Tappan, Oct. 1, 1780.

SIR, BUOYED above the terror of death, by the confcioufnefs of a life devoted to honourable purfuits,

and ftained with no action that can give me remorse, I trust that the request I make to your Excellency at this ferious period, and which is to foften my laft moments, will not be rejected.

Sympathy towards a foldier will furely induce your Excellency and a military tribunal to adapt the mode of my death to the feelings. of a man of honour.

General Arnold's Addrefs to the Inhabitants of America, after having abandoned the Service of the Congrefs.

New York, Oct. 7, 1780.

SHOULD forfeit, even in my own opinion, the place I have long held in your's, if I could be indifferent to your approbation, and filent on the motives which

JOHN ANDRE,

Adj. Gen. to the British Army.

The time which elapsed between the capture of Major Andrè, which was the 23d of September, and his execution, which did not take place till twelve o'clock on the 2d of October; the mode of trying him; his letter to Sir Henry Clinton, K. B. on the 29th of September, in which he said," I receive the greatest attention from his Excellency General Wathington, and from every perfon under whofe charge happen to be placed;" not to mention many other acknowledgments which he made of the good treatment he received; muft evince, that the

have induced me to join the king's

arms.

A very few words, however, fhall fuffice upon a fubject so perfonal;

for to the thcufands who fuffer under the tyranny of the ufurpers in the revolted provinces, as well as to the great multitude who have long withed for its fubverfion, this inftance of my conduct can want no vindication; and as to the clafs of men who are criminally protracting the war from finifter views at the expence of the public intereft, I prefer their enmity to their applaufe. I am, therefore, only concerned in this address to explain myfelf to fuch of my countrymen, as want abilities or opportunities to detect the artifices by which they are duped.

Having fought by your fide when the love of our country animated our arms, I thall expect, from your jufticé and candour, what your de ceivers, with more art and lefs

honesty,

honesty, will find it inconfiftent with their own views to admit.

When I quitted domeftic happinefs for the perils of the field, I conceived the rights of my country in danger, and that duty and honour called me to her defence. A redrefs of grievances was my only object and aim; however, I acquiefced in a step which I thought precipitate, the declaration of independence to juftify this meafure, many plaufible reafons, were urged, which could no longer exist, when Great Britain, with the open arms of a parent, offered to embrace us as children, and grant the wifhed-for redrefs.

And now that her worst enemies are in her own bofom, I thould change my principles, if I confpired with their defigns; your. felves being judges, was the war the lefs juft, because fellow-fubjects were confidered as our foe? You have felt the torture in which we have raised our arms against a brother. God incline the guilty protracters of these unnatural diffenfions to refign their ambition, and ceafe from their delufions, in compaffion to kindred blood.

I anticipate your question, Was not the war a defenfive one, until the French joined in the combination? I anfwer, that I thought fo. You will add, Was it not afterwards neceffary, till the feparation of the British empire was complete? By no means; in contending for the welfare of my country, I am free to declare my opinion, that this end attained, all ftrife should have ceased.

I lamented, therefore, the impolicy, tyranny, tyranny, and injuftice, which, with a fovereign contempt of the people of America, ftudi

oufly neglected to take their collective fentiments of the British propofals of peace, and to negociate, under a fufpenfion of arms, for an adjustment of differences; I lamented it as a dangerous facrifice of the great interefts of this country, to the partial views of a proud, ancient, and crafty foe, I had my fufpicions of fome imperfections in the councils, on propofals prior to the parliamentary commiflion of 1778; but having then lefs to do in the cabinet than the field (I will not pronounce peremptorily, as fome may, and perhaps juftly, that Congress have veiled them from the public eye) I continued to be guided in the negligent confidence of a foldier. But the whole world faw, and all America confeffed, that the overtures of the fecond commiffion exceeded our wishes and expectations; and if there was any fufpicion of the national liberality, it arofe from its excess.

Do any believe we were at that time really entangled by an alliance with France? Unfortunate deception! they have been duped by a virtuous credulity, in the incautious moments of intemperate paffion, to give up their felicity to ferve a nation wanting both the will and power to protect us, and aiming at the deftruction both of the mother country and the provinces. In the plainnefs of common sense, for I pretend to no cafuiftry, did the pretended treaty with the court of of Versailles, amount to more than an overture to America? Certainly not, becaufe no authority had been given by the people to conclude it, nor to this very hour have they authorifed its ratification. The articles

of

of confederation remain ftill unfigned.

In the firm perfuafion, therefore, that the private judgment of an individual citizen of this country is as free from all conventional reftraints, fince as before the infidious offers of France, I preferred those from Great Britain; think ing it infinitely wifer and fafer to caft my confidence upon her juftice and generosity, than to truft a monarchy too feeble to establish your independency, fo perilous to her diftant dominions; the enemy of the Proteftant faith, and fraudulently avowing an affection for the liberties of mankind, while the holds her native fons in vaffalage and chains.

I affect no difguife, and therefore frankly declare, that in thefe principles I had determined to retain my arms and command for an opportunity to furrender them to Great Britain; and in concerting the measures for a purpose, in my opinion, as grateful as it would have been beneficial to my country, I was only folicitous to accomplish an event of decifive importance, and to prevent, as much as poffible, in the execution of it, the effufion of blood,

With the highest satisfaction I bear teftimony to my old fellow. foldiers and citizens, that I find folid ground to rely upon the clemency of our fovereign, and abundant conviction that it is the generous intention of Great-Britain not only to leave the rights and privileges of the colonies unimpaired, together with their perpetual exemption from taxation, but to fuperadd fuch further benefits as may confift with the common profperity of the empire. In

fhort, I fought for much less than the parent country is as willing to grant to her colonies as they can be to receive or enjoy.

Some may think I continued in the ftruggle of thefe unhappy days too long, and others that I quitted it too foon.-To the first I reply, that I did not fee with their eyes, nor perhaps had fo favourable a fituation to look from, and that to our common master I am willing to ftand or fall. In behalf of the candid among the latter, fome of whom I believe ferve blindly but honestly-in the bands I have left, I pray God to give them all the lights requifite to their own fafety before it is too late and with respect to that herd of cenfurers, whofe enmity to me originates in their hatred to the principles by which I am now led to devote my life to the re-union of the Briti empire, as the best and only means to dry up the ftreams of mifery that have deluged this country, they may be allured, that, confcious of the rectitude of my intentions, I fhall treat their malice and calumnies with contempt and neglect.

B. ARNOLD,

had undertaken. I look upon that partiality and favour as a moft honourable teftimony, because it proves that you entertain a conviction of the purity of my intentions, fufficient to make you overlook every thing amifs which did not proceed from the will.

In renewing my defire to continue in your fervice, I think it, however, my duty to confefs to you, that it has not been without much ferious confideration, and more than common hefitation, that I have determined upon it. I must not omit making you aware, that it is by no means probable I fhould be able even to perform the mere duty of attendance as punctually as I have hitherto done; especially if the duration of parliament fhould prove to be for feven years. By what I have in fome degree experienced already, I have no reafon to believe fo long a continuance of fuch an attendance would be perfectly confiftent with my health.

But there is fomething more ferious I have to fay to you on this fubject. The fatisfaction and honour of attending your bufinefs have ever overbalanced the labour: but my attendance during the laft parliament has been fomething worse than laborious; it has been difcouraging, grievous, and painful. Look back, for a moment, upon the things which have been done, or (being done) have been approved of, by that body, of which I have been a conftituent part. Compare the prefent with the paft fituation of public affairs. Whether glory, conqueft, and riches; or peace, content, liberty, and the enjoyment of your conftitutional rights, be your principal

4

objects-In which of them have you been gratified? I have been, in my collective capacity, a party to all these changes, and to all the measures which have produced them: fupported in this mortifying fituation with one only confolation, a very great one indeed to my own mind, that of being able to affure you, that there has been no one measure, of all thofe that have proved fo ruinous and fatal, which I have not, as an individual, refifted, to the utmost of my power. A poor, barren, ineffectual negative; and a miserable claim to your favour, to have failed (as far as my power and flender efforts are in queftion) almoft in every point regarding thofe rights, and that profperity, which I was fpecially chofen to cultivate and maintain.

I return to you, therefore, baffled and difpirited, and I am forry that truth obliges me to add, with hardly a ray of hope of feeing any change in the miferable courfe of public calamities.

On this melancholy day of account in rendering up to you my truft, I deliver to you your share of a country maimed and weakened, its treasure lavished and mitfpent, its honours faded, and its conduct the laughing-flock of Europe; our nation in a manner without allies or friends, except fuch as we have hired to destroy our fellow-fubjects, and to ravage a country, in which we once claimed an invaluable fhare. I return to you fome of your principal privileges impeached and mangled. And, laftly, I leave you, as I conceive, at this hour and moment, fully, effectually, and abfolutely under the difcretion and

power

power of a military force, which is to act without waiting for the authority of the civil magiftrates; for it is fit you should know, if you are not already informed, that an order iffued in London (at a moment when the violence of the riots, and the remiffness of the civil magiftrate might render neceffary an extraordinary and violent temporary exertion of the military) that order, I fay, has, as I have good grounds to believe, been extended to the whole kingdom; where neither of those caufes exifted in any degree fufficient to justify fo decifive and extraordinary a meafure; and I do not know of that order being recalled.

In this flate of public affairs, and with this account to render of my commiffion, judge whether I can boldly and chearfully, or fup: ported by any rational confidence, boaft to you as candidates are wont to do, of what I will do, and what I will undertake for your service.

For this reafon, avoiding even the ufual ftyle of fuch addreffes, and forbearing as well the forward promifes as the fuperficial humbleness of phrafe in ufe on these occafions, I make it a folemn duty to lay before you, without disguise or palliation, the prefent ftate of your concerns as they appear to me, and the gloomy profpect which lies before us.

Some have been accused of exaggerating the public misfortunes, nay of having endeavoured to help forward the mifchief, that they might afterwards raife difcontents. I am willing to hope that neither my temper, nor my fituation in life, will be thought naturally to urge me to promote mifery, difVOL. XXIII.

cord, or confufion; or to exult in the fubversion of order, or in the ruin of property. I have no rea fon to contemplate with pleasure the poverty of our country, the increase of our debts, and of our taxes: or the decay of our commerce-Trust not, however, my report. Reflect, compare, and judge for yourselves.

to

But under all these difheartening circumstances, I could yet entertain a chearful hope, and undertake again the commiffion with alacrity, as well as zeal, if I could fee any effectual fteps taken to remove the original caufe of the mifchief. "Then would there be a hope."

Till the purity of the conftituent body, and thereby that of the representative be restored, there is NONE.

While the electors fell their voices to the member, and the member diftreffes his fortune to buy them, parliament will be the purchase of the minifter. Parlia ment-men will find ways of partaking other advantages than nferely their fhare in common with you, of thofe good measures which they fhall promote, and of those good laws which they fhall enact for your government and their own: and the modern improved arts of corruption, by contracts, fubfcriptions, and jobs, is attended with this perverfe and vexatious confequence; that their benefit is not only unconnected with your's, but it grows upon your diftrefs. They feed on the expence; they fatten on every extravagance that art and ill conduct can engraft on the natural difadvantages of a remote, rash, ill-fated, impolitic, and unfuccefsful war: the mi