husband.”²⁰ “Could I forgive Arnold for sacrificing his honor, reputation, and duty,” he added, “I could not forgive him for acting a part that must have forfeited the esteem of so fine a woman. . . . At present she almost forgets his crime in his misfortunes, and her horror at the guilt of the traitor, is lost in her love of the man. But a virtuous mind cannot long esteem a base one; and time will make her despise, if it cannot make her hate.” When Major Franks learned of the rumor that Peggy was complicit in Arnold’s plot he was incensed. Arnold had assigned Franks the responsibility of guarding Peggy while she was at West Point. He insisted on her innocence when questioned later by a friend. As further proof that Arnold would not have confided in her Franks mentioned her delicate state of health:

Paroxysms of physical indisposition attended by nervous debility, during which she would give utterance to anything and everything on her mind. This was a fact well-known amongst us of the General’s family; so much so as to cause us to be scrupulous of what we told her, or said in her hearing. General Arnold was guarded and impenetrable towards all around him, and I should believe her to have been ignorant of his plans, even without my knowledge of this peculiar feature in her constitution; but with it, such a strong corroborative proof, I am most solemnly and firmly convinced that General Arnold would never confide his detestable scheme to her. . . . He was moreover, too well aware of her warm patriotic feelings. ²¹

Washington was deeply sympathetic, and when Peggy regained her composure he gave her the letter Arnold has asked him to deliver and informed her that Arnold was safe. Then the commander did as Arnold had asked and gave Peggy the choice of returning to her father and family in Philadelphia or going to Arnold in New York City. She chose to go home to her family. On September 27, two days after Arnold’s flight, Peggy, escorted by Major Franks, left with the nurse and her baby son for the long journey home to Pennsylvania. Had she been complicit in Arnold’s plot, or loved him above all else, she would never had elected to return to Philadelphia where the Executive Council radicals and Congress were already hostile to her husband, and where she and her child would be in real danger. But she chose to go home to her family, whatever the danger, rather than to join her husband in the British bastion of New York.

The news of Arnold’s defection caused a national furor with wild parades and bonfires that burned him in effigy. His two older sons were taken into the home of Arnold’s old friends, Comfort Sage and his wife. Mrs. Sage closed her curtains that his children might not see the horrible image of their father that a raucous crowd carried in parade past their door. The rioting in Norwich where Arnold was born and raised was particularly vicious, the rioters even overturning his father’s gravestone. In New Milford, Connecticut, residents carried effigies of Arnold and Satan through the streets as firecrackers were exploded.²² Later the effigy of Arnold was hanged, cut down, and buried. A similar parade wound through the streets of Philadelphia with effigies of Arnold and Satan, Satan carrying a pitchfork and offering gold. At the end of the parade the effigy of Arnold was burned.

Arnold’s defection had an impact on Europeans considering whether to support the American Revolution. John Adams was in the Netherlands trying to get a loan and financing when the Dutch learned about Arnold’s treason. Baron van der Capellen informed Adams that Arnold’s treason, together with the loss of Charleston and Gates’s defeat at Camden, had destroyed Dutch confidence.²³ “Never has the credit of America stood so low.” Adams was to inform Congress to “depend upon no money from hence.”

The feelings among Arnold’s fellow soldiers and officers were intense. General Greene, a friend of Arnold’s, learning of his treason, judged: “Since the fall of Lucifer, nothing has equaled the fall of Arnold. His military reputation in Europe and America was flattering in the vanity of the first General of the age. He will now sink as low as he had been high before, and as the devil made war upon heaven after his fall, so I expect Arnold will upon America.”²⁴ He added, “Should he ever fall into our hands, he will be a sweet sacrifice.” Rewards were placed on Arnold’s head and Washington plotted to have him captured.

