Benedict Arnold is remembered as America’s most famous traitor, but that reputation tells only part of the story. Long before his betrayal of the Revolution, Arnold was among George Washington’s most trusted generals and one of the Continental Army’s most daring battlefield commanders. His actions at Fort Ticonderoga, Valcour Island, and Saratoga helped keep the American cause alive during some of its darkest moments.
So how did a Revolutionary War hero become the man whose name is still synonymous with treason more than two centuries later? Our own Greg Hengler shares the fascinating story of Benedict Arnold’s extraordinary military career, his growing resentment toward Congress and fellow officers, and the fateful decision that forever changed how history remembers him.
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Lee Habeeb (00:09):
And we continue with Our American Stories.
Few stories are as compelling, as complex, or as mystifying as that of Benedict Arnold.
Here’s Greg Hengler with the story.
Greg Hengler (00:23):
Benedict Arnold is hands down America’s most infamous turncoat.
He has been dead for over 200 years, and his name is still shorthand for traitor, as we’ve seen exemplified in movies like Grumpier Old Men.
Movie Clip (00:37):
“You traitor! Benedict Arnold!”
Greg Hengler (00:42):
In spite of his ultimate deception, Benedict Arnold remains one of the most gifted generals America has ever known.
In May of 1775, Arnold led an attack on the remote British outpost at Fort Ticonderoga.
Quick-tempered and strong-willed, Arnold joined forces and immediately clashed with Ethan Allen, the leader of a small militia of frontiersmen known as the Green Mountain Boys.
The fort was captured, thanks mostly to Benedict Arnold. That victory forced the British to abandon Boston.
Both Allen and Arnold wrote extensive reports about the events to the colonial committees, but they only accepted Allen’s glorified version, which barely mentioned Arnold.
This would be the beginning of a pattern in Arnold’s military career that would repeat itself.
Arnold was later given the impossible task of defending New York’s Lake Champlain from attack.
He constructed the first American naval fleet of fifteen small war vessels to engage the British at Valcour Island in October of 1776.
Although he was not victorious, his efforts not only established the American Navy but severely delayed the advancement of the world’s finest navy into American territory, allowing Washington’s army time to rebuild and resupply.
In spite of his aggressive and heroic achievements, the Continental Congress refused to recognize Arnold, and he was passed over for promotion in favor of junior officers with far less military achievement.
George Washington, who was Arnold’s close friend and one of the few men who came to his defense, took issue with the Continental Congress’s decision, rebuking them for making political rather than strategic military promotions.
In September of 1777, Arnold was placed under the command of Horatio Gates at Saratoga in upstate New York.
Gates, while never coming within a mile of the fighting, held Arnold back, confined him to his tent, and refused reinforcements.
Defying Gates’s orders, Arnold seized a horse and rallied the Americans to victory. He took a bullet to the leg and barely survived after being crushed by his own horse.
However, it is this shot that would change the course of history and nearly alter the course of independence.
Here’s Arnold biographer Willard Randall.
Willard Randall (03:27):
When the battle was over, his second-in-command said, “Sir, where are you hit?”
And Arnold said, “It’s my leg. I wish it had been my heart.”
And I do too.
I wish it had been in his heart because if he had died at that moment, he would have been the great hero of the Revolution.
Paul Hutton (03:46):
Carried from the battlefield terribly wounded, Arnold was immediately placed under arrest for having disobeyed orders.
But the day is won.
It’s clear to everyone on the battlefield that Benedict Arnold has won the day—clear to everyone except Horatio Gates.
He denies Arnold credit.
He accepts credit for America’s greatest victory.
Greg Hengler:
General Washington steps in and entrusts the newly reclaimed city of Philadelphia to Arnold.
He is now the city’s military governor.
Away from the battlefield, Arnold takes full advantage of his position, living opulently while using and abusing his office through shady business deals in a lively black market.
Willard Randall (04:42):
He has served. He has been wounded severely. And so he starts, as governor, to take what he thinks is his due.
William Stanley (05:13):
Arnold was to the British what Rommel was to the English, what Patton was to the Germans—in other words, a general who could defeat them.
The British wanted Arnold out of there, without question.
Greg Hengler:
Arnold did win, but Arnold’s shady side deals were exposed by the press.
Once again, Arnold faced a slight against his honor, with an impending court-martial and a public rebuke from General Washington.
Arnold and his young bride began exploring options for defection.
Despite his reprimand, Washington wanted to give his brilliant general a field position of honor. But after Arnold ambitiously lobbied strongly for a non-field position at West Point, Washington made him commander of the strategic American stronghold in the fall of 1780.
For Arnold, West Point became his key negotiating resource.
Here’s former Superintendent of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, Lieutenant General Dave Palmer.
Lt. Gen. Dave Palmer (06:34):
West Point was not just a strategic spot.
West Point was the strategic spot in the American Revolution.
Both sides, British and Americans, agreed on one thing: if the British could ever capture the line of the Hudson, they would probably win the war.
Greg Hengler (06:53):
It didn’t take long for Arnold’s secret plot to be unearthed, causing him to flee West Point for a British warship stationed on the Hudson.
Ironically, at this same hour, General Washington was en route to West Point to dine with his trusted friend.
Arnold’s betrayal was so unexpected and cut General Washington so deeply that, after failing to capture Benedict Arnold, Washington proclaimed:
“Arnold has betrayed me. Whom can we trust now?”
Now safely behind British lines, Benedict Arnold received his £20,000 payment and a commission as brigadier general of 1,600 troops in His Majesty’s Army.
Benjamin Franklin remarked, “Judas sold only one man. Arnold sold three million.”
Benedict Arnold’s treason united the thirteen colonies and increased enlistments and re-enlistments in ways that neither he nor the British could have foreseen.
Benedict Arnold died in London in 1801 at the age of sixty—a spiritually, financially, and emotionally broken man.
There’s a monument on the battlefield at Saratoga National Historical Park, the site of his greatest victory.
A boot statue commemorates the permanent wounds General Benedict Arnold sustained there, with the inscription:
“In memory of the most brilliant soldier of the Continental Army, who was desperately wounded on this spot, winning for his countrymen the decisive battle of the American Revolution, and for himself the rank of major general.”
The monument bears no name.
And there’s good reason.
William Stanley (08:46):
Because there is a law in America, passed by Congress, that you can neither chisel the name Benedict Arnold nor mold it in metal.
They took this guy right off the face of the U.S.
Major John Hall (08:59):
Were it not for his treason, he would almost undoubtedly be one of the most celebrated American commanders of all the American Revolution.
West Point, to this day, would probably still be called Fort Arnold rather than West Point.
Lee Habeeb (09:18):
And great job as always to Greg Hengler and to all the supporters and contributors to this show.
The story of Benedict Arnold, here on Our American Stories.
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