Benedict Arnold. A biography/6
CHAPTER VI.
INJUSTICE TO ARNOLD.
THE British army having gone back into winter-quarters in Canada, a large detachment was drawn from the American force at Ticonderoga and sent forward to Washington's camp in New Jersey. Arnold went along with them, and presented himself to Washington, on the western side of the Delaware, exactly a week before the famous battle of Trenton. The Commander-in-chief had just forwarded a letter to him, ordering him to go to Rhode Island and aid General Spencer in enlisting recruits in New England, with a view to prevent the enemy's advance; into the interior for they were already hovering off the coast, and did a very few days afterwards take possession of the town of Newport.
Arnold stayed in the camp of Washington but three days, and then posted off for Providence, which was the head-quarters of the eastern army. And thus the two forces kept their position through the rest of the winter. Arnold was quite active in devising plans for harassing the British and finally driving them from the land, but the chances of enlisting men enough for carrying out any plan to attack them, were extremely few and feeble. He went on to Boston to lay the matter before the legislature through some of the most influential men of the State, but nothing resulted from his errand. The people of New England were anxious enough to drive the hostile invaders beyond their borders, but there were a great many obstacles that practically prevented such an undertaking then. The last year's campaign had well nigh drained them of their resources, and what was more, they were calculating almost with certainty on the British army's marching down out of the northern country in the spring.
Late in the winter of 1776-77, Congress advanced five officers, each of them of inferior rank to Arnold's, to one above his own, making them Major-Generals in the Continental Army; while he was slightingly passed by without any public notice, and left with nothing but his old rank of a brigadier. The transaction showed a motive on the face of it; for certainly no one of the five men promoted had ever rendered such brilliant services as he, nor done a fraction of what he had done to inspire the minds of the soldiers with enthusiasm.
Washington was sorely perplexed at this slight on the part of Congress, for he knew as well as others, that no conduct of Arnold had ever earned it; and he felt as well assured of the mischief such a course would make throughout the army. He therefore set himself to work applying the remedy.
Assuming at first that it was nothing worse than a mistake on the part of Congress, he addressed a letter to Arnold at Providence, begging him to keep perfectly quiet and neither do nor say anything rash, but promising, so far as lay with himself, to see that this manifest wrong was made right. A second letter he forwarded to Lee, then in Congress, in which he said of Arnold, "Surely, a more active, a more spirited, and sensible officer, fills no department of your army. Not seeing him, then, in the list of major-generals, and no mention made of him, has given me uneasiness, as it is not presumed, being the oldest brigadier, that he will continue in service under such a slight."
Arnold immediately wrote back to Washington, on receiving his letter, "I am greatly obliged to your Excellency for interesting yourself so much in respect to my appointment, which I have had no advice of, and know not by what means it was announced in the papers. Congress undoubtedly have a right of promoting those whom, from their abilities, and their long and arduous services, they esteem most deserving. Their promoting junior officers to the rank of major-generals, I view as a very civil way of requesting my resignation, as unqualified for the office I hold. My commission was conferred unsolicited, and received with pleasure only as a means of serving my country. With equal pleasure I resign it, when I can no longer serve my country with honor."
He closed his letter by protesting that he was even willing to spend his life for the welfare of his native land, and insisting that a court-martial should at once be ordered to examine into his public conduct during the war; and added, that he did not intend to do anything rashly, but should continue in command of his present post at Providence until he could relinquish it without bringing the general cause into any needless risks and danger.
Congress afterwards explained the grounds of their action to Washington. It appeared that they had made the new promotions with as careful a view to the geography of the country, as to its productions in the line of men; and as Connecticut had already furnished two major-generals, they deemed it quite proper that in the new promotions, candidates should be taken from other States. Washington wrote to Arnold that it was "a strange mode of reasoning," yet he did not see on what grounds the latter could ask for a court of inquiry; adding in complimentary phrase, "Your determination not to quit your present command, while any danger to the public might ensue from your leaving it, deserves my thanks, and justly entitles you to the thanks of the country."