When the news reached Hannah of her brother’s flight to the British, she was in Philadelphia with Arnold’s little son Henry. Hannah had often been upset at Arnold’s long absence in the army and the dangers he faced during the war, but she was also distraught at the war itself and the terrible pain it caused. Yet now writing to a friend from New Haven she referred to the “distressful step” that he had taken.²⁵ She asked that her bed, which was to have been sent to Arnold, be kept until she sent for it, praying that “if my wretched life is continued, that I shall one day quit this land of strangers and return to that of my birth.” Of course Arnold’s fine house in New Haven was promptly confiscated as punishment for his treason, and would be sold. “Let me ask the pity of all my friends,” Hannah grieved, “there never was a more proper object of it . . . Do write. Forsake me not in my distress, I conjure you, but let me hear at all opportunities.” She reported that Arnold’s sons, “The little unfortunate boys in Maryland,” and young Harry were well, then remembered the tragedy that had struck her friend. “I was so swallowed up in my own distress I had forgot yours, in the loss of your little son! But mourn not for him, my friends, he has escaped the snares and miseries of a wretched, deceitful and sorrowing vale of tears.”

When Peggy returned home she wanted nothing more than to remain quietly with her family, especially her father. That was not to be. Indeed Major Franks reported to friends that only the intervention of Joseph Reed, of all people, had saved him and Mrs. Arnold from physical violence.²⁶ Less than a month after her return the Pennsylvania Executive Council that previously had been so hostile to Arnold, decided she had to leave. On October 27 they announced:

The Council, taking into consideration the case of Mrs. Margaret Arnold (the wife of Benedict Arnold, an attainted traitor, with the enemy at New York) whose residence in this city has become dangerous to the public safety; and this board being desirous as much as possible, to prevent any correspondence and intercourse being carried on with persons of disaffected character in this State and the enemy at New York, and especially with the said Benedict Arnold, therefore, Resolved, That the said Margaret Arnold depart this State within fourteen days from the date hereof, and that she do not return again during the continuance of the present war.²⁷

Peggy’s father was permitted to accompany her most of her way to New York. A day after they left Edward Burd, her brother-in-law, wrote his father, “You have doubtless heard of the unfortunate affair of Mrs. Arnold. We tried every means to prevail on the Council to permit her to stay among us, and not to compel her to go to that infernal villain her husband in New York. The Council seemed for a time to favor our request, but at length have ordered her away.”²⁸ Her forced departure, he wrote, threw the entire family “in the deepest distress.” Her father had promised the Council and Peggy had signed, engaging not to write to Arnold or to receive letters without showing them to the Council if they permitted her to stay. This wasn’t enough for the Council that had done so much to ruin her husband’s life and reputation. “If she could have staid Mr. Shippen would not have wished her ever to be united to him again.” “It makes me melancholy,” he added, “every time I think of the matter. I cannot bear the idea of her re-union. The sacrifice was an immense one at her being married to him at all. It is much more so to be obliged, against her will, to go to the arms of a man who appears to be so very black.”

Four days before Christmas Peggy’s father arrived back home after bidding farewell to his favorite child. They would correspond over the years but would see each other again only once. He wrote Peggy’s beloved grandfather, “My poor daughter Peggy’s unfortunate Connection has given us great grief. She is however safe arrived at New York and well provided for, which is all the Consolation we could expect considering all Circumstances. . . . When will this terrible War with all its Evil have an end?”²⁹

Of all those touched by Arnold’s action, John André’s tragic execution would be followed by an even more “giddy rise” to the highest pinnacle of public esteem than even he could have imagined. But first came his ordeal, and Smith’s. Smith had served as André’s escort from the Vulcan and guided him through the American lines toward White Plains. He was now seized by Washington’s orders and brought to him for questioning. Smith insisted he had done nothing wrong, that everything he did was at the orders of General Arnold. “Sir,” Washington retorted, “do you know that Arnold has fled and that Mr. Anderson whom you piloted through our lines, proves to be Major John André, the Adjutant General of the British Army, who is now our prisoner?” Pointing to a tree visible through the window Washington threatened “unless you confess who were your accomplices, I shall suspend you both on that tree.”³⁰ Smith stood his ground. He was a lawyer, and after insisting on his innocence added that as a citizen he was not to be tried by a military court. However, under persistent questioning he explained all he knew of the affair.

