BENEDICT ARNOLD.
Benedict Arnold, born Jan. 14, 1741, in Norwich, Connecticut, ran away from home at the age of fifteen, and entered the military force of his native State, then marching to Albany and Lake George, to resist the French invasion. Growing weary of discipline, he deserted, returned home alone through the wilderness, and became a druggist’s clerk, afterward skipper of a New England schooner trading with the West Indies, and at times a horse-dealer. His spirit of adventure and his early taste of war led him to offer himself among the first who took the field when the American colonies began their struggle for independence. In conjunction with Col. Ethan Allen he surprised the garrison at Fort Ticonderoga on the 10th of May, 1775, capturing large stores of cannon and ammunition without the loss of a single man. Disagreeing with the officers of the party, and becoming bitterly jealous of Allen, Arnold left New York; and applying to Washington for service in the Continental army, he was given command of about five hundred men and despatched, by way of the wilderness, to join General Montgomery in an attack on Quebec. During the Canadian campaign, as during his service in New York, Arnold evinced the same traits of character,—dashing gallantry and perfect fearlessness when in action, with petty meanness, vindictiveness, arrogance, and covetousness at all other times. On the 10th of January, 1776, Congress bestowed on him the rank of brigadier-general, and after his defeat of Tryon at Danbury, and his daring heroism in bearing from the field the body of the gallant Wooster, he was promoted to the rank of major-general on the 2d of May, 1777. Being ordered again to the North, he did good service under Schuyler; but all his worst passions seem to have been aroused when Gates took command. The stirring events immediately preceding the surrender of Burgoyne prevented an open rupture, and Arnold’s reckless daring at the battle of Saratoga, though gaining the victory, resulted in rendering him a cripple for life. Incapacitated for active service, he was placed in command at Philadelphia when that city was evacuated by the British, on the 17th of June, 1778. At this point Arnold’s downward career began. There are just grounds to believe that he entered into a secret contract to enrich himself at the expense of the public; and finding many of the wealthiest of the citizens to be Tories, he used all his influence in their behalf, hoping, no doubt, for a pecuniary reward. His second marriage with Miss Shippen bound him still more closely to the Tory faction.[2] In November, 1778, Gen. Joseph Reed was elected president “of the executive council of the State” of Pennsylvania, and in the discharge of his duties, brought the delinquencies of Arnold to the notice of Congress. A court-martial on Jan. 26, 1780, sentenced him to be reprimanded by the commander-in-chief. In addition to the public disgrace, he was now cut off from various sources of revenue by which he had been striving to ward off a threatened bankruptcy, and his pecuniary affairs became sadly involved through extravagance and wild speculations. Unsuccessful in his attempt to obtain a loan from the French minister, De la Luzerne, he appears to have entered into correspondence with the British, but soon found that to obtain any considerable sum of money from that quarter, he must have control of some place worth the purchase. Accordingly, having many warm friends in Congress and in the army, he brought strong pressure to bear upon Washington to grant him the command of West Point. Yielding at length, though reluctantly, Arnold was assigned to this important post, and immediately put himself in direct communication with the British commander-in-chief, Sir Henry Clinton. On the night of the 21st of September, 1780, Major André was sent by the latter to obtain personally from Arnold all the information necessary to capture West Point and the posts on the line of the Hudson. Arnold’s elaborate plans, however, miscarried; André was captured, West Point saved, and Arnold obliged to fly. Though receiving the military rank and the money promised him by Sir Henry Clinton,—ten thousand pounds sterling and a commission as brigadier in the British army, he was almost as much detested by the English as by the Americans, and after some brutal outrages in Virginia and Connecticut, ended his days in obscurity in London, on the 14th of June, 1801.
[2] His first wife was Margaret, daughter of Samuel Mansfield of New Haven, by whom he had three sons, Benedict, Richard, and Henry.
MARQUIS DE LAFAYETTE.