It was not long before matters were in train to bring Arnold out before the public eye again. He obtained leave to proceed to Philadelphia and lay his claims for a court-martial before Congress; at all events, if that much should not be granted him, he was desirous of settling his accounts, and as soon after as possible of quitting the public service.
It so happened that the Americans had a large deposit of stores and provisions at Danbury, an inland town in Western Connecticut, some twenty-five miles from the coast; and Gov. Tryon, the British General, set off by water with a force of two thousand men, intending to pass up the Sound from New York, and, after landing at a favorable point, to march across the land and capture them. This expedition was on the move at the very time when Arnold was passing through Connecticut on his errand to Philadelphia.
Tryon's force was a mixed medley of Americans, British, and Irish refugees, and made their way along the Connecticut shore in a fleet of twenty-six sail, the sight of which filled all the peaceable settlements on the coast with terror. He landed this body of troops at Compo, a point of land near Fairfield, and close by the mouth of the Saugatuck river. A handful of raw militia flocked to give them a warm reception; but a few cannon balls speedily dispersed these and left the way open for the enemy's advance. The men all went ashore from the vessels just at evening on Friday, the 25th day of April.
Arnold had proceeded as far on his journey as New Haven, when he heard the intelligence of the enemy's approach; and without a thought more of the way in which he had been treated by Congress, he mounted his horse on the instant, and, in company with General Wooster, set off at a rapid pace for Fairfield, where was General Silliman, commander of the Connecticut militia. It was a long ride of between twenty and thirty miles. They roused the people as they went along, and there was many a hamlet, and many a plain and sequestered farm-house, that gave its generous and ready quota of men to the work of driving the enemy from the soil.
The British marched on seven miles into the interior that evening, and encamped for the night. During the night it rained. They started again at an early hour, and by eight o'clock reached the town of Reading, only eight miles from Danbury, where they stopped and breakfasted. There they procured the services of a couple of young men, named Jarvis, and Benedict, who showed them the route to Danbury, and went along with them. It was between one and two o'clock in the afternoon, when they reached the village, and they had proceeded so expeditiously that none of the people heard of their coming till they were within a few miles of the town. And then there was such a confusion, flying and lamenting and hasty arranging for the safety of the sick and aged, as baffles all attempt at description.
At the little village of Bethel, Tryon and his whole force of two thousand men were suddenly brought to a stand by the boldness of a single individual named Holcomb. This man wished to give the inhabitants of Danbury as much time to escape as possible, and he rode to the brow of a hill the enemy were on the point of climbing, and, turning his back to them and waving his hat as if he were addressing at least a whole army, cried out the top of his voice, "Halt, the whole universe! Break off into kingdoms!" Tryon did not understand what sort of a force might be collected on the other side of the hill, and brought his army to a sudden halt; he then ordered his cannon to the front, and displayed strong parties at the flanks to prevent a surprise. Holcomb saw that he had carried the stupendous joke as far as it would answer, and drove the spurs into his horse and galloped off to Danbury.
The Americans collected from all quarters as fast as they could, and set off after the marauders in hot pursuit. It was eleven o'clock at night, however, when they arrived at Bethel, and the mischief had all been done before then. Bethel is four miles from Danbury. They rested here until morning, resolved then to form and cut off the enemy's retreat to their shipping.
At the time the British came upon Danbury, there was a body of militia-men a hundred and fifty strong in the town; feeling themselves too weak in 'numbers to offer resistance to a force so much their superior, the commanders left the town by the north road as the British entered by the south, and during the night took a circuitous route and joined the rest of the Americans at Bethel.