A cold autumn rain cast its gloomy chill on André and his escort, as he was taken by horse and then by barge to Robinson House. André arrived at Robinson House not long after Smith and was questioned. Afterward he and Smith were sent under heavy escort to Fort Putnam. The two men were not permitted to speak to each other or even given an opportunity to converse. As they rode André was near the front of the column, Smith near the rear. They crossed the river in two barges, each prisoner in a different boat. Sitting next to Tallmadge on the barge, Tallmadge asked André if he had intended to participate in the attack on West Point. André said he was, and pointed out the spot where the British meant to launch an attack.³¹ André asked Tallmadge how he would be regarded by Washington and a military tribunal. Tallmadge, hesitant at first, finally replied with a story. He had a “much-loved class-mate in Yale College,” he told André, “by the name of Nathan Hale, who entered the army in 1775.”³² Hale had been disguised as a civilian when he was captured on his return from a mission to Long Island to get information on the British army. “Do you remember the sequel of the story?” Tallmadge asked. Hale had suffered especially cruel treatment. He was summarily hanged the following day without a trial. The night before his execution he was denied the service of a chaplain or even a Bible. He had been allowed to write two letters, one to his brother, another to a friend who he didn’t realize had been killed. Allowed to make a last speech, he ended it with the now famous phrase, “I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country.” After his death the British officer in charge destroyed both letters. “But you surely do not consider his case and mine alike?” André asked Tallmadge. “Yes, precisely similar,” Tallmadge answered, “and similar will be your fate!”³³

Hale’s brutal treatment was cause of great bitterness among Americans and is important for Washington’s determination that André be treated with scrupulously correct treatment, unlike that meted out to Hale. Despite this the British were, and remain, incensed by Washington’s treatment of André. Fortescue, author of the classic history of the British army, explains their view that Washington used disguised spies and kidnappers himself, and hoped Clinton would exchange Arnold for André. The British acknowledged the appropriateness of the trial of André but they were convinced the threat to execute him as a spy was “employed chiefly as a means of putting pressure of a peculiarly cruel kind upon Clinton, and it was for this reason and for no other that it was so much resented by the British Army and the British nation.”³⁴

At Stony Point they were provided with horses for the remaining journey. They reached Tappan, where they were to be incarcerated, at sunset. Word had traveled quickly and as their column drew up in front of the old Dutch church the town green was jammed with residents, with others peering from windows and doorways. Smith wrote, “We were paraded before the church. Many of my quondam friends flocked around us, and from them I received the bitterest invectives.”³⁵ Smith was lodged in a cramped spare room in the church while André was provided a bedroom and adjoining living room in the stout stone building that accommodated the Casparus Mabie Tavern. As Washington ordered “[e]very attention was paid him suitable to his rank and character.” Both were kept under heavy guard, with guards constantly with each man. The locals hurriedly built two coffins that they carried back and forth past the windows of the rooms where André and Smith were incarcerated.

On September 27 Clinton wrote to Washington. Ignoring André’s rustic disguise he pointed out that since André had gone into American-held territory under a flag of truce and had passports for his return he had “no doubt but that your Excellency will immediately direct that this officer has permission to return to my orders at New York.”³⁶ Clinton was an aloof, stiff man but he had warmed to this amiable, elegant young officer, and was thoroughly alarmed at his predicament. Washington was unmoved by Clinton’s appeal. Keen to resolve the affair as quickly as possible he ordered André’s case to be heard by a board of general officers on September 29. The board was to determine “in the light of which he ought to be considered, and the punishment that ought to be inflicted.”³⁷ It was a distinguished board comprised of six major generals and eight brigadier generals. André was brought into the church where the officers were sitting, wearing the clothes in which he had been captured, and was seated at a small table. Alexander Hamilton, who was a member of the board, described the proceedings and André’s comportment to Colonel Laurens:

“When brought before the Board of officers, he met with every indulgence, and was requested to answer no interrogatory which would even embarrass his feelings. He frankly confessed all the facts relating to himself.” Indeed, the facts were not controverted, and the Board reported that André ought to be considered as a spy, and agreeably to the law and usages of nations, must suffer death. André met the result with manly firmness. “I foresee my fate,” said he; “and though I pretend not to play the hero, or to be indifferent about life, yet I am reconciled to whatever may happen, conscious that misfortune, not guilt, has brought it upon me.”³⁸

The following day Washington replied to General Clinton’s letter reminding him that the circumstances in which André was caught would have justified summary execution.³⁹ Instead Washington had referred the case to a board of officers, who reported André had made a “free and voluntary confession.” André had arrived in the night from an armed sloop for an interview with General Arnold—André did not name his contact—“in a private and secret manner,” had changed his dress within the American lines and then passed through the lines in disguise carrying several papers that contained intelligence for the enemy. “It is evident,” Washington wrote, “that Major André was employed in the execution of measures very foreign to the objects of flags of truce, and such as they were never meant to authorize or countenance in the most distant degree.” In fact, during his examination André had admitted “that it was impossible for him to suppose that he came on shore under the sanction of a flag.” André’s execution was set for five o’clock in the evening the first of October.

