2
On the night of Monday, the 18th of September, 1780, there was a brilliant military assemblage in New York City, then occupied by the British army under General Sir Henry Clinton. The place was the ancient stone house
of the Kip family, built in 1696 (and standing as lately as 1850), where is now the corner of Second Avenue and Thirty-fourth Street. At the time it was
the quarters of Colonel Williams,1 of the 80th regiment. The occasion was a dinner given by him to Clinton and his staff. Andre, as Adjutant General
and Clinton's favorite, was prominent among the guests.2 At the close of the festivities he sang the song attributed to General Wolfe, and then very popular,8
the second and best-known verse beginning:
Why, soldiers, why ,
Should we be melancholy boys?
Though officers of the Highland regiments were present, no soothsayer like he of Clan Ivor was there, to see the winding sheet almost as high on
Andre's breast as the Taishatr had seen it on Colonel Gardiner's the day before
Prestonpans. Little thought any of the party that just two weeks later he
would be a corpse, buried at the foot of an improvised gibbet in a little hamlet
of Orange County (the present Rockland County was formed out of Orange).
From New York he went the next day, Tuesday, by way of King's Bridge to Dobbs' Ferry, and thence to the sloop-of-war Vulture* then probably
at anchor off North Point, Teller's Point.6 Reaching her about 7 P. M., he
waited all the next day (Wednesday) without message or news from Arnold.6
The next point of interest in the drama—its opening scene, in fact, regarding
the Williams dinner as the prologue,—is the spot where the interview with him
occurred. At the period we are noticing, the correspondence with Arnold had
continued for eighteen months,7 or from about the spring of 1779, under the guise
of proposed mercantile transactions. His letters, in a disguised hand, were
1 It is significant that so early in the story I have to note that while I insert this name on the strength of Lossing,
I can find in Mr. Worthington C. Ford's valuable List of British Officers, 17J4-&0, no Williams who was a
Colonel, nor any Williams among the 80th officers. Prom whom did Lossing quote?
For the view of the Kip House I am indebted to Mr. S. Victor Constant, of New York.
2 Lossing (The Two Spies) says Clinton had intimated that he was about starting on a mission of importance,
and openly declared he would become Sir John Andre1 if he successfully accomplished it.
8 See Appendix.
* She was a third-rate, carrying fourteen guns, and commanded by Lieutenant Andrew Sutherland, R. N. " If any omen might be derived from her name and history, she was a fortunate ship for the enterprise, having been
very successful in avoiding our privateers. Thirty-five years before (1745) a band of prisoners, some of
them detained as spies (comprising not only Home, in whose tragedy of Douglas Andre had delighted to
bear a character, but Witherspoon, now active for the Congress, and Barrow, in arms for the King,) had
escaped from Charles Edward's hands, and flying from Doune Castle by Tullyallan, were received on board
her."—Sargent.
6 See map, post.
6 The meeting planned by Arnold for September 11 at Dobbs' Ferry had failed, owing to his never-explained
neglect to provide his boat with a flag of truce, and its consequent hostile reception by the British. He
then wrote again, September 15 : "I will send a person to meet you at Dobbs' Ferry, at the landing on the
east side, on Wednesday, the 20th, who will conduct you to a place of safety, where I will meet you. It
will be necessary for you to be disguised . Smith {seepost.) failed to get one of the Colquhoun
brothers as boatman, hence the delay until Thursday. 1 It became necessary, page 3.
