[18] On one of his voyages, he fought a duel in Honduras with a British sea captain who had called him a "damned Yankee, destitute of good manners or those of a gentleman". He did, however, investigate its extent, and suggested that he was willing to exchange Andr for Arnold during negotiations with Clinton concerning Andr's fate. Before his name became synonymous with treason, Benedict Arnold was a bonafide hero of the American Revolutionary War. Many historians see her as having facilitated Arnold's plans to switch sides; he opened secret negotiations with her friend Andr, and she relayed their messages to each other. In December 1780, Arnold was given command of British forces sent to raid Virginia. As a young man, Arnold. In a July 11 letter, he complained that the British did not appear to trust him, and threatened to break off negotiations unless progress was made. [40] In February 1777, he learned that he had been passed over by Congress for promotion to major general. 8. He won a victory at Fort Stanwix (now Rome) in August 1777 and commanded advance battalions at the Battle of Saratoga that autumn, fighting brilliantly until seriously wounded. Arnold was planning to surrender the fort there to British forces, but the plot was discovered in September 1780, whereupon he fled to the British lines. Thereafter his name became an epithet for traitor in the United States. His father's alcoholism worsened after her death, and the youth took on the responsibility of supporting his father and younger sister. [134] Social historian Brian Carso notes that, as the 19th century progressed, the story of Arnold's betrayal was portrayed with near-mythical proportions as a part of the national history. [123], In January 1801, Arnold's health began to decline. Arnold reopened the secret channels with the British, informing them of Schuyler's proposals and including Schuyler's assessment of conditions at West Point. On the morning of September 22, from their position at Teller's Point, two American rebels, John "Jack" Peterson and Moses Sherwood, under the command of Col. James Livingston fired on HMS Vulture, the ship that was intended to carry Andr back to New York. Some historians suggested an Arnold liaison in New Brunswick, but Canadian historian Barry Wilson noted the weakness of this traditional account. 0:00. [22], The Sugar Act of 1764 and the Stamp Act of 1765 severely curtailed mercantile trade in the colonies. He hoped that this work would earn him wider respect and a new command; instead, it earned him and his sons a land-grant of 15,000 acres (6,100ha) in Upper Canada,[122] near present-day Renfrew, Ontario. Omissions? [12] In 1757 when he was 16, he did enlist in the Connecticut militia, which marched off toward Albany, New York, and Lake George. [137] A moralistic children's tale entitled "The Cruel Boy" was widely circulated in the 19th century. Arnold wrote out passes for Andr so that he would be able to pass through the lines, and he also gave him plans for West Point. The first man was a British major named John Andre. The first major biography of his life was The Life and Treason of Benedict Arnold, published in 1832 by historian Jared Sparks; it was particularly harsh in showing how Arnold's treacherous character was formed out of childhood experiences. Get a Britannica Premium subscription and gain access to exclusive content. These charges were then referred to Congress, and Arnold asked for an immediate court-martial to clear himself. During the American War for Independence, several engagements were fought at the five-pointed star-shaped Fort Ticonderoga. Meanwhile, in April 1779, Arnold married Margaret (Peggy) Shippen, a young woman of loyalist sympathies. [33], The Second Continental Congress authorized an invasion of Quebec, in part on the urging of Arnoldbut he was passed over for command of the expedition. Arnold and Wemyss faced similar situations but created different legaciesWemyss "served with distinction during the war" but became a footnote in history; Arnold lost the respect of people on all sides of the Revolution and his name became synonymously linked to treason. He followed up that action with a bold raid on Fort Saint-Jean on the Richelieu River north of Lake Champlain. The most famous of these occurred on May 10, 1775, when Ethan Allen and his band of Green Mountain Boys, accompanied by Benedict Arnold, who held a commission from . His subordinates, some long-time associates, grumbled about Arnold's unnecessary distribution of supplies and eventually concluded that he was selling them on the black market for personal gain. While this is the case, no power in this country could suddenly place you in the situation you aim at under the East India Company. . [121], In July 1792, Arnold fought a bloodless duel with the Earl of Lauderdale after the Earl impugned his honor in the House of Lords. His father's alcoholism and ill health kept him from training Arnold in the family mercantile business, but his mother's family connections secured an apprenticeship for him with her cousins Daniel and Joshua Lathrop, who operated a successful apothecary and general merchandise trade in Norwich. [73] By October 1779, the negotiations had ground to a halt. After his leg healed, Benedict Arnold was named Military Governor of Philadelphia. He received a colonel's commission in the Continental Army for this expedition and left Cambridge in September 1775 with 1,100 men. On May 9, Franklin introduced Stansbury to Major Andr, who had just been named the British spy chief. Various translations of Sun Tzu's The Art of War have been published over the past century. [108], On his return to New York in June, Arnold made a variety of proposals for attacks on economic targets to force the Americans to end the war. Odell was a Loyalist working with William Franklin, the last colonial governor of New Jersey and the son of Benjamin Franklin. Unlike his accomplishments in the battlefield, Arnold was not a good Governor. He began to drink heavily, and . [113] George Johnstone turned him down for a position in the East India Company and explained: "Although I am satisfied with the purity of your conduct, the generality do not think so. He dared not tell me his name. As the park's Facebook page explains, the hero's name was left off the monument for a reason. At the end of 1781 Arnold went to England. [113] Other attempts all failed to gain positions within the government or the British East India Company over the next few years, and he was forced to subsist on the reduced pay of non-wartime service. [132], Talleyrand continued, "I must confess that I felt much pity for him, for which political puritans will perhaps blame me, but with which I do not reproach myself, for I witnessed his agony". [37] He also had disagreements with John Brown and James Easton, two lower-level officers with political connections that resulted in ongoing suggestions of improprieties on his part. Benedict Arnold was born on January 14, 1741, in Norwich, Colony of Connecticut, British America. In April of 1775, after learning about the conflicts at Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts, Arnold organized his men in preparation for a march to Cambridge to aid in the fight against the British . It is impossible to say when 37-year-old Benedict Arnold first met 18-year-old Peggy Shippen, but we do know that on September 25, 1778, he wrote her a love lettermuch of it an exact copy of . Clinton was concerned that Washington's army and the French fleet would join in Rhode Island, and he again fixed on West Point as a strategic point to capture. He then took the letter back to Connecticut, suspicious of Arnold's actions, where he delivered it to the head of the Connecticut militia. He fought with distinction for the American Continental Army and rose to the rank of major general before defecting to the British side of the conflict in 1780. Together, they won the Battle of Fort Ticonderoga, America's first victory in the Revolutionary War. [89] Eventually, a meeting was set for September 11 near Dobb's Ferry. When American leaders discovered the plot, Arnold fled. While Benedict Arnold escaped to British-occupied New York, where he was protected from punishment. These letters were delivered by Samuel Wallis, another Philadelphia businessman who spied for the British, rather than by Stansbury. [103] The anti-war Whigs had gained the upper hand in Parliament, and Germain was forced to resign, with the government of Lord North falling not long after. [99][100] Upon receiving Jameson's message, however, he learned that Jameson had sent Washington the papers which Andr was carrying. Arnold was born in Norwich, Connecticut, on January 14, 1741. At the age of sixteen, Arnold enlisted in a militia and served in the French and Indian War in upstate New York . Saint Benedict once lived in a hermit cave. To raise money, he violated several state and military regulations, arousing the suspicions and, finally, the denunciations of Pennsylvanias supreme executive council. Andr was captured the next day, near Tarrytown, with those plans tucked inside his boot. His father was a successful businessman and young Arnold was educated in private schools. [55], Arnold lived extravagantly in Philadelphia and was a prominent figure on the social scene. Interesting Facts About Benedict Arnold. Background. His physicians diagnosed him as having dropsy, and a visit to the countryside only temporarily improved his condition. He was named after his great-grandfather Benedict Arnold who was once governor of the colony of Connecticut. Arnold's childhood was marred by tragedy; by age 20, he was an orphan struggling to make his way in the world as an apothecary. Benedict Arnold was born on January 14, 1741 in Norwich, Connecticut and named after his His mother was Hannah Waterman King, a rich widow. Arnold escaped; Andr was hanged. Arnold's early life consisted of study at some of the Continent's best private schools. Phillips led further raids across Virginia, including a defeat of Baron von Steuben at Petersburg, but he died of fever on May 12, 1781. [9], Arnold's father was a successful businessman, and the family moved in the upper levels of Norwich society. She couldand did. The arched, double-door main entrance provided a stately, picturesque quality to the home. Major-General Nathanael Greene (August 7 [O.S. S T I L L W A T E R, N.Y., June 14, 2001 -- Benedict Arnold, America's most infamous. "No," he replied, and after a few moments of silence, noticing my surprise, he added, "I am perhaps the only American who cannot give you letters for his own country all the relations I had there are now broken I must never return to the States." Working as a spy, Armistead gained the trust of General Cornwallis and Benedict Arnold,. When Arnold learned the following morning that Andr had been caught and that . [133] George Canning Hill authored a series of moralistic biographies in the mid-19th century and began his 1865 biography of Arnold: "Benedict, the Traitor, was born". He was a general that preferred to lead in the front then the back, always riding his horse into battle alongside his men. [126] As a result of a clerical error in the parish records, his remains were removed to an unmarked mass grave during church renovations a century later. Arnold was let off with just a slap on the wrist, but again his pride had been wounded. He organized the militia response, along with David Wooster and Connecticut militia General Gold Selleck Silliman. This long after he lived, it would probably be impossible to know whether Benedict Arnold liked or disliked any particular food. By early July, he was back in Philadelphia, where he wrote another secret message to Clinton on July 7 which implied that his appointment to West Point was assured and that he might even provide a "drawing of the works by which you might take [West Point] without loss". [63][64], Arnold had an extremely ambitious and jealous personality. "[102], The British gave Arnold a brigadier general's commission with an annual income of several hundred pounds, but they paid him only 6,315 plus an annual pension of 360[b] for his defection because his plot had failed. 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