Clinton was distraught and, according to Chief Justice Smith, prepared to hang as many American spies as he held prisoner. He was in tears at a meeting of British officers as he read the letter André had sent him.⁴⁰ Instead of sending Washington a threatening letter, he was persuaded to write a more conciliatory one attempting to persuade Washington that the board was not properly informed of all the pertinent facts, adding, “I think it of the highest moment to humanity that your Excellency should be perfectly appraised of the state of this matter before you proceed to put that judgment in execution.” A threatening letter would be sent however. Arnold was to write it, and it would be sent with Clinton’s.

Washington postponed the execution until October 2 to give Clinton’s three emissaries, lieutenant-generals Robertson and Elliot and Chief Justice William Smith, time to plead for André. They arrived accompanied by Colonel Robinson. General Greene met them on behalf of Washington. After a long conference Greene reported to Washington. They had delivered a letter from Arnold to Washington expressing gratitude for Washington’s kindness to Peggy, then arguing that André ought not to be considered a spy concluding with an eloquent appeal: “Suffer me to entreat your excellency for your own and the honor of humanity, and the love you have of justice, that you suffer not an unjust sentence to touch the life of Major André.”⁴¹ But then Clinton had Arnold write that if Major André “should suffer the severity of their sentence, I shall think myself bound by every tie of duty and honor to retaliate on such unhappy persons of your army, as may fall within my power . . . I have further to observe that forty of the principal inhabitants of South Carolina have justly forfeited their lives . . . [Clinton could not] in justice extend his mercy to them any longer if Major André suffers, which in all probability will open a scene of blood at which humanity will revolt.” “If this warning should be disregarded,” he concluded, “and he suffer, I call heaven and earth to witness, that your excellency will be justly answerable for the torrent of blood that may be spilt in consequence.” Arnold could not have known what prisoners Clinton had in Charleston nor was he in any position to threaten their lives. The letter was obviously written by and for Clinton with Arnold pointing out the threat executing André would produce. Arnold was in no position to dispute it. He was as distraught as Clinton. His plans for ending the war by surrendering West Point had failed; he was now useless to the British as a spy, having been exposed as a traitor. He had compromised the chief of British intelligence, close confidant of General Clinton, a highly regarded and much-loved officer. Arnold was, and must have felt, supremely responsible for André’s predicament as well as his own. At any rate, despite persuasions and threats, Clinton’s delegation was informed that Washington’s opinion had not altered. The three delegates tried once more, arguing that André be permitted to return to New York to no avail. Washington was unmoved.

André was reconciled to his fate but he worried that Clinton would reproach himself what had happened, telling Hamilton, “I would not for the world, leave a sting in his mind that should embitter his future days.” When he wrote Clinton thanking him for his kindness he exonerated him of any responsibility for what happened, reminding Clinton that he had gone against his advice.⁴² Then he proclaimed, “With all the warmth of my heart, I give you thanks for your Excellency’s profuse kindness to me, and I send you the most earnest wishes for your welfare, which a faithful, affectionate, and respectful attendant can frame.” He asked Clinton’s help for his mother and three sisters, “to whom the value of my commission would be an object.”

