Major John André and the
treason of General Benedict Arnold
Excerpted from Benson J. Lossing, Chapter 13
General Arnold was at the mansion of Colonel Robinson (Beverly House)
on the morning of the 24th of September, 1780, fully persuaded that his
treasonable plans for surrendering West Point and its dependencies into
the hands of Sir Henry Clinton, the British commander-in-chief, then in
possession of New York, for the consideration of a brigadier's commission
in the British army, and £10,000 in gold, were working prosperously.
Major André, Arnold's immediate accomplice in treasonable, designs, had,
in a personal interview, arranged the details of the wicked bargain, and
left for New York. Arnold believed he had arrived there in safety, with
all requisite information for Sir Henry; and that before Washington's
return from Connecticut, whither he had gone to hold a conference with
Rochambeau and other French officers, Clinton would have sailed up the
Hudson and taken possession of the Highland fortresses.
But André did not reach New York. He was captured on his way, by militia
men, as a suspicious-looking traveller. Evidences of his character as
a spy were found upon his person, and he was detained. Washington returned
sooner than Arnold expected him. To the surprise of the traitor, Hamilton
and Lafayette reached the Beverly House early on the morning of the 24th,
and announced that Washington had turned down to the West Point Ferry,
and would be with them soon.
At breakfast Arnold received a letter from an officer below, saying,
"Major André, of the British Army, is a prisoner in my custody."
The traitor had reason to expect that evidences of his own guilt might
arrive at any moment. He concealed his emotions. With perfect coolness
he ordered a horse to be made ready, alleging that his presence was needed
"over the river" immediately, He then left the table, went into the great
passage, and hurried up the broad staircase to his wife's chamber. In
brief and hurried words he told her that they must instantly part, perhaps
for ever, for his life depended on his reaching the enemy's lines without
detection.
Horror-stricken, the poor young creature, but one year a mother, and
not two a wife, swooned and sank senseless upon the floor. Arnold dare
not call for assistance, but kissing, with lips blasted by words of guilt
and treason, his boy, then sleeping in angel innocence and purity, he
rushed from the room, mounted a horse, hastened to the river, flung himself
into his barge, and directing the six oarsmen to row swiftly down the
Hudson, escaped to the Vulture, a British sloop-of-war, lying far
below.
Washington arrived at the Beverly House soon after Arnold left it. As
yet no suspicion of treason had entered his mind. After a hasty breakfast,
he crossed to West Point, expecting to find Arnold there. "I have heard
nothing from him for two days," said Colonel Lamb, the commanding officer.
Washington's suspicions were awakened. He soon re-crossed the river, where
he was met by Hamilton with papers just received revealing Arnold's guilt.
He called in Knox and Lafayette for counsel. "Whom can we trust now?"
he inquired with calmness, while deep sorrow evidently stirred his bosom.
At the same time the condition of Mrs. Arnold, who was frantic with grief
and apprehension, awakened his liveliest sympathies. "The general went
up to see her," wrote Hamilton in describing the scene. "She upbraided
him with being in a plot to murder her child, for she was quite beside
herself. One moment she raved; another she melted into tears. Sometimes
she pressed her infant to her bosom, and lamented its fate, occasioned
by the imprudence of its father, in a manner that would have moved insensibility
itself."
Washington believed her innocent of all previous knowledge of her husband's
guilt, and did all in his power to soothe her. "She is as good and innocent
as an angel, and as incapable of doing wrong," Arnold wrote to Washington,
from the Vulture, imploring protection for his wife and child.
Ample protection was afforded, and Mrs. Arnold and her infant were conveyed
in safety to her friends. She was the traitor's second wife, and the daughter
of Mr. Shippen, a loyalist of Philadelphia; and she was only eighteen
years of age at the time of her marriage to Arnold, while he was military
governor of that city, in 1778.
Beverly Dock is the place where Arnold, the traitor, entered his barge
in which he escaped to the Vulture sloop-of-war, on the morning
when he fled from the "Beverly House," the cause of which we have already
considered. Here he kept his barge moored, and here he embarked on that
flight which severed him for ever from the sympathies of his countrymen--ay,
of the world--for those who "accepted the treason, despised the traitor."
His six oarsmen on that occasion, unconscious of the nature of the general's
errand in such hot haste down the river, had their muscles strengthened
by a promised reward of two gallons of rum; and the barge glided with
the speed of the wind. They were awakened to a sense of their position
only when they were detained on board the Vulture as prisoners,
and saw their chief greeted as a friend by the enemies of their country.
They were speedily set at liberty, in New York, by Sir Henry Clinton,
who scorned Arnold for his meanness and treachery.
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