This invasion of Tryon will ever be remembered in western Connecticut, for it was little less than a continued series of burnings and cruelty and rapine. The moment his troops entered the town, they began their piratical work. The people were insulted and outraged in every imaginable way. It is stated that what first brought on the serious part of the business, was the indiscreet conduct of four men who had stationed themselves in a dwelling house near the court house, and fired upon the British, though without effect, as they marched by. One of these zealots was a negro, and they were all excited with the too free use of liquor. But they paid dearly enough for their folly; they were instantly seized by the enemy, who rushed with fury into the house, thrust them down into the cellar, and fired the building over their
heads! All four perished in the flames.An anecdote is narrated of an old man named Hamilton, who was bent on saving a piece of woollen cloth which he had left at a clothier's at the south end of the village. He got his cloth, tied one end of it to his saddle, and had just jumped on his horse to ride away with it, when the British troopers came up. Three of them at once set off in pursuit. His beast was slower than theirs, and the chances were all against him. One of them pretty soon caught up with him, and called out in a taunting way, "Stop, old daddy! stop! we'll have you!" "Not yet!" was the old gentleman's answer; and at that moment his cloth began to let itself out on the wind. Such a fluttering did it make as it streamed far out behind him, that the troopers' horses could not be made to approach any nearer, and by the means he got several rods the start of them. They chased him all the way to the bridge at the north end of the town, where they were obliged to give over. Several times they raised their sabres to cut him down, but the troublesome streamer of cloth was always tangling itself up and flirting in their way. He carried off his prize, and most courageously had he earned it.
Having begun their work in this way, they next attacked the public stores. The Episcopal Church was filled up to the galleries with flour and pork, and provisions were likewise stored in two other buildings. These were immediately sacked, and the stores thrown out into the street. The soldiers drank freely of the ardent spirits they found, and were very soon more or less intoxicated. Indeed, they gave up the rest of the day and night to a general carouse; nor could their officers have stopped them if they had tried.
The night came on dark as pitch. Those who were already sober were too much fatigued from their two days' march to keep awake; and the others certainly could not have done so. Tryon found it a difficult matter to procure even sentinels enough to keep the necessary watch. In fact, there were not over three hundred men out of his whole two thousand, on whom he could at this time rely. Could the Americans have been apprized of his real condition, they might have attacked him in the night, and won an easy victory. This was what Tryon chiefly feared. He did not sleep a wink that night himself, but remained in a state of helpless suspense until morning. A tory brought him word of the rapid gathering of the Americans at Bethel, and he concluded it was best for him to be off as soon as he could start.
He therefore began his retreat out of town before daylight on the 27th. This was Sunday morning, quiet and holy. The houses of the tories in the town had all been marked the evening before with a cross that could easily be distinguished, and these were spared. To the remainder the torch was applied, and before the day broke in the east the flames were lighting up the country all around with their lurid radiance. And thus was a beautiful and inoffensive village devoted to destruction by an enemy that hoped to conquer a peace by such ruthless barbarities.
By this attack on Danbury, three thousand barrels of pork and over one thousand barrels of flour were destroyed, together with four hundred barrels of beef, seventeen hundred tents, and two thousand bushels of grain. The spirits and sundry other articles likewise destroyed were in the same ratio. The entire loss to the American army in money was more than seventy thousand dollars; but it was not easy to estimate it in such a way, at a crisis like the one we were then passing through.
It is as well to add in this place, that the two fellows Jarvis and Benedict who had piloted the British army across the country to Danbury, left that part of the country forthwith. Jarvis went to Nova Scotia. He returned to Danbury many years afterwards, and went to his father's house; but the people, as soon as they heard of it, procured a coat of tar and feathers, and surrounded the house with the determination to capture him. They demanded of his friends that they should give him up, and some of them entered the house to take him; but his sister hid him in an ash oven, and he lay thus concealed until the search was over and they had all gone. He then secretly took himself out of the town forever. Benedict came back, intending to spend the rest of his days among those who could not help despising him; but on hearing loud threats of being ridden out of town on a sharp rail, he concluded he could find more peaceful quarters elsewhere.