Believing he was to die on October 1 Andre wrote Washington that morning, pleading to die like a soldier not a spy, by a firing squad, not a gibbet. “I trust that the request I make to your Excellency at this serious period, and which is to soften my last moments, will not be rejected. Sympathy toward a soldier will surely induce your Excellency and a military tribunal to adapt the mode of my death to the feelings of a man of honor. Let me hope, Sir, that if aught in my character impresses you with esteem towards me, if aught in my misfortunes marks me as the victim of policy and not of resentment, I shall experience the operation of those feelings in your breast, by being informed that I am not to die on a gibbet.”⁴³ Based on the verdict of the board however, Washington felt he could not grant this request. The board of inquiry had been split, six for and six against hanging, and General Greene had made the decision for hanging. Hamilton disagreed, writing Elizabeth that he felt this was too hard, that delicate sentiment, virtue, fortitude “pleads for him, but hard-hearted policy calls for a sacrifice. He must die . . . I must inform you that I urged a compliance with André’s request to be shot; and I do not think it would have had an ill-effect, but some people are only sensible to motives of policy, and sometimes, from a narrow disposition, mistake it.”⁴⁴ He then predicted, correctly, “When André’s tale comes to be told, and present resentment is over, the refusing him the privilege of choosing the manner of his death will be branded with too much obstinacy.”

There was criticism among the British later that Arnold never offered to surrender himself in exchange for André when it was learned that André was captured. But in 1782 a Captain Battersby, who “enjoyed the friendship of military men of the highest social rank,” came forward stating that “It was currently reported and believed in the lines, that Arnold himself proposed to Sir Henry that he might be permitted to go out and surrender himself in exchange for André, and that the reply was, ‘Your proposal, sir, does you great honor, but if André was my own brother I could not agree to it.’”⁴⁵ This assertion was published and never denied by any of the British officers in Clinton’s circle. The biographer who offers this evidence rightly points out that the offer would be in keeping with Arnold’s temperament, adding, “what was there left for Arnold to live for after his disgrace and the failure of the conspiracy? That he realized his unhappy fate, I do not doubt. Such a sensational death, a voluntary sacrifice of his life to save the life of André, exhibiting alike his courage and his generosity, would not, in his despair, have been altogether repulsive. It would unquestionably have been better for his fame if Sir Henry Clinton had assented to his offer.”⁴⁶

André’s courtly behavior, his graciousness and manly courage made a very great impression on all his captors. He was to die at noon on October 2. Not hearing any response from Washington about his request to be shot André thought it had been approved. It was a perfect, almost summer-like day. André ate the meal sent him as his others had been, from Washington’s table, dressed and chatted with his guards. As the hour for his execution approached Washington ordered the shutters closed so he and his staff were hidden from the view of the large crowd that had gathered on the hill where the execution was to take place. André’s escort arrived to the beat of drums. He placed his tricorn on his head and followed the guards. Outside he was flanked by officers and a guard of five hundred dragoons, four abreast. They followed a fife and drum corps and were followed by a black coffin on a horse-drawn wagon. André marched along nodding to the board of officers that had tried him. Dr. Thather witnessed the execution and described the event in his journal: “Melancholy and gloom pervaded all ranks and the scene was affectingly awful. The eyes of the immense multitude were fixed on him who, rising superior to the fears of death, appeared as if conscious of the dignified deportment he displayed. His only hesitancy was when he saw the gallows. “Must I die in this manner?” he asked the captain of the guard. “I am reconciled to my fate but not to the mode.”⁴⁷ The captain replied, “It is unavoidable, Sir.” Other than this, Dr. Thatcher remembered, “not a murmur or a sigh ever escaped him and the civilities and attentions bestowed on him were politely acknowledged.”⁴⁸ André, as requested, climbed onto the wagon under the gallows, stood in the coffin, removed his hat and put the rope around his neck and covered his eyes with his handkerchief. He was given the opportunity to say final words: “I have nothing more to say gentlemen but this, you all bear me witness that I meet my fate as a brave man.” His hands were tied, and at the end he said quietly, “It will be but a momentary pang.” At the signal the horses pulled the wagon from under his feet, his body swinging in an arc as the crowd gasped. In 1821 the Duke of York arranged to have André’s remains, which had been buried near the gallows, removed and reinterred in Poet’s Corner at Westminster Abbey, oddly alongside Britain’s literary greats.

Two days after André’s execution Congress’s Board of War stripped Arnold’s name from the list of officers. Deeply alarmed after André’s execution, Arnold wrote Washington fearful for the fate of his family.⁴⁹ “Necessity compelled me to leave behind me in your camp a wife and offspring that are endeared to me by every sacred tie.” “If any violence be offered to them,” he warned, “remember I will revenge their wrongs in a deluge of blood.” It was rather late to think of his family’s danger, and Washington was the unlikeliest person to harm them.