Marie Jean Paul Roch Yves Gilbert Motier, Marquis de Lafayette, was born at Chavagnac, in the province of Auvergne, France, on the 6th of September, 1757. He was educated at the military college of Duplessis, in Paris; graduating at sixteen, although offered a high position in the royal household, he preferred the career of a warrior, and at nineteen had risen to the rank of captain of dragoons. During the summer of 1776 his interest in the American colonies in their struggle for independence became so great that he determined to espouse their cause. Discouraged by all except his noble young wife, who sympathized with the oppressed colonists as warmly as he did, Lafayette persevered; and when the news of the disastrous termination of the campaign of 1776 reached France, he generously determined to offer not only his services, but also his wealth. Prohibited by the king from leaving Europe, he reached Spain in disguise, and with Baron de Kalb and ten other officers embarked for America. After a perilous voyage, they landed on the Carolina coast. Proceeding at once to Philadelphia, he offered his services as a volunteer and without remuneration. When his credentials had been examined, and his rank, wealth, and undaunted perseverance became known, he was appointed major-general July 31, 1777. His valor, coolness in the presence of danger, and military ability were shown on more than one occasion; but when our alliance with France involved that country in war, he applied to Congress for permission to return to France, for although he had incurred the displeasure of the king by coming to America, he was still that king’s soldier, and in the hour of need he felt he owed his first duty to his native land. Congress granted him the desired leave of absence, instructed its president to write him a letter of thanks for coming to America and for his valuable services, and directed our minister at Versailles to present him a sword, suitably engraved, as a token of the esteem and gratitude of the United States. His return to France was hailed with joy by the people, though the court for a time refused to notice him. Presently, however, he was given a command in the king’s own regiment of dragoons. A year later, March, 1780, he returned to the United States, and re-entering the army, was actively engaged until the close of the war. After the fall of Yorktown, he again asked leave of absence to visit his family. Arrived in France, he was at once made major-general in the French army, his commission to date from the surrender of Cornwallis.
In 1784, Lafayette paid a short visit to this country, being received everywhere with marks of love and respect. In 1785, he returned to Paris to find the finances of his country hopelessly involved, and the people ripe for revolution. Throughout his subsequent life he remained true to those high principles of honor, patriotism, and love of humanity, that had led him so warmly to espouse the cause of liberty and justice. Kept for years a prisoner in the most loathsome dungeons, his property confiscated, his wife doomed to the guillotine and only saved by the death of Robespierre, his son an exile but finding shelter in the home of Washington, he was at length restored to liberty by the power of Napoleon. In 1824, he was invited by Congress to revisit the United States. Though most of his friends and companions-in-arms had passed away, and a new generation had grown up, the whole nation united to welcome and do him homage. He died in 1834, leaving behind him the record of one who amid every temptation and allurement had remained the stanch, unwavering advocate of constitutional liberty.
BARON DE KALB.
Johann, Baron de Kalb, born in Hüttendorf, Bavaria, on the 29th of July, 1721, had gained in the armies of France the reputation of being a brave and meritorious officer. At the close of the Seven Years War, he married the daughter of a Holland millionnaire. In 1768, he came to this country as a secret agent of the French Government, and had already attained to the rank of brigadier-general in the French army, when he entered into an agreement with Silas Deane and Benjamin Franklin to join the Continental forces. Coming to this country with Lafayette, De Kalb’s services were at once accepted by Congress, a commission as major-general given him on the 15th of September, 1777, and the command of the Maryland division of the Continental army. Studious in his habits, exceedingly temperate in his diet, kindly and courteous of manner, his many noble and lovable traits endeared him to all with whom he was associated. For three years he served this country gallantly and well, sealing his devotion to liberty and justice with his life-blood. On the 16th of August, 1780, at Camden, South Carolina, while fighting against vastly superior numbers, and rallying his men by words of courage and deeds of valor, he fell, pierced with eleven wounds. He died three days after, saying to one who was condoling with him, “I thank you for your generous sympathy, but I die the death I always prayed for,—the death of a soldier fighting for the rights of man.”