CHAPTER VI.

MAJOR-GENERAL ARNOLD ORDERED TO RELIEVE GENERAL HOWE.DISAFFECTION OF ARNOLD.-DISHEARTENING CONDITION OF THE AMERICAN CAUSE.-ADVANTAGES OF WEST POINT IF CAPTURED BY THE ENEMY.-SIR HENRY CLINTON'S IDEA.-THE SECRET CORRESPONDENCE WITH ARNOLD.-APPOINTMENT TO MEET JOHN ANDERSON. THE "ROBINSON HOUSE," AND ITS ORIGINAL PROPRIETOR. THE MEETING BETWEEN ARNOLD AND ANDERSON THWARTED. -A FLAG OF TRUCE FROM THE VULTURE, AND ITS PURPORT.-SMITH'S HOUSE.-JOSHUA HETT SMITH.-MEETING BETWEEN ARNOLD AND ANDERSON.-ATTEMPT OF ANDERSON TO RETURN TO NEW YORK BY LAND.-COW-BOYS AND SKINNERS.-CAPTURE OF ANDERSON.

ON the 3d of August, Major-General Arnold was instructed from general head-quarters at Peekskill, to proceed to West Point and relieve General Robert Howe of

the command of

that Post, and its dependencies. In pursuance of this order, Arnold arrived on the 5th, and established his Head-Quarters at the "Robinson House."*

Real and imaginary grievances had already unsettled

*

*

*

*

*On the 8th of August, Arnold wrote Washington: "I wish your Excellency would be kind enough to order Mr. Erskine [Geographer to the Army] to send me a map of the Country from this place to New York, particularly on the east side of the river, which would be very useful to me." * "Major Villefranche has surveyed the works at West Point, and informs me that there is a vast deal to do to complete them " * * *-[Correspondence of the Revolution, III., 57.-Sparks.]

this officer's attachment to the cause of the Revolution, and later evidences have brought to light the fact, that he sought this command with a predetermination to abandon the cause, and betray his trust and associates into the hands of the enemy. "The moment was truly a favorable one. The English were weary of the continued strife, and really anxious for peace with America on any terms that might not involve Independence. The mess-rooms no more, as in Howe's days, echoed the toast of A glorious war, and a long one!' The Royal officers now pledged 'A speedy accommodation of our present unnatural disputes!' On the other hand, America too was tired of the war. A cloud of witnesses of the best authority, testify to the probability of a majority of our people being desirous of accommodating the quarrel, and of reuniting with England on conditions of strict union, if not of mediated dependence. The public chest was empty. The miserable bubble by which it had hitherto been recruited was on the verge of explosion, and the Continental paper-money, always really worthless, though long sustained by the force of laws and bayonets, was now rapidly approximating its ultimate value. The ranks were supplied with children, whose service for nine months was bought for $1,500 apiece. 'Hundreds even of the staff officers,' said Greene, in May, 1780, 'were ruined by the public charges they had been forced to incur, while every obstacle was opposed to a settlement of their accounts, lest their demands on government should become fixed.' 'However important our cause, or valuable the blessings of liberty,' he continues to Washington, it is utterly impossible to divest ourselves of our private feelings

while we are contending for them.'

'It is obvious that

the bulk of the people are weary of the war,' said Reed, in August. There never has been a stage of the war,' said Washington, in which the dissatisfaction has been so general and so alarming.' The army, ill-paid, ill-fed, ill-clad, avenged its sufferings and its wrongs by such means as lay in its power. Martial law was published to procure its supplies in States that had not a hostile ensign within their borders. Regiment after regiment rose in mutiny; nor could the rope or the scourge check the devastation and desertion that marked the army's course. At this very period, despite the repeated sentences of courts-martial, and the general order for the officer of the day, on his individual authority, to flog any straggler within the limit of fifty lashes, we find in Washington's own words the most unwelcome evidences of the necessities of his followers, and their consequent marauds along the banks of the Hudson.

"Not until the end of August, was the pay due in the preceding March forthcoming. In September, Hamilton found the army a demoralized, undisciplined mob; disliking the nation for its neglect, dreaded by the nation for its oppressions. Our chiefs, with mortification and regret, confessed the day impending, when, unless the war was carried on by foreign troops and foreign treasure, America must come to terms.

"Send us troops, ships, and money,' wrote Rochambeau to Vergennes, but do not depend upon these people, nor upon their means.' Yet it was known that

the aid of France and Spain was merely sporadic; and there was now reason to fear that, without some great stroke on our part, the former would soon abandon us

as a profitless ally, and make her own peace with Britain.

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Congress too, rent by faction and intrigue, no longer commanded the entire confidence of the Whigs. Its relations with the States were not satisfactory, and with the army were decidedly bad. Jealousy on the one hand, aversion and distrust on the other, daily widened the unacknowledged breach. The party hostile to the Chief-deep-rooted in New England, and pervading Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia-which, from the beginning of the war to its end, dreaded lest the tyranny of a Commodus should lurk behind the wise virtues of a Pertinax, though foiled in a former effort to displace him, still retained power to hamper his movements and embarrass his designs. It was very evident that his removal would be the signal for the army's dissolution, and the inevitable subjection of the infant State; but it was yet feasible to limit his powers, deny his requirements, and in a hundred ways exhibit a distrust of his capacity or integrity that would have caused many soldiers to throw up the command."

"Much of this was known to the British, and the reduction of West Point had long been their hope; but to accomplish it without loss of life would indeed have been a triumph for Sir Henry Clinton, and a most brilliant conclusion to the campaign. Mr. Sparks has clearly mapped out the advantages he must have contemplated in this contingency. In the first place, the mere acquisition of a fortress so important, with all its dependencies, garrison, stores, magazines, vessels, &c., was an achievement of no secondary magnitude. The supplies gathered here by the Americans were very