The Americans were now six hundred strong at Bethel. The Generals divided them into two parties, having heard that Tryon had shaped his course south-westerly, instead of south-easterly, by the way he came; one division, consisting of two hundred men, commanded by Wooster, and the other, of four hundred men, was led by Generals Arnold and Silliman. The plan now was, both to harass the enemy in their rear and to cut off their retreat to their shipping.
Wooster started after them at nine o'clock in the morning, and was not long in overtaking them. This was before they reached Ridgefield. He at once fell upon the rear guard, and captured forty prisoners after but little fighting. Two miles out of Ridgefield they had another brush, on broken ground which favored that kind of fighting. The British were hidden behind a hill, and Wooster was urging his men forward to another attack. A discharge of artillery, however, seemed to make them a little timid. "Come on, my boys!" shouted Wooster from his horse; "never mind such random shots!" He had hardly spoken the cheering words when a musket ball entered his side, and he fell from his horse mortally wounded. His men at once fled in disorder. He was carried from the field and removed to Danbury, whither his wife and son hastened to solace him in his dying moments; and there he lingered along till the 2d of May, when he died. It is a standing shame to the town that to this day even the place of his burial cannot be distinguished. At the time he fell fighting so bravely, he was an old man of sixty-seven years, with all the fire of youth still burning in his heart.
Arnold and Silliman started across the country to head the British off. About eleven o'clock in the forenoon of that Sunday they reached Ridgefield, having five hundred men under their command. Arnold chose his position on the road by which the British were coming, and began to get ready to receive them. He hastily threw up a barricade of carts, logs, earth, and stones across the road, having a house and barn on his right, and a ledge of rocks on his left.
By and by the British approached. The moment they saw what a formidable obstacle lay across their path, the main body advanced in solid column, while other detachments made a movement to gain the American rear. In this they were finally successful, since they so greatly outnumbered the handful of Americans and could readily accomplish it. Arnold ordered a retreat when he saw that no more could be done to stay their progress, and was himself engaged in bringing away the rear when a whole platoon of British muskets belched forth their fire upon him from the ledge, and his horse instantly fell, coming down on his knees. Arnold found his feet entangled in the stirrups, and for a moment was not able to rise. A tory villain seeing the plight he was in, ran up with fixed bayonet, intending to capture him whether dead or alive. "You are my prisoner!" shouted the tory. "Not yet!" answered Arnold; and with great presence of mind he drew a pistol from the holsters and shot him dead in his tracks. He then extricated himself from the stirrups, and fled to a swamp near by, volleys of the enemy's bullets whistling after him all the way.
So cool an action is very rarely recorded of any one in a time of great danger. It drew forth the admiration of all to whom it soon after became known. A few years ago, an old man, who was a boy at the time of this transaction, declared that himself and a few other boys skinned Arnold's horse, after the battle, and found nine bullet holes in his hide! It was wonderful that the brave rider should himself have escaped.
That night, the British stayed in Ridgefield. The Americans still hung on their rear, while Arnold again took the saddle and threw himself in the way of their advance. His own force was now considerably strengthened by two companies of artillery and three field pieces.
The enemy saw where he had posted himself in their way, and at once turned off to take another route, intending to ford the Saugatuck river. Arnold hurried to get across the bridge below the ford, with the design of taking them in flank; but he found he was just too late. Still, the field pieces were brought to bear, and a hot skirmish of fifteen minutes ensued, during which seven or eight men were killed. He continued to push on in pursuit as far as Compo, where they had just landed, which was now about three miles distant to the south. Here they had another skirmish with the right flank of their rear; and had it not been for the sudden assistance which came from the marines who were sent on shore from the ships, they would all have been made prisoners and carried back into the interior. A great many Connecticut fanners had collected at this place through the day, and Arnold exerted himself with his usual energy to induce them to go into the fight; had it not been for their strange cowardice, the enemy would have been overcome.
While urging them forward to the conflict, a second horse was shot under General Arnold, and a bullet passed through his coat collar. The enemy finally took to their boats under the protection of the marines, and escaped in safety; the latter afterwards, by a sudden movement, secured their own escape. It was sunset by this time, and the British fleet weighed anchor and sailed out of sight.
The Americans lost during this invasion about an hundred men; the British lost three times as many. The infamous Gov. Tryon was safe on board his ship, but he did not leave the soil without carrying away a souvenir of his unwelcome visit in the shape of a wound.
Congress was obliged to confess to the bravery of Arnold in these engagements, and at once directed the quarter-master to "procure a horse and present the same, properly caparisoned, to Major- General Arnold, as a token of their approbation of his gallant conduct in the action against the enemy in the late enterprise to Danbury." At the same time they promoted him to the rank he had so long and unjustly been deprived of, as the order just quoted shows. Still, it left him below the other four Major-generals, and the case was as bad as before; besides, by making the appointment now, the old geographical objection to it was destroyed, and unless there was some secret feeling against him, he should have been given the seniority to which his brilliant services fully entitled him.
The gift and the promotion, therefore, appeared to betray an inconsistency on the part of Congress; with one hand they gave, and with the other they took. Washington saw the injustice, and felt it keenly; writing to the president of Congress about Arnold, he said, "He has certainly discovered, in every instance where he has had an opportunity, much bravery, activity, and enterprise. But what will be done about his rank? He will not act, most probably, under those he commanded but a few weeks ago."
Still, nothing was done. Washington gave him the command on the Hudson, thinking thus to testify his own appreciation of his services, and likewise to heal the wound which Congress persisted in keeping open. It was as honorable a position as any Major-general in the army could have desired : but Arnold declined it, determined to go on and prosecute his demands himself before Congress.
Arrived at Philadelphia, he saw what a deep prejudice existed against him among the members, and how fruitless almost it would be for him to try to make head against it. All the old stories about him at Ticonderoga had been brought up, and were having their influence. There is no disputing that, even if Congress took the right view of his real character and felt a disposition to treat him with distrust, they did not deal with such a man with the good judgment and skill we should have expected. It is unquestionable that they made a serious mistake, or rather a series of mistakes; and the natural fruit was borne a little more than three years afterwards.
Arnold wrote to them, "I am exceedingly unhappy to find that, after having made every sacrifice of fortune, ease, and domestic happiness to serve my country, I am publicly impeached (in particular by Lieut. Col. Brown) of a catalogue of crimes, which, if true, ought to subject me to disgrace, infamy, and the just resentment of my countrymen. Conscious of the rectitude of my intentions, however I may have erred in judgment, I must request the favor of Congress to point out some mode by which my conduct and that of my accusers may be inquired into, and justice done to the innocent and injured."
His letter was referred to the Board of War, who reported that they saw no fault whatever to find with General Arnold, but, on the contrary, they thought that his character had been "cruelly and groundlessly aspersed." Congress accepted this report, thus subscribing to the opinion of the Board; yet they did not restore him to the rank to which he was properly entitled, and thus opened the way for all the calamities that naturally followed such unjust conduct.
Arnold next presented his accounts to Congress for final settlement; and while these were under the examination of a committee, he was appointed to the command of the army near Philadelphia, which was concentrating to oppose the advance of General Howe across the Delaware into Pennsylvania. He was soon after sent forward to a point on the river above Trenton, where he could be of more immediate service in conjunction with the main body of the army under Washington. Howe made a movement from Brunswick towards Washington's position, but soon retired to that place again; and finding nothing was likely to be done, Arnold went back with his force to Philadelphia.
Still, Congress made no progress with his accounts. He was irritated at the delay beyond measure, and forthwith sent them a letter resigning his commission. He said that he still loved his country as much as ever, and was still willing to risk his life in her imperilled cause; "but," he continued, "honor is a sacrifice no man ought to make; as I received, so I wish to transmit it inviolate to posterity."