Arnold and André agreed to meet in person on the night of 20th September, 1780, to finalize the plans for the British capture of West Point. Clinton wanted to arrange for the officers to meet openly under some pretext, such as arranging for an exchange of prisoners. Arnold feared such a meeting might arouse suspicions, and preferred to arrange a secret conference with André, whom he desired to dress as a civilian.

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A number of attempts to meet on Clinton’s terms failed when American officers disapproved Arnold’s request to meet with a British officer. Finally, Arnold convinced his co-conspirators that only a secret rendezvous would work. From the moment that decision was made, an almost unbelievable string of bad luck sealed André’s fate.

Reluctantly agreeing to the meeting, Clinton insisted that André remain in uniform at all times, though keeping it hidden beneath an overcoat; that he not cross behind the American lines, and that he not carry any military documents. If André scrupulously followed Clinton’s instructions, he could not legally be executed as a spy if caught.

The arrangements for the meeting called for André to join Arnold on the west shore of the Hudson River, south of the American lines. Arnold, though, had to rely on unsuspecting dupes to arrange transportation for him. Cleverly, he accounted for his strange nighttime meeting by telling the men a half-truth. He admitted that he was going to confer with a British agent, but reversed his and André’s true roles, explaining that the man he was going to meet was a British traitor, who would give him valuable intelligence. If Arnold deliberately picked dull-witted men to accompany him, who were not likely to become suspicious, he outsmarted himself, because when the time came to go downriver to meet André, the boat he had requested was not ready. Delay piled upon delay and by the time Arnold found a boat and two men whom he was able to talk into rowing him down the Hudson, André had been waiting for hours.

The two men conferred out of earshot until dawn, when André learned to his horror that Arnold’s boatmen, fed up with skulking around all night, refused to row him back to a British ship waiting in the river. André had no choice but to spend the day behind American lines in the house of an Arnold confidant named Smith, and then try to reach the British lines the following evening. André’s predicament went from bad to worse. Smith insisted that he remove his uniform, and dressed him in civilian clothes in an effort to smuggle him back across the lines. André also hid messages from Arnold to General Clinton in his sock, thereby doing all three things that Clinton had expressly warned him would be cause for a charge of spying should he be caught.

The next night, Smith, a double agent known to both sides, escorted André towards safety, successfully getting him past several checkpoints. Apparently feeling that the danger was past, Smith then left André to finish the journey on his own. André continued on to within sight of the British lines, when three American deserters captured him and discovered the plot.

When news of Arnold’s treason spread, the one-time hero immediately became the most despised man in America. Even the British, who stood to benefit greatly from his defection, privately heaped scorn upon him for behaving so treacherously. In contrast, André seemed to draw sympathy from friends and enemies alike. ‘There was, in truth, no way of saving him,’ wrote George Washington’s aide, Alexander Hamilton. ‘Arnold or he must have been the victim, and Arnold was out of our power.’ Arnold was, in fact, safe in British-occupied New York, having fled West Point before anyone had realized his role in André’s mission.

Washington had the spy under lock and key, but he really wanted the traitor, so he pressed Clinton to agree to a trade: ‘Major André’s character and situation seem to demand this of your justice and friendship. Arnold appears to have been the guilty author of the mischief and ought more properly to be the victim.’ Probably everyone involved, except the Arnolds themselves, would privately have been pleased to make the exchange. But Clinton had guaranteed Arnold’s safety, and was honour bound to keep his